Japan’s lower house of parliament passed a bill Friday allowing Emperor Akihito to step down and calling for a debate on women emperors in the male-dominated monarchy. Emperor Akihito, who has been on the throne for nearly 30 years, would be the first abdication in almost two centuries. Akihito, 83, who has had heart surgery [...]
Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed a law Thursday night that significantly loosens voter identification requirements. Senate Bill 5 is intended to salvage portions of a 2011 law that was found to be discriminatory against minority voters by a federal judge in April. The bill allows voters who lack a photo ID to produce other documents [...]
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro pledged Thursday to hold a referendum on a new controversial constitution that he has proposed. Maduro’s pledge to rewrite the national charter has led to two months of protests in which at least 62 people have been killed. Maduro’s pledge came after criticism from opponents that his plan to rewrite the [...]
The Trump administration filed a petition Thursday asking the Supreme Court to temporarily lift injunctions that block the president’s executive order suspending visa issuance to individuals traveling to the US from six Muslim-majority countries. The move is appealing an injunction the Fourth Circuit upheld last month. The administration is also seeking to place on hold [...]
The New Hampshire House of Representatives voted without debate Thursday to remove criminal penalties for the possession of small amounts of marijuana. The purpose of the legislation is to reduce time spent on small possession drug cases, allow police and courts to spend more time on serious crime and to reduce penalties for those possessing [...]
The UN Working Group on business and human rights on Thursday urged Canada to address human rights abuses resulting from business activities, both domestic and international. The experts, after a 10-day trip to Canada, specifically referred to human rights abuses taking place in countries where Canadian corporations practice business and the usage of indigenous people’s [...]
John Knox, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment, urged all governments Thursday to fulfill their existent obligations to protect the world’s biological diversity from extinction. Knox warned: The extinction of species and the loss of microbial diversity undermines our rights to life and health by destroying potential sources for new medicines [...]
Christina Strickland, represented by Lambda Legal Counsel , filed an appeal on Thursday to the Mississippi Supreme Court to challenge a lower court’s ruling that she is not a legal parent of her ex-wife’s sons. The children were conceived with sperm from a donor while the couple was together , although their marriage was not [...]
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said Thursday that Egypt’s new NGO law will further restrict human rights advocacy. Law 70, which was passed on May 24, 2017, requires NGO’s to be approved by a government agency, for civil society groups to report all information on their funding and activities to [...]
US President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that the US will no longer be part of the Paris climate accord . 195 nations have signed on to the deal making it a world-wide effort to curb global warming. Foreign leaders, business executive and Trump’s daughter, Ivanka Trump , campaigned against withdrawal. Trump contested the climate [...]
