The Argentine Chamber of Deputies voted 126-109 Wednesday in favor of a bill to legalize same-sex marriage in the country. The bill would also give gay couples the right to adopt children , one of the bill's more controversial provisions. The legislation has been under consideration since last year, with more than 50,000 marching in [...]
The Sri Lankan Parliament on Wednesday eased certain restrictions under the country's state of emergency laws, which have been in place for most of the last 27 years. Lawmakers voted to extend the state of emergency for another month but reduced some of the toughest provisions. Parliament lifted certain restrictions on assembly and distributing literature [...]
The Dutch Public Prosecution Service announced Tuesday that the public prosecutor for the Utrecht District Court filed an appeal against the April 22 ruling acquitting the Arab European League (AEL) of hate speech charges stemming from posting an inflammatory cartoon on their website. The court ruled that publishing the cartoon, which insinuated that the Holocaust [...]
India's Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down the use of so-called "truth drugs" and lie detector tests in criminal investigations. The court held that the involuntary use of narcoanalysis and polygraph tests "amount to an unwarranted intrusion into personal liberty," and that "no individual should be forcibly subjected to any of the techniques in question, [...]
Ken Gude "Spain is leading the way among US allies in assisting the Obama administration in the critical counterterrorism mission to close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay. With domestic efforts stalled due to political opposition and opportunism, the Obama administration is forced to turn to allies like Spain to bring down the population at [...]
The New York Court of Appeals , the state's highest court, issued two rulings Tuesday expanding the rights of nonbiological gay and lesbian parents. In one case, the court ruled 7-0 that a lesbian can assert parental rights over the biological child of her partner, reversing a lower court decision . The court found that [...]
A Syrian native held in Canada for more than eight years on a national security certificate on Tuesday sued the Canadian government for negligence and false imprisonment. Hassan Almrei filed suit in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice against the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Citizenship and Immigration Canada, and [...]
The District of Columbia Court of Appeals heard arguments Tuesday on whether DC voters should be allowed to decide on same-sex marriage in the city. While appeals are normally decided by a three-judge panel, the full nine-member court convened for Tuesday's arguments. The appeal comes after a judge for the Superior Court of the District [...]
Two US lawmakers on Tuesday unveiled draft legislation aimed at protecting Internet privacy. Representatives Rick Boucher (D-VA) and Cliff Stearns (R-FL) proposed the bill as a means to regulate how websites track information about visitors and then use that information to target advertising. The bill would require websites to inform visitors how their information will [...]
US Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday that Pakistani-born US citizen Faisal Shahzad will face terrorism charges for his alleged role in an attempted car bombing in New York City's Times Square. Shahzad was taken into custody Monday evening after an SUV containing explosives was found parked in Times Square Saturday afternoon. Holder said that [...]
