The Kurdish Parliament announced Friday that it was postponing a public referendum on approval of the Constitution of Kurdistan . The vote had previously been scheduled to coincide with parliamentary elections later this month, but parliamentary president Adnan Mufti said that the election commission was unable to organize both votes on the same day for [...]
An African Union (AU) panel led by former South African president Thabo Mbeki recommended Friday that the AU cooperate with International Criminal Court (ICC) efforts to arrest Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity . The recommendation comes in stark contrast to a vote by the full AU last [...]
The UK Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) announced Friday that it is investigating the alleged mistreatment of an Ethiopian Guantanamo Bay detainee by British intelligence officers. Binyam Mohamed , who was arrested in Pakistan in 2002, claims that while he was held in Pakistan for three months he was tortured by Pakistani agents and interrogated by [...]
Chinese authorities on Wednesday detained four employees of Australian mining company Rio Tinto on suspicion of stealing 'state secrets' during stalled iron ore price negotiations. Rio Tinto's Shanghai manager Stern Hu, who is an Australian citizen, along with three of the company's Chinese employees are accused of bribing officials and steel industry executives in order [...]
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said Thursday that human rights violations committed during recent Somalian conflicts may amount to war crimes . Pillay said that ongoing violence between Islamist rebels and the newly-formed government has resulted in hundreds of civilian deaths, despite a peace accord signed last year. Pillay's office reported that [...]
A group of federal judges on Thursday urged the US Sentencing Commission (USSC) to revise complicated and mechanical calculations used to determine federal criminal sentences. Federal circuit and district court judges praised the 2005 Supreme Court decision in US v. Booker , which made the USSC's guidelines advisory rather than mandatory, but said that the [...]
Turkish President Abdullah Gul on Thursday approved a law that would allow the prosecution of military personnel in civilian courts and would prevent military prosecution of civilians during peacetime. Gul said that the law was necessary for accession to the European Union (EU) , but suggested that parliament amend the law to clarify the civil [...]
The Afghan government has revised a controversial law which appeared to legalize marital rape, according to statements made by government officials on Thursday. The provisions of the Shi'ite personal status law requiring a wife to submit to sex with her husband were removed along with other provisions, following international condemnation and protests. Afghan President Hamid [...]
The trial of Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi resumed Friday with the testimony of Khin Moe Moe, a member of Suu Kyi's National League of Democracy (NLD) party. Suu Kyi is charged with violating the terms of her house arrest by allowing an American to stay at her home, but Khin Moe Moe [...]
The Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation on Wednesday filed a request for partial summary judgment concluding that the National Security Agency (NSA) illegally wiretapped several conversations between the charity and its lawyers. The organization is suing the government for the wiretapping and is seeking both disclosure of what was intercepted and monetary damages. Al-Haramain argues that there [...]
