Human Rights Watch (HRW) Thursday urged international donors to increase their contributions to the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL) , echoing a plea by prosecutor Stephen Rapp who warned Wednesday that the tribunal would be forced to release accused former Liberian President Charles Taylor "if they run out of resources and can't continue [...]
Constitutional gridlock continued in Ukraine on Thursday, as the country's parliament again failed to approve a bill that would set a new date for controversial parliamentary elections. Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych finally reached an agreement on Sunday to hold the elections on September 30, giving parliament just two days to [...]
Approximately 30 Chinese demonstrators carrying banners massed outside the Japanese embassy in Beijing Thursday, protesting a April 27 court ruling by the Supreme Court of Japan denying compensation claims made by five Chinese wartime slave laborers. The compensation claims were denied on the grounds that the 1972 Joint Communique of the Government of Japan and [...]
Eric Linge, Pitt Law '09, files from Mumbai: On Wednesday a gang of lawyers tied a 24-year old boy to a tree in front of the Court in Agra. They shaved his head and poured water on it. Then the gang took turns slapping him across his face. He was a skinny boy, and he [...]
US immigration courts are inconsistent in granting asylum to applicants, according to a new study by three law professors to be published in the Stanford Law Review. The professors found that factors that contributed to the outcome of applications for asylum include the location of the court, the background of the judge, and the nationality [...]
Japan's Nagoya High Court Thursday upheld a district court's denial of compensation to a group of seven South Korean women who were former slave laborers at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd.'s aircraft factories during World War II, finding that neither the Japanese government or Mitsubishi were obligated to provide compensation, apology, or unpaid wages because the [...]
A Saudi Arabian detainee held at the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay died Wednesday afternoon in what military officials characterized as an apparent suicide . The officials did not identify the detainee or disclose the manner of death. Approximately 80 of the 385 detainees currently held at Guantanamo are from Saudi Arabia. If the [...]
The UN Security Council Wednesday approved a resolution to establish an ad hoc international tribunal to investigate and try suspects in the February 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri . The move passed in a 10-0 vote, with China, Russia, Indonesia, Qatar and South Africa abstaining; nine votes were required for passage. [...]
The Office of Inspector General and Office of Professional Responsibility of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) have expanded internal investigations into whether politics played a role in hiring decisions within the department, the DOJ confirmed in a letter sent Wednesday to the Senate Judiciary Committee. The announcement comes on the heels of last week's [...]
US federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment Wednesday charging four current and former partners of "Big-Four" accounting firm Ernst & Young with tax fraud. The indictment alleges that the defendants created tax shelters through development of "false and fraudulent factual scenarios", and marketed them to individuals with taxable income generally exceeding $10-20 million. The four are [...]
