Guantanamo Bay detainee Omar Khadr said in an affidavit released Tuesday that US interrogators in Afghanistan threatened him with rape, physically abused him, and forced him to swear to false statements. The 63-item statement, signed by Khadr on February 22, was heavily redacted by the US military before its release, omitting many of the specific [...]
The War Crimes Chamber of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina Tuesday indicted a Bosnian Serb ex-soldier for crimes against humanity allegedly committed against Muslims in the Bosnian war of the early 1990s. Miodrag Nikacevic is accused of raping two Muslim women in April and June 1992, and is also alleged to have participated in [...]
A German state administrative court Tuesday upheld a ban on teachers wearing religious headscarves during school. The court in the federal district of Baden-Wuerttemberg ruled that the teacher who brought the lawsuit had violated her obligation to keep religious expression out of the classroom by wearing a headscarf in class. The ruling overturns a 2006 [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit Tuesday rejected an appeal by three former Enron Broadband Services executives seeking the dismissal of remaining charges after a jury failed to reach a verdict on all counts in their 2005 fraud trial. Former VP Scott Yeager, former senior VP Rex Shelby, and former CEO Joseph [...]
Chief Human Rights Officer Norah Niland of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan Tuesday called on the Afghan government to do more to protect human rights and see that human rights violators are brought to justice. Speaking at a press conference in Kabul, Niland said a general sense that human rights violators could operate [...]
The trial of Chinese human rights activist Hu Jia began Tuesday on charges of inciting subversion of state power . Hu was formally charged last month after he made public letters and recordings from Chinese lawyer Gao Zhisheng alleging that Gao was tortured into confessing to subversion charges. Two local lawyers told AP that they [...]
Rights groups Tuesday marked the anniversary of a March 2003 crackdown on dissidents in Cuba by calling for the release of political prisoners detained during that round-up. Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) , Human Rights First (HRF) and other groups urged new Cuban President Raul Castro to release 55 detainees still in custody. Seventy-five journalists, [...]
French "rogue trader" Jerome Kerviel was released from prison Tuesday after a French court ordered that he be freed while the investigation continues into fraudulent activity allegedly conducted by Kerviel while employed at French Bank Societe Generale . The court ordered Kerviel not to leave the country or communicate with a number of former colleagues. [...]
Lawyers for four Kuwaiti Guantanamo Bay detainees have asked the US Court of Military Commission Review to order prosecutors not to speak to detainees without the consent of their lawyers. In an emergency petition filed with the court last week, the lawyers accused prosecutors of violating ethics rules that require a lawyer to gain the [...]
Beleaguered investment bank Bear Stearns was hit with two major lawsuits Monday in the wake of its announced acquisition by JPMorgan Chase . The first suit , filed in US District Court for the Southern District of New York , alleged that some of the company's officers and directors – including Chairman James Cayne, CEO [...]
