Iraqi officials on Wednesday released nearly 600 detainees who had been in Iraqi and US custody – the first of 2,500 detainees slated to be released under the order of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki . In the interest of national reconciliation, Maliki said Tuesday that detainees without clear evidence against them and without Iraqi [...]
A French trial court has ordered the French government and the state-controlled railway SNCF to pay 60,000 euros, or about $80,000 US, in compensation to a Jewish family for complicity in crimes against humanity. The case was brought by European Parliament member Alain Lipietz and his sister on behalf of their father and relatives who [...]
Australian Prime Minister John Howard and his Cabinet have announced that the federal government will set aside legislation allowing same-sex civil unions in the Australian Capital Territory , the federal district that includes Canberra. Speaking Tuesday at a press conference , the prime minister said: Well I can indicate that the legislation by its own [...]
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA), chairman of the US Senate Judiciary Committee, has said that he has abandoned his plan to subpoena executives of three top phone companies after Vice President Dick Cheney said Tuesday that national security concerns would prevent executives from speaking about allegedly providing phone records to the NSA. Verizon and BellSouth have [...]
UK Attorney General Lord Peter Goldsmith will call for prosecutors to study whether the British court-martial system is adequate for prosecuting soldiers accused of misconduct in Iraq , the Times of London reported Wednesday. The development follows Tuesday's acquittal of three infantrymen accused of manslaughter in the death of a 15-year-old Iraqi boy who prosecutors [...]
The US Department of Defense has issued comprehensive guidelines for the treatment of detainees that direct doctors to force-feed detainees who endanger their own lives as a result of a hunger strike. The guidelines , aimed primarily at the recent wave of hunger strikes by detainees at Guantanamo Bay , also gives doctors a limited [...]
A Vatican panel Tuesday condemned same-sex marriage as a major threat to the family, along with abortion , contraception and in vitro fertilization. The Pontifical Council for the Family , founded by Pope John Paul II in 1981, issued a 57-page document titled "Family and Human Procreation," saying that "he unitive act of man and [...]
US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales called the May FBI raid of the congressional office of Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA) an "unusual" but necessary step on Tuesday, comparing the office search to past searches of the homes and vehicles of other members of Congress. The US Department of Justice has consistently defended the search of Jefferson's [...]
Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000: Trafficking in Persons Report, US Department of State, June 6, 2006, . Read the full text of the report. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
SB 33, Abortion: Prohibits abortion, except when necessary to save the life of the mother; State of Louisiana, passed by the Louisiana Senate June 5, 2006 . Read the full text of the bill . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
