Eight Somalis were charged in a Kenyan court for piracy on Wednesday after being turned over to Kenyan officials by the British Royal Navy . The suspected pirates were captured by the HMS Cumberland while attempting to use a hijacked Yemeni fishing boat to attack a Danish vessel on November 11 and then handed over [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has vacated a district court judge's contempt order against former USA Today reporter Toni Locy in connection with her refusal to disclose sources for articles she wrote about the 2001 anthrax attacks . The citation, issued by US District Judge Reggie Walton , required [...]
A panel of UN experts on Wednesday urged authorities in Myanmar to retry political and religious prisoners. The group, including Special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar Tomas Ojea Quintana , called for fair and open trials for dozens of activists convicted in judicial proceedings inside Yangyon's Insein Prison . The panel [...]
UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Public Health Officer Heiko Hering said Wednesday that the large-scale anti-malaria effort recently launched by the United Nations Foundation is part of fulfilling the service obligations of the Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees . Hering made the comment during a conference call promoting the mission [...]
Navy defense attorney Cmdr. Suzanne Lachelier was given rare access on Wednesday to Camp Seven , a special Guantanamo camp for alleged al Qaeda members classified as "high-value detainees" at the Guantanamo Bay military prison. Lachelier is a defense lawyer for Ramzi Binalshibh , who has been charged with murder and war crimes for his alleged [...]
A judge for the Moscow District Military Court on Wednesday ordered that the trial of three men accused in the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya be closed to the public. This essentially reversed his Monday decision to allow an open trial. Also on Wednesday, all of the accused pleaded not guilty to the charges. The [...]
Amnesty International (AI) called Tuesday for an international investigation into the deaths of civilians during the August 2008 conflict between Russia and Georgia over the breakaway region of South Ossetia . A new AI report entitled "Civilians in the Line of Fire: the Georgia-Russia Conflict" faulted both Russia and Georgia, as well as South Ossetian [...]
The Supreme Court of Nepal has directed the country's government to end sexual orientation-based discrimination and to extend equal rights to gender minorities, including same-sex marriage . The order, made Monday, came in a lawsuit brought by several gay rights groups and follows a December 2007 ruling recognizing homosexuals as citizens under the classification "third [...]
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Tuesday ruled that it has jurisdiction to hear a case brought by Croatia accusing Serbia of genocide during the Croatian War from 1991-1995. Croatia claimed in its application that Serbia had engaged in "a form of genocide which resulted in large numbers of Croatian citizens being displaced, killed, [...]
A three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit on Tuesday upheld a New Hampshire law that prohibits the gathering of data from prescription drug records to target pharmaceutical sales to doctors. The Prescription Information Law was enacted in June 2006 and was aimed at limiting health care costs by reducing [...]
