Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko announced Monday that the Ukrainian government would no longer object to allowing a referendum that could grant greater autonomy to the eastern regions of the country controlled by Russian-backed rebels. This concession marks a major reversal in the Ukrainian government’s position regarding the rebel-held regions. Despite the president’s decision, rebel leaders [...]
The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) on Sunday ordered a female Palestinian legislative council member, Khalida Jarrar, to serve a six-month detention without trial. Jarrar, member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) has been placed under Israeli administrative detention , a system Israel says exists to prevent attacks by militants. Under administrative [...]
An Indonesian court on Monday rejected the appeals of two Australians on death row for drug smuggling. The two Australians, Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan, are known leaders of the Bali Nine narcotics organization. They filed appeals after President Joko Widodo rejected their pleas to spare their lives. Lawyers for the Australians expressed disappointment with [...]
An Egyptian prosecutor referred 187 Muslim Brotherhood supporters to a military court on Sunday. The supporters are accused of killing police officers while storming a Maghagha police station in the southern province of Minya in August 2013, only weeks after the removal of former president Mohamed Morsi . Egypt had recently expanded the jurisdiction of [...]
Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim was granted a furlough on Sunday to leave prison so that he could attend his father’s funeral. Anwar was taken from the prison under heavy security to his father’s house and will have to return to prison after the burial. His father, who died Sunday morning and whose cause of [...]
Former Bangladeshi prime minister Khaleda Zia was granted bail on Sunday after surrendering to the court in Dhaka. Zia, the leader of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), had been voluntarily confined to her office since January 5, when an indefinite transport blockade was called on the anniversary of the previous election. She faces charges [...]
Kuwait’s Supreme Court on Sunday upheld a two-year prison sentence for a man accused of insulting the emir on Twitter, his lawyer said. Opposition activist Ayyad al-Harbi is an online journalist in his 20s who posted verses by an Iraqi poet critical of the nation’s ruler. Al-Harbi was sentenced to two years in prison for [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Randall D. Eliason of the George Washington University Law School discusses DOJ’s recent opposition to relaxed sentencing guidelines … On March 12, 2015, the US Sentencing Commission held a public hearing on its annual proposed amendments to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines. A number of the proposals concern the guideline for economic crimes [...]
An Egyptian court on Saturday began the retrial of former president Hosni Mubarak and his two sons for their alleged diversion of public funds to upgrade family properties last year. The three allegedly diverted funds that were to be used for renovations to the presidential palace. Mubarak and his sons were originally imprisoned for their [...]
Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Saturday urged Egypt to halt the executions of six men convicted by a military tribunal for participating in attacks on security forces and killing two armed forces officers in a shootout in 2014. A total of nine men were accused and convicted of participating in the attack on Egyptian security [...]
