William Schabas , leader of a three-member UN committee investigating possible war crimes committed in Gaza last summer, resigned Monday after Israelis accused him of bias due to his previous work as a consultant for the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) . Schabas claimed that the opinion he wrote for the PLO was no different than [...]
Iraq’s Cabinet on Tuesday approved a draft law creating a national guard in a step toward achieving national unity. The Cabinet also approved a draft law reforming a previous ban on former Baath Party members becoming part of the government. This second draft law proved challenging to pass as Sunni ministers boycotted the reform. However, [...]
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein on Tuesday called for both sides of the Ukraine conflict to halt “the dangerous escalation in the fighting” in response to the human rights “situation in the east of the country.” The death toll now exceeds 5,358, and Zeid said that many public placed have [...]
The International Court of Justice ruled Tuesday that Serbia and Croatia did not commit genocide against one another’s citizens during the 1990s wars that erupted after the division of Yugoslavia. Croatia had accused Serbia of committing genocide against native and ethic Croats, and in a counter-claim Serbia accused Croatia of committing genocide against Serbs living [...]
A Syrian rebel fighter was charged in Sweden Monday with war crimes for abusing a member of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces. The assault on the representative of Assad’s forces was not only carried out by this individual but also by other members of the Free Syrian Army. The suspect was indicted in Södertörn District [...]
Romania’s Bucharest Appeals Court on Monday sentenced Judge Mircea Moldovan to 22 years in prison for several instances of taking bribes from wealthy Romanian businessman in exchange for ruling in their favor in court. Though the ruling is not yet final, the court also confiscated a luxury car and seized money from Moldovan’s estate. The [...]
Hungary must end its crackdown of local non-governmental organizations (NGOs), Amnesty International (AI) urged in a new report Monday. The report claims that the Hungarian government has engaged in “public smearing, criminal investigations, office raids and the seizure of equipment, and a politically motivated audit which could eventually lead to the closure of organizations.” The [...]
Saudi Arabia officials on Sunday beheaded convicted murderer Abdelrahman al-Jahni, the fifth person to be executed since King Salman took office last month. Saudi Arabia has executed 17 people so far this year, and the number of executions has significantly increased in recent years to reach around 80 annually. A significant number of the executions [...]
Uganda’s attorney general on Monday assured the International Criminal Court (ICC) that the government will cooperate in the trial of rebel commander Dominic Ongwen . The former Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) commander made his first appearance before the ICC last week. Ongwen faces three counts of crimes against humanity: murder, enslavement and inhumane acts of [...]
The head of the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) , Irina Bokova , on Monday condemned the killings of Mexican journalist Moisés Sánchez Cerezo and Japanese freelancer Kenji Goto. Moisés Sánchez Cerezo was the owner and editor of the weekly magazine, La Unión, which he used as a platform to address problems of [...]
