The state of Missouri must give all prison inmates access to abortion a federal judge in Kansas City ruled Tuesday. US District Judge Dean Whipple ruled last year in Roe v. Crawford that Missouri had to provide a particular inmate with transportation to an abortion facility and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) subsequently asked [...]
The US Senate voted Tuesday afternoon to increase federal funding for embryonic stem cell research , but the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act fell four votes shy of the two-thirds supermajority needed to survive an expected White House veto – President Bush's first. At an afternoon press briefing , press secretary Tony Snow promised "pretty [...]
Human Rights in Iraq, 1 May-30 June 2006, United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq, May 23, 2006 . Read the full text of the report . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
UN Human Rights Committee, presentation by the United States on compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, July 17-18, 2006. Read the text of the October 2005 report; remarks by Ambassador Warren W. Tichenor at the July 17 meeting; the transcript of the delegations's press briefing; the written responses to advance questions [...]
Islamic militant group Hezbollah violated international humanitarian law and likely committed war crimes by firing the rockets that have killed at least a dozen Israelis , whether the attacks were targeted at civilians or merely indiscriminate, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Tuesday. Most of the rockets were a type that can't be aimed precisely and [...]
Iranian human rights lawyer Abdolfattah Soltani says he has received a five-year prison sentence for disclosing confidential information and engaging in propaganda against the regime, even though neither he nor his lawyers appeared in court or saw the primary evidence against him. Working with Tehran's Defenders of Human Rights Center, which is led by Nobel [...]
AP is reporting that the US House of Representatives has defeated a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage . House leaders scheduled the vote on the Marriage Protection Amendment despite a failed vote on the Senate floor in June. Last month, President Bush urged Congress to approve the amendment . The House vote [...]
BetOnSports PLC and its chief executive are among four corporations and 11 individuals indicted by a federal grand jury in St. Louis on charges of racketeering, conspiracy and fraud for allegedly accepting illegal sports bets online. The indictment, returned on June 1 but only unsealed Monday, also alleges that BetOnSports founder Gary Stephen Kaplan failed [...]
Leading class-action law firm Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman has pleaded not guilty to fraud and conspiracy charges in US District Court in Los Angeles. In a message e-mailed to the media after Monday's arraignment, the firm described its indictment as "unprecedented and unfair" and expressed confidence that it would be "fully vindicated," echoing an [...]
The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) has expressed continued concern for the human rights situation in Iraq in its latest bi-monthly report , welcoming the new Iraqi government's "firm commitment to address forcefully urgent human rights concerns" while establishing democracy, but also noting concern over the increasing number of civilian casualties at the [...]
