<p><font face="tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif" size="2"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial">The Thai government should remove restrictions on free speech contained in today&rsquo;s emergency decree, Amnesty International said. </span></font></p>

<p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Tahoma">On Agust 26^th 2008, the<span>&nbsp; </span>Brazilian Patent Office (INPI) rejected the patent application filed in 1998 by United States pharmaceutical company Gilead Laboratories for tenofovir disoproxil fumarate, recommended for the first and second line in the treatment of people living with HIV/AIDS. For the first time, a pre-grant opposition filed by Brazilian civil society and a public laboratory (Farmanguinhos) for an antiretroviral (ARV) has led to a patent rejection.<span> <br /></span></span></p>

<p><font face="tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif" size="2" color="#000000">Reporters Without Borders and the Burma Media Association (BMA) have called for the immediate release of<strong> Saw Myint Than</strong>, chief reporter on the privately-owned magazine<em> Flower News Journal</em> who was arrested after writing an article about the murder of a couple.</font></p>

<p><span style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: Tahoma">On Sept 2, Harry Nicolaides, 41, was arrested by Thai police while he was waiting for his flight at the airport&rsquo;s departure lounge in an attempt to flee the country, according to Immigration Police Commander Pol Lt Gen Chatchawan Suksomchit.<span>&nbsp; </span>He was sent to the Crime Suppression Division for detention and prosecution.</span></p>

<p><font face="tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif" size="2">The Asian Human Rights Commission has vehemently opposed and campaigned for the lifting of the emergency decree over the southernmost provinces of Thailand since it was introduced in mid-2005. Now in an alarming sign of the dramatically worsening conditions in that country, today the AHRC finds itself calling for the lifting of the decree from the streets of Bangkok. </font></p>

<p>Thai media associations are bracing against a government declaration of a state of emergency in Bangkok, saying certain aspects of the declaration could undermine press freedom, free expression, and access to information.</p>

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<p><font size="2">On the occasion of International Day of the Disappeared, the Working Group on Justice for Peace (WGJP) calls on the Thai government to ratify the new Convention for the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearances as reports of this atrocious crime being committed by state forces continue to surface throughout Thailand. While knowing of many more cases, WGJP has collected over 90 cases of disappearances throughout Thailand, of which 6 occurred in the last year.</font> </p>

<p>Reporters Without Borders secretary general Robert M&eacute;nard has written to Google CEO Eric Schmidt and one of Google&#39;s founders, Sergey Brin, about a defamation lawsuit that the Indian construction company Gremach brought against Google&#39;s Indian subsidiary, Google India Private Ltd, in February 2008.</p>

<p>Protesters idenitifed with Thailand&#39;s People&#39;s Alliance for Democracy - an anti-government movement - broke through a police-fortified iron gate to enter the compound of Thailand&#39;s state-run National Broadcasting Television this morning, Tuesday, 26 August 2008.</p>

<p>The Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA) joins its member, the Thai Journalists Association (TJA), in condemning a mob attack on a state-run television station in Bangkok.</p>

<p><font face="tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif" size="2"><strong><font size="2">The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that a union leader was dismissed allegedly for wearing a protest T-shirt while outside of work on July 30, 2008. While a protest regarding her dismissal has continued, tens of colleagues who held a protest were threatened with dismissal and suspension.<br /></font></strong></font></p>