Leading Monday's states brief, the California Supreme Court ruled today that a private country club must offer spousal discounts to same-sex domestic partners. The court found that the country club's policy of allowing members' spouses to golf for free while charging members' domestic partners was "impermissible marital status discrimination." In the majority opinion, Justice Carlos [...]
British officials are seeking the return of Hamdi Isaac, the suspected fourth bomber in the July 21 London bombing attempts . Isaac, an Ethiopian who was living in the UK under the name Osman Hussain and claimed to be of Somali origin, was arrested in Rome on Friday , a move which led the British [...]
Uzbekistan Monday angrily denounced a UN airlift to Romania of Uzbek refugees who fled to Kyrgyzstan after a violent uprising in May 2005 in the Uzbek city of Andijan. The refugees were moved amidst fears that Kyrgyzstan would forcibly return the refugees to Uzbekistan, where they might be tortured or face execution. Uzbekistan called the [...]
The trial of Chicago resident Osyp Firishchak, 86, was set to begin Monday on charges that he was part of a Ukrainian police unit that worked for the Nazis by transporting thousands of Jews to concentration camps. The government is also looking to strip him of US citizenship and eventually have him deported. The Office [...]
Iran announced on Monday that it would resume uranium enrichment, effectively ending recent negotiations with the European Union . The International Atomic Energy Agency had urged Iran to continue with the negotiation process , but Iran's only concession was a two-day delay in restarting the program to allow inspectors to observe the dismantling of UN [...]
The UN Human Rights Committee has criticized Yemen for not incorporating many of its 2002 recommendations for civil and political rights in the country. Some major concerns of the Committee were judicial independence, inequality for women, domestic violence, 'honor killings', the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM) , and alleged serious rights violations used to [...]
A new report released today by Human Rights Watch is adding to international concerns that a Colombian law intended to encourage paramilitary groups to disarm is too soft and would not allow Colombia to punish the paramilitary groups that had attacked leftist opposition rebels clashing with the government. The UN had asked Colombian President Alvaro [...]
Former rebel leader John Garang , who eventually made peace and joined the Sudanese government as a vice-president, died over the weekend in a helicopter crash, sparking riots and threatening to destabilize the region. Officials in Sudan said Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement leader Garang and 13 others died after the presidential helicopter he was traveling [...]
An FBI memo obtained by Newsweek to be reported in its August 8 print edition warned three years ago that government officials could be prosecuted for planning transfers of terrorism suspects to countries that allow torture, a process called extraordinary rendition . A senior FBI official said the memo was only advisory and not an [...]
The Supreme Court of Pakistan Monday took up a government challenge to a controversial morals law passed by its North-West Frontier Province on the border with Afghanistan that provides for Taliban-style enforcement of Islamic law. President General Pervez Musharraf asked the court earlier this month to rule on the constitutionality of the law that calls [...]
