The Worst of the Worst: Repressive States Ranked

It's that time of year again, when Freedom House ranks the world's most repressive regimes. And the results ain't pretty:

Freedom House today released The Worst of the Worst: The World's Most Repressive Societies 2006, its annual compilation of the most dictatorial regimes in the world... Eight countries judged to have the worst records in the past year... are Burma, Cuba, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, Syria, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

The Worst of the Worst country reports are excerpted from Freedom House's forthcoming annual global survey, Freedom in the World 2006. The countries deemed the most repressive earn some of the worst numerical ratings according to the survey's methodology, which measures the state of political rights and civil liberties worldwide and classifies countries as Free, Partly Free, or Not Free.

Saudi Arabia and the disputed territory of Western Sahara (under Moroccan rule) also make the list of areas of great concern. And the Freedom House press release also makes sure to note that the UN's new Human Rights Council (on which Saudi Arabia has a seat!) has utterly failed in holding any of these regimes accountable. Shocker!

Anyway, it's nice to see Qaddafi, Bashir, and Bashar getting the attention they deserve. And it's nice to see an independent human rights organization using objective standards to measure the freedom deficit of countries. Sadly, at the same time this report was being released, many of the thug leaders gathered for a self-congratulatory party at the non-aligned summit - as if to prove the Freedom House report's point.

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