UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay on Thursday criticized the state of human rights in Sri Lanka, Iran, and several other countries, while presenting her annual report to the 13th Session of the Human Rights Council . Pillay described mistreatment of the government's critics as a threat to peace in Sri Lanka, and [...]
UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown on Thursday proposed tighter restrictions on the use of politically motivated arrest warrants for foreign leaders accused of war crimes. Brown said that he would seek to make tougher "the evidential basis on which arrest warrants can be allowed" and to restrict the right to prosecute universal jurisdiction crimes to [...]
A bill was introduced Wednesday to the US Senate that would allow gay soldiers to serve openly in the US military. Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) introduced the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2010 , which would repeal the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy . In a statement released Thursday, Senator Roland Burris (D-IL) hailed [...]
The Canadian government of Conservative Party Prime Minister Stephen Harper pledged Wednesday to strengthen copyright laws . Announcing government policy in the Speech from the Throne opening the third session of the Canada's fortieth Parliament, Canadian Governor General Michaelle Jean said that tightening intellectual property regulations was necessary to move the Canadian economy forward: To [...]
Guatemalan authorities have arrested two high-ranking police officials leading the country's war on drugs on charges of corruption and drug trafficking, Guatemalan Attorney General Amilcar Velasquez announced Tuesday. Police Chief Baltazar Gonzalez and anti-narcotics official Nelly Bonilla were arrested Tuesday in connection with a drug-related shoot-out last year between drug traffickers and a gang of [...]
JURIST Contributing Editor Michael Kelly of Creighton University School of Law says that while democracy in Iraq may look one way in second Iraqi general election on Sunday, it may evolve to look very different when the next election cycle rolls around and the American troops are gone… American Ambassador Christopher Hill said this coming [...]
Women's rights and opportunities have increased in nearly all Middle Eastern and North African countries over the last five years, but women in those countries still face many obstacles in achieving equality, according to a Freedom House report released Wednesday. The report found that in general, women in those countries had more opportunities for employment, [...]
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa announced Wednesday that the dissolved Sri Lankan Parliament will reconvene to ratify a one-month extension to the current state of emergency. Rajapaksa dissolved parliament last month to prepare for April elections, but, under the Sri Lankan Constitution , the president's emergency powers can be extended for only one month at [...]
Richard Dieter : "The United States is often rightly seen as a world leader in human rights. But we have become increasingly isolated from the international community in one respect – our persistent use of the death penalty. The worldwide trend is clearly away from capital punishment. The United Nations, a recent World Congress in [...]
The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Wednesday in Samantar v. Yousuf on whether a foreign state's immunity under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act extends to an individual acting in an official capacity on behalf of the foreign state. The plaintiffs allege that former Somali defense minister and prime minister Mohamed Ali Samantar committed acts [...]
