The US Attorney's Office for the Central District of Illinois Monday filed a federal lawsuit against state of Illinois in an effort to invalidate a state law that wold prevent employers from using the voluntary E-Verify program maintained by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) . E-Verify tracks whether potential employees can legally work [...]
The US Supreme Court on Tuesday granted certiorari in 17 cases for the October Term 2007, among them notable cases dealing with lethal injection, voter ID laws and subsequently seized evidence. In Baze v. Rees (07-5439) , the Court will consider whether lethal injections of death row inmates constitute cruel and unusual punishment in violation [...]
The Iranian government ended the four-month detention of Iranian-American peace activist Ali Shakeri Monday, releasing him on bail in the amount of 1 million rials (approximately USD$110,000). Shakeri, a founding member of the University of California, Irvine, Center for Citizen Peacebuilding , is the fourth dual US citizen Iran has detained in recent months on [...]
Hungarian officials announced Monday that the government has begun granting entrepreneur licenses to sex industry workers, despite critics' claims that the licensing scheme encourages human trafficking and violates Hungary's obligations under the 1950 UN Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others . The licenses [...]
The Supreme Court of Israel Monday ordered the Jewish National Fund (JNF) to end its discriminatory policy of selling land only to Jews, ruling that the JNF's mandate to provide land for Jewish resettlement cannot deny equal rights to non-Jewish Israelis. The high court also accepted a temporary arrangement in which the JNF will allow [...]
Peruvian President Alan Garcia pledged on Monday to act with fairness during the trial of former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori , who was extradited from Chile last week after a Supreme Court of Chile ruling that he should be transferred to Peru to face human rights and corruption charges. Garcia lauded the court's decision, and [...]
The Iraqi Interior Ministry is proposing draft legislation to be submitted to the Iraqi parliament that places private security contractors under Iraqi legal jurisdiction, a ministry spokesperson said Tuesday. The legislation, drafted in response to the domestic outrage at a September 16 incident in which Blackwater USA contractors allegedly killed 11 unarmed civilians, will overturn [...]
The Bush administration expressed concern Monday about recent "setbacks on press freedom and civil society" in Egypt. Commenting on a recent Egyptian government order mandating the closure of the Association for Human Rights Legal Aid , White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said : These latest decisions appear to contradict the Egyptian Government's stated commitment [...]
The Thai Supreme Court for Political Appointees suspended proceedings Tuesday against former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra until he and his wife, Pojamarn, are arrested and brought into court for proceedings. Thaksin has been living in the United Kingdom since the bloodless military coup that ousted him from power last year. In making the decision [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled Monday that foreign prisoners do not have a cause of action under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations if police do not inform the inmate of their right under the treaty to call the inmate's home country embassy following arrest. Finding that the Vienna Convention [...]
