UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan told delegates at the opening of the second session of the UN Human Rights Council Monday that the Council should pay more attention to the Darfur crisis and not focus exclusively on the situation in Lebanon . Urging delegates to "not disappoint the hopes of humanity," Annan said: The world is [...]
Ben Davis : "Back in 1994 when the US ratified the Convention Against Torture and Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment ("CAT") it included reservations, understanding, and declarations ("RUD's) as regards the prohibitions against cruel, inhuman and degrading ("CID") treatment. Those RUD's interpreted CID to mean the US constitutional standard – the so called "shocks the [...]
The British government Monday proposed closing off the possibility of overturning criminal convictions on legal technicalities where the guilt of accuseds is clear. In a new consultation paper the Home Secretary, the Lord Chancellor, and the Attorney General argue that if the Court of Appeal is convinced that the defendant in fact committed the offense [...]
The Turkish parliament, the Grand National Assembly , is scheduled to meet Tuesday, two weeks earlier than usual, to work on passing reform measures aimed at gaining membership to the European Union . The EU has cautioned Turkey that its EU bid will not be accepted unless the country improves its record on torture and [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Douglas Branson of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law says that recent problems at Hewlett-Packard related to board leaks and their investigation could have been avoided with a little thought and the application of basic corporate governance principles… In Jim Collins’s award winning book about rock solid companies, Built to Last, [...]
An Israeli military court on Monday postponed a decision on whether 21 defendants, who were who were detained following the Hamas capture of Israeli Cpl. Gilad Shalit in Gaza in June, should be released from detention while their cases are examined. Last Tuesday, the military court ordered the 21 defendants released on bail , but [...]
Hewlett-Packard's deadline to submit documents to the US House Energy and Commerce Committee expires Monday, and two top executives have been asked to testify before the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee on the topic of "pretexting," a method of tricking companies into divulging their customers' records, a practice HP is alleged to have engaged in during [...]
Ben Davis : "Alberto Gonzales has said that one of the reasons the Administration departed from the Geneva Conventions in early 2002 was to provide more "flexibility" to the President. This week, some of the ironies of the Military Commission Bills of the President and Senators McCain-Warner-Graham are (1) the rejection of the flexibility of [...]
About 14,000 people are currently being detained by the US in overseas prisons in uncertain legal circumstances, the Associated Press reported Sunday. Some 13,000 are being held in Iraq. US officials have told the Red Cross that 70 to 90 percent of the tens of thousands of Iraqis detained in recent years have been "mistakes." [...]
Women's rights activists in Pakistan urged the government Sunday to suspend controversial religious laws that make it extremely difficult to prosecute rapists in the country. The Pakistan parliament delayed the introduction of a revised 2006 Protection of Women Bill as planned on Friday because Islamic leaders do not want to change the laws, called the [...]
