Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi on Sunday declared support of Saudi Arabia’s decision to reject a seat on the UN Security Council (UNSC) after several Arab ambassadors criticized the decision earlier this week. The UN awarded Saudi Arabia a two-year position on the UNSC Thursday along with Chad, Chile, Lithuania and Nigeria. The Saudi government, [...]
Amnesty International (AI) on Friday called upon the Dominican Republic reject a constitutional court ruling that would impact the nationality of Dominicans of foreign descent. The court ruling, which was issued last month, held that a person born in the Dominican Republic to parents of another nationality should not be registered as a Dominican citizen. [...]
The New Jersey Supreme Court on Friday ruled that the state must begin recognizing same-sex marriages. The court declined to issue a stay on a lower court’s decision pending appeal. The lower court ruling found that, in light of US v. Windsor , the status of civil unions deprive same-sex couples of federal benefits enjoyed [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Benjamin Davis of the University of Toledo College of Law examines the recent oral arguments in Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action …
An Italian court on Friday prohibited former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi from running for office for two years due to his conviction for tax fraud . However, the ruling must be approved by parliament before taking effect because Berlusconi is currently a member of the Italian Senate . If Berlusconi is expelled from his Senate [...]
The International Criminal Court (ICC) ruled on Friday that Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta need not be present for his whole trial for crimes against humanity. The court issued its decision in response to growing tensions between the Kenyan government and the ICC regarding the court’s authority to exercise jurisdiction over Kenyan officials. The ICC also [...]
The Tennessee Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously rejected a movement to overturn the Tennessee Voter Identification Act, ruling that a requirement of government-issued photo ID for voters is constitutional. Chief Justice Gary Wade delivered the majority opinion and Justice William Koch Jr. delivered a concurring opinion concluding that the provisions of the act protect against [...]
Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported Friday that Ethiopian police investigators routinely use torture and other coercive methods to obtain statements and confessions from detainees in Addis Ababa’s Maekelawi detention center. The Maekelawi detention center is used to house the country’s political prisoners, including “opposition politicians, journalists, protest organizers, alleged supporters of ethnic insurgencies and many [...]
A UN independent rights expert on Friday joined with two other key international anti-trafficking expert mechanisms to call for global cooperation in the fight against the transnational trafficking of persons. Human rights experts from the UN, the Council of Europe (COE) and the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE) jointly stated that, “Partnership [...]
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a Freedom of Information (FOIA) lawsuit Thursday in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York to compel the federal government to disclose its policy for notifying criminal defendants that they have been surveilled under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) . The 2008 FISA [...]
