A Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas judge Thursday issued a temporary restraining order blocking Philadelphia from enforcing new gun control legislation that would have banned the sale of assault weapons, required owners to report lost or stolen guns within 24 hours, and limited firearms purchases to one per month. The National Rifle Association (NRA) and [...]
Former Russian Atomic Energy Minister Yevgeny Adamov was released from prison Thursday after a Moscow City Court suspended his sentence. Adamov was convicted on charges of fraud and abuse of office in February and sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison by Moscow's Zamoskvoretsky District Court. Adamov said he plans to appeal the verdict and [...]
A lawyer for Chinese human rights activist Hu Jia , sentenced in early April to over three years in prison on charges of inciting subversion of state power , said Thursday that his client has been denied an appeal. Hu's lawyer said that Hu had 10 days to appeal his conviction, but that Hu's legal [...]
Two videotapes showing CIA officers interrogating al Qaeda suspects are likely not related to a federal case filed by a Guantanamo Bay detainee and thus not covered by a court order entered in that case directing the CIA to preserve evidence relating to the case, the CIA argued in court papers filed Wednesday. The filing [...]
Martial law will be lifted in most of Thailand, new Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej said Thursday. Sundaravej said that while the restrictions were no longer necessary after elections in December and the passage of the controversial Internal Security Bill , martial law will still remain in effect in three southern provinces, which are home [...]
Current Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and his Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) Thursday accused opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) of treason. Mugabe's government has said that Tsvangirai and Britain are conspiring to overthrow Mugabe; Tsvangirai denied the accusations in an AP interview. AP has more. In [...]
The Iowa House voted 84-16 Wednesday to pass a bill that would require Iowa employers to verify within 10 business days of hiring a new employee that they are a legal US resident. Employers would have to sign a statement under penalty of perjury that they checked the employee's driver's licenses or state-issued identification card [...]
The movement in Malaysia to reform the judiciary took another step forward Thursday as Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told a Bar Council assembly that the government will implement a Judicial Appointments Commission that will identify and nominate candidates for the bench, hopefully bringing transparency to the process. A similar proposal was made [...]
Afghan President Hamid Karzai should reinstate a moratorium on the death penalty and should not sign execution orders for 100 prisoners, approved by the Supreme Court this week, advocacy group Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Thursday. According to the HRW press release : Supreme Court officials told the media those sentenced to death had been [...]
Serbia is not doing enough to cooperate with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) , ICTY Chief Prosecutor Serge Brammertz said Thursday. Brammertz said he was especially concerned with Serbia's inability to find and capture four fugitives wanted in connection with the 1995 Srebrenica massacre , including alleged Srebrenica masterminds Ratko Mladic [...]
