The Supreme Court of the Philippines ruled Thursday that a prominent gay rights organization may field candidates in the upcoming national elections as an accredited political party. The decision invalidates an order issued by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in November that rejected a bid for party recognition by Ang Ladlad . In denying Ang [...]
Pakistan's National Assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a constitutional amendment that would curtail the powers of the president. The 18th Amendment Bill would reverse the expansion of presidential powers under former military leader Pervez Musharraf by transferring presidential powers to the office of the prime minister , effectively reserving the presidency as a figurehead. Among [...]
Former Kyrgyz foreign minister Roza Otunbayeva announced Thursday that she will lead an interim government in Kyrgyzstan after violent protests Wednesday apparently ousted president Kurmanbek Bakiyev and his administration. Otunbayeva, leader of the Social Democratic Party of Kyrgyzstan , urged Bakiyev to resign and said that her temporary government will rule for six months until [...]
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott announced Wednesday that five additional states will join in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the recently enacted Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act . The five states – Indiana, North Dakota, Mississippi, Nevada, and Arizona – will join 13 other states in a legal battle that began last month [...]
US President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Thursday signed the so-called New START treaty , pledging to reduce their countries' nuclear warheads by about 30 percent. Under the terms of the treaty and its protocol , both countries would only be allowed to deploy 1,550 strategic warheads, a decrease from the 2,200 [...]
The Kenyan Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared Wednesday that Kenya's government is attempting to secure the release of Kenyan native Mohammed Abdumalik, who is currently detained at Guantanamo Bay . The news was revealed in a letter to Abdulmalik's family, informing them that the government will ask the United States to release the detainee. Abdulmalik's [...]
Human Rights Watch (HRW) called Wednesday for an investigation into alleged war crimes committed during the recent conflict between the government of Yemen and Shiite Huthi Rebels. According to HRW's report , "All Quiet on the Northern Front?: Uninvestigated Laws of War Violations in Yemen's War with Huthi Rebels," the February truce between the factions [...]
Swedish Police on Wednesday arrested a Kosovo war crimes suspect. The suspect is accused of committing war crimes during the 1998-1999 Kosovo war in the small village of Cuska in May 1999. A Swedish police spokesperson did not release the man's full name because of Swedish privacy laws but did state that the suspect is [...]
A special tribunal in Bangladesh on Wednesday convicted 29 members of the paramilitary group Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) on charges relating to their involvement in last year's border guard mutiny . The military-run court in Panchagarh district sentenced those convicted to jail terms ranging from four months to seven years. The sentences are the first of [...]
Several visual artist organizations filed a class action suit Wednesday against Google alleging copyright infringement resulting from the company's book scanning project . The plaintiffs include the American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP), the Graphic Artists Guild, the Picture Archive Council of America, the North American Nature Photography Association, Professional Photographers of America , as [...]
