UN Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Myanmar Ibrahim Gambari Monday criticized Myanmar's detention of four more pro-democracy activists , urging the military government to release political prisoners and end the detention of peaceful democracy activists. Gambari is currently visiting Asian states to solicit greater support for multilateral sanctions against Myanmar. The latest detainees, all [...]
Four prominent Sri Lankan human rights activists have resigned from a government advisory panel to protest Sri Lanka's worsening human rights situation, including ongoing extradjudicial killings, activist and lawyer Nimalka Fernando said Monday. The four submitted their resignations last week after Sri Lankan Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarashinghe rejected a proposed UN monitoring mission supported [...]
UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories John Dugard told the BBC Monday that he will recommend that the UN withdraw as a mediator in the Middle East unless action is taken on human rights violations in the Palestinian territories. Dugard said that the UN's membership in the Middle East Quartet , [...]
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani defended the legality of the semi-autonomous Kurdish government's Kurdistan Oil and Gas Law in an interview aired on Al Jazeera Sunday, faulting the Iraqi national government in Baghdad for failing to finalize oil revenue legislation. Barzani insisted that the KRG's oil contracts with foreign companies were consistent [...]
US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said Sunday that the House will vote on a resolution labeling as genocide the World War I-era killings of over one million Armenians by Turkish soldiers despite complaints from Turkey. In a Sunday interview on ABC News' This Week, Pelosi said that the resolution will go forward for [...]
The US Supreme Court granted certiorari Monday in a case where the Court will consider what constitutes money laundering, specifically whether the government must prove an intent to make money received from an unlawful activity appear to be from a legitimate source, or whether a defendant can be convicted of money laundering for merely hiding [...]
The US Department of Defense (DOD) secretly issued hundreds of national security letters (NSLs) to obtain financial, telephone and Internet records without court approval, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said Sunday when it released documents obtained from the Defense Department . The ACLU filed a lawsuit in June to compel the DOD and CIA [...]
JURIST Contributing Editor Ali Khan of Washburn University School of Law says that despite recent remarkable rulings the Supreme Court of Pakistan should avoid venturing further into the treacherous waters of judicial activism and should not disturb the new political deal between President Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto under which the military leader pardoned the [...]
The trial of 30 suspected terrorists accused of plotting to explode the Spanish National Court in Madrid began Monday. The defendants are charged with membership in a terrorist organization, conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack and forgery. The group, led by alleged mastermind Abderrahmane Tahiri, also known as Mohamed Achraf, allegedly planned to run a [...]
Emadeddin Baghi , founder of Iran's Society for Defending Prisoners' Rights , was arrested on charges of violating national security, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported Sunday. An unnamed government official told IRNA that Baghi and family members had participated in opposition meetings designed to overthrow Iran's Islamic regime. Specifically, Baghi has been charged [...]
