Freedom at Issue:

This Thursday, former senator Chuck Hagel will appear before the Senate Armed Services Committee to seek confirmation as secretary of defense. While he will not have primary responsibility for U.S. foreign relations in that post, he will have substantial influence over U.S. policy toward regimes that are hostile to both American interests and democracy. Senator Hagel’s record on these issues raises critical questions that should be addressed during the hearing, which are included in the following blog post.

Earlier this month, Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa replaced Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake with a political ally following a parliamentary impeachment process that was deemed unconstitutional. While the government claimed that Bandaranayake had abused her position for personal gain, her ouster was widely regarded as a Rajapaksa vendetta and yet another blow to judicial independence in the country. In the wake of this showdown between the branches of government, the judiciary has been reduced to little more than an appendage of the ruling party. According to the latest edition of Freedom in the World, Sri Lanka experienced declines in political rights and civil liberties indicators in 2012, adding to a multiyear deterioration. If January is any indication, the coming year promises more of the same.

When a New York Times columnist feels the need to tell his readers, “Don’t get me wrong—I am hardly advocating totalitarian government,” something has probably gone badly awry in his analysis.

This week marks the release of Freedom in the World 2013, the latest edition of an annual report on global political rights and civil liberties that Freedom House launched nearly 40 years ago.  Of the 195 sovereign countries assessed in this year’s report, none was as important to the future direction of global freedom as Egypt, and none was as complex. Egypt, in fact, showed sufficient gains for the year to register an improvement from Not Free to Partly Free on the Freedom House scale. But as the overview narrative for the report notes, “Developments in Egypt encapsulated a pattern in which gains for freedom in the Middle East and North Africa were threatened by opposition from governments, security forces, ruling families, or religiously based political factions.”