Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Sunday released a report outlining serious flaws in the Iranian electoral system which they say are damaging prospects for free and fair parliamentary elections on February 26th. The report states that this is due to Iranian authorities not allowing the majority of candidates to run due to discriminatory and arbitrary [...]
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Saturday expressed concern over the delay of Haiti’s presidential election and urged political actors to reject all forms of violence. The election, which was to be held on Sunday, was postponed on Friday due to concerns of violence, and had already faced past delays as well. The Secretary General [...]
The Parliament of Iran on Sunday passed a law defining what constitutes a political crime. Under the country’s constitution, individuals accused of committing “public offenses” are guaranteed public trials and other legal protections. Prior to this newly passed law, however, the term “political offenses” was never defined. The parliament’s actions are part of a larger [...]
In anticipation of the fifth anniversary of the Arab Spring uprising, Egyptian authorities have spent the last week clamping down on dissidents in an effort to avoid further political unrest. At the instruction of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi , Egyptian security forces searched over 5,000 homes, seized activists in public, closed an art gallery, raided [...]
A delegation from the United Nations Security Council on Friday met with top government officials in Burundi, in an effort to end months of political turmoil in the country. Led by Ismael Gaspar Martins, Samantha Power and Alexis Lamek, the delegation met with Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza , Foreign Minister Alain Aimé Nyamitwe, and various [...]
The US Department of Justice (DOJ) on Thursday announced that Big Brothers Big Sisters of America (Big Brothers) will pay $1.6 million as a result of accusations of false claims for Federal grants awarded from 2009-2011. The DOJ contends that Big Brothers failed to follow guidelines associated with these grants because they did not maintain [...]
The Pennsylvania Superior Court on Friday, in three separate opinions, overturned several charges for three Pennsylvania State University administrators accused of playing a role in covering up the Jerry Sandusky child abuse scandal. The defendants argued that a former lawyer of the university, Cynthia Baldwin, should not have been allowed to testify against them in [...]
The Kansas Court of Appeals on Friday turned down a state law that would prohibit doctors from using the most common second-trimester abortion method. The Kansas Unborn Child Protection from Dismemberment Abortion Act was enacted in the spring of 2014 and it prohibited doctors from using forceps on a live fetus to remove it from [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled in favor of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Thursday, dismissing a claim that the imposed pollution regulations in Minnesota are too lenient. The National Parks Conservation Association challenged the EPA’s approval of a “reasonable-progress” plan as satisfying the Minnesota Regional Haze Plan to improve [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit on Thursday rejected a bid to block the implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Clean Power Plan (CPP) . A three-judge panel of the DC Circuit issued an order denying an application seeking to stay the rule while litigation continues. The parties challenging the Obama [...]
