JURIST] The president of Human Rights Watch , mediation advisors, and other NGO leaders have recently begun to more openly criticize prosecutorial and other judgments made by International Criminal Court (ICC) chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo . Moreno-Ocampo has already received sharp criticism from both the League of Arab States (LAS) and the African Union (AU) for his [...]

Richard Scott, head of the Canadian Judicial Council conduct committee , warned on Sunday that judges should exercise caution in agreeing to head up extra-judicial public inquiries designed to address politically controversial issues. Scott, who is also the chief justice of the Manitoba Court of Appeal , said that by straying too far from their [...]

The Yemeni Parliament on Monday voted against a bill which would have amended the country's electoral laws by restricting government officials from influencing the ballot. The bill would also have required electors to register in either their place of birth or residence rather than their place of work. Yemen's ruling General People's Congress (GPC) voted [...]

A bill introduced in the Malaysian parliament on Monday would require all criminal suspects to submit DNA samples, a measure that has been tied to to the ongoing investigation into sodomy charges against opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim since the government promised to table it last month . Also on Monday, Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri [...]

Senegal may drop charges against former Chadian dictator Hissene Habre who was sentenced to death in absentia in Chad on Friday, according to Monday media reports. Senegalese Justice Minister Madicke Niang said that Habre could not be tried twice on the same charges, although human rights activists argue that Habre's indictment in Chad for armed [...]

Indonesian prisoners who have been convicted of terrorism, drug offenses, illegal logging and corruption this year did not receive the sentence reductions that most of the prisoners traditionally receive on Indonesia's Independence Day , August 17. Indonesian officials previously said that sentence reductions were a constitutional right afforded to all criminals regardless of their crimes, [...]

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf announced Monday he was resigning from office in order to avoid impeachment proceeding by the country's parliament. In a television address , Musharraf denied any wrongdoing, but said that the proceedings alone would damage the country. Earlier on Monday, Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N) coalition [...]

Chad Hazlett and Nina McMurry : "The debate continues as to whether Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir should be offered a way out of a possible ICC indictment via Article 16 of the Rome Statute. There are good reasons to worry that pursuing an indictment is a mistake. The first is that the situation is too [...]

The US Justice Department has sent so-called target letters to six Blackwater USA guards involved in the September 16 killings of 17 Iraqi civilians , the Washington Post reported Sunday. Sources told the Post that the letters, which provide an opportunity for the recipients to contest grand jury evidence, indicate the Justice Department will likely [...]

The US-led Multi-National Force-Iraq (MNF-Iraq) announced Saturday that the first hearing of a US soldier charged in connection with the death of an Iraqi detainee will begin on September 5 . Staff Sgt. Hal M. Warner, who was stationed about 130 miles north of Baghdad, was charged early this month with premeditated murder, assault, accessory [...]