The California Labor Commission has ruled that drivers for the personal transportation service Uber are considered employees, not contractors. The ruling, which was handed down on June 3, only became known to the public on Tuesday after Uber appealed it in state court in San Francisco. The commission had previously found in 2012 that Uber [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on Wednesday ruled that a group of former top US officials may be held liable for the abuse of hundreds of detainees held for minor immigration violations after the events of September 11 . In a 2-1 ruling the court ruled that former Attorney General John [...]

A Bahraini court on Tuesday sentenced prominent Shiite leader Sheikh Ali Salman to four years in prison for insulting the Interior Ministry , inciting others to break the law, and inciting hatred against naturalized Sunnis. Salman is the secretary-general of the Al-Wefaq political opposition group, and was arrested in late December for speeches made between [...]

The European Court of Justice handed down a ruling Tuesday that strengthened the role of the European Central Bank (ECB) in mediating financial markets. The Court upheld the ECB’s 2012 offer to purchase the bonds of countries whose governments that would otherwise face high borrowing costs. The Court disagreed with a German group’s challenge that [...]

The UN Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) on Tuesday renewed calls for womens and girls to be given equal access to education. A discussion panel held by OHCHR said equal educational rights is way to end discrimination against women that is “so deeply etched in many societies.” The panel said gender [...]

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced Tuesday that food manufacturers will be given three years to remove all partially hydrogenated oils (PHOs), the main ingredient in artificial trans fat, saying they are no longer “generally recognized as safe.” After June 18, 2018 no PHOs can be added to human food unless specifically approved [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the District of Arizona issued a pre-trial order Monday accepting another court’s finding of racial profiling by Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio . Hearing a lawsuit brought by the US Department of Justice (DOJ), US District Court Judge Roslyn Silver accepted the finding from a previous case [...]

The New York Senate on Monday passed a medical marijuana bill that would expedite access to marijuana for emergency medical purposes. The bill, passed by a Republican-led Senate in a 50-12 vote, would allow people with “progressive and degenerative” diseases or whose lives are at risk to have better access to marijuana. Opponents of the [...]

The Supreme Court of Bangladesh on Tuesday upheld the death sentence of Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed for war crimes committed during the 1971 War of Liberation against Pakistan. Mojaheed, the Secretary-General of Jamaat-e-Islami Party (JI) was originally sentenced by the International Crimes Tribunal Bangladesh (ICTB) on charges of kidnapping and murder during the war. Mojaheed [...]

An Egyptian court upheld the death sentence of deposed president Mohammed Morsi on Tuesday after consulting the grand Mufti, Egypt’s highest religious figure and a government advisor on Islamic law. The death sentence was originally imposed in May, with more than 100 other defendants sentenced to death in absentia. The sentences were ordered as a [...]