Global: Activists win human rights awards

Five brave and selfless advocates of human rights from Burma, Congo, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka and Uzbekistan have been awarded the prestigious 2008 Human Rights Defender Awards, Human Rights Watch has said. All five have been persecuted and threatened for their work. One winner, Saudi lawyer Abd al-Rahman al-Lahim, is under a travel ban, which Human Rights Watch urges the Saudi government lift so that he may receive his award in person in London.