Leading Thursday's corporations and securities law news, the US Senate Banking Committee has approved Rep. Christopher Cox 's nomination to head the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) . The nomination will now go before the...

Leading Thursday's states brief, New Jersey Acting Governor Richard J. Codey has ordered the state's Attorney General to file suit against Delaware in the US Supreme Court over British Petroleum's plans to build a...

Republican lawmakers in the Senate on Thursday agreed to delay the Streamlined Procedures Act of 2005 , a bill limiting the rights of death row inmates to extend appeals in federal courts, because of strong Democratic opposition. The bill...

US judge Sterling Johnson on Thursday sentenced Yemeni cleric Sheikh Mohammed Ali Hassan al-Moayad, convicted in March of conspiring to support foreign terrorist groups , to 75 years in prison and fined him $1.25 million. Al-Moayad...

The US House of Representatives on Thursday approved a massive energy plan that provides huge tax breaks and subsidies to energy companies, but is predicted to only modestly reduce gas prices and US reliance on oil. The...

Ugandans voted Thursday to decide whether to allow a multiparty system, after a ban of nearly 20 years by President Yoweri Museveni who claimed political parties promoted tribal divisions and were responsible causing civil war. The referendum...

Lal Krishna Advani , former deputy Prime Minister of India, was charged along with seven Hindu leaders on Thursday with inciting a mob to destroy a mosque in Ayodhya in 1992. The destruction sparked riots that killed at...

Australia has abandoned mandatory detention for some illegal immigrants, one of the most criticized provisions of its immigration law, releasing dozens of children on Thursday. Australia's courts also paved the way for over 1,000 asylum-seekers to avoid deportation. Prime...

Indonesia Thursday continued to characterize an international tribunal for the 1999 East Timor violence as "unnecessary" despite a UN report formally released Wednesday that called for international oversight . Rights groups have...

Police in Pakistan said Thursday that a key suspect wanted in connection with the abduction and murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl has been arrested. Mohammad Hashim, known as Arif, was arrested earlier in the week in...