In a joint news conference Wednesday with Moqtada al-Sadr , a militant Shiite cleric and head of the Mehdi Army militia, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki expressed hope for speedy proceedings against former president Saddam Hussein and proclaimed that “God willing the death sentence verdict will be issued soon against the tyrant Saddam and his [...]
Members of an Ethiopian inquiry team charged with investigating violent mass demonstrations following the May 2005 elections and separate protests about ballot fraud in November 2005 announced Wednesday that 193 civilians were killed by Ethiopian security forces during the violence, nearly three times the official number reported by the government. Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi [...]
A US district court judge from the Northern District of Texas has ruled that the one-year statute of limitations for bringing libel suits in Texas applies equally to articles posted on the Internet and articles in print. In dismissing a lawsuit against the Dallas Morning News , columnist Scott Burns, , and parent company Belo [...]
A military court in Jordan found eight Islamic militants guilty Wednesday of plotting to attack Americans and Israelis in Jordan and of planning to kill US forces being trained in both Jordan and Iraq. The convicted eight, including three still at large, were reportedly part of Al-Taa'efa al-Mansourah , a group purported to have been [...]
Former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet told federal judge Alejandro Solis during a meeting Wednesday that he neither participated in nor was aware of the torture of thousands of citizens at Villa Grimaldi prison , the infamous political detention center allegedly operated by Pinochet’s secret police in Chile between 1974 and 1977. Solis, who reportedly plans [...]
A civil court in Berlin Wednesday dismissed two claims against a German distributor of the drug Vioxx , manufactured by US pharmaceutical firm Merck & Co. , citing plaintiffs' failures in both cases to demonstrate a causal connection between the drug and symptoms. The court held that "expressing a vague suspicion is not enough" in [...]
Plans for the organization of a national human rights commission in Iraq were announced Wednesday by members of the Iraqi parliament at a workshop sponsored by the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) . The proposed commission, supported by many Iraqi political parties, will employ nine persons selected by the Iraqi parliament to monitor [...]
Seventy-eight people have been charged with bankruptcy fraud and related counts as a result of a nationwide federal law enforcement sweep entitled "Operation Truth or Consequences," a top US Department of Justice (DOJ) official announced Wednesday. Deputy Attorney General Paul J. McNulty said the charges arose out of 18 separate cases of bankruptcy fraud and [...]
Four US soldiers implicated in the rape and murder of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and the murder of her family in the Mahmudiya (also "Mahmoudiya") area in March have been referred to trial by general court-martial, military officials at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, announced Wednesday. Two of the soldiers, Pfc. Jesse Spielman and Sgt. Paul Cortez, [...]
US Army Col. Richard Basset traveled to the US prison camp at Guantanamo Bay Wednesday to begin an investigation into accusations of abuse . The US Defense Department last week ordered US Southern Command , which oversees the military facility, to investigate allegations that military guards beat detainees and took away their personal items for [...]
