UN human rights experts on arbitrary executions and torture on Tuesday urged the state of Texas and the US government to prevent the execution of Scott Panetti, who was sentenced to death for killing his parents-in-law in 1992. The experts contend that Panetti, who is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday, has a history of [...]
South Carolina officials indicated Monday that they would appeal a recent decision legalizing same-sex marriage directly to the US Supreme Court, bypassing the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit . The state officials have asked for a stay or continuance on the appeal pending the Supreme Court’s decision whether to grant certiorari in [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Anton Moiseienko, PhD Student at Criminal Justice Centre, Queen Mary University of London, discusses the problem of recovery of stolen state assets and describes what obstacles Ukraine may face in its pursuit of the governmental assets diverted by the Yanukovich regime …A year passed on November 21, 2014 since mass protests erupted [...]
The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments in two cases on Monday. In Elonis v. United States the court considered whether a conviction of threatening another person over interstate lines under 18 USC § 875(c) requires proof that the defendant maintained subjective intent to threaten, or if it is enough to prove that a reasonable [...]
The International Criminal Court (ICC) on Monday upheld the conviction and 14-year prison sentence of former Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) militia leader Thomas Lubanga Dyilo . Lubanga was convicted in March 2012 for the war crimes of enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15 and using them to participate actively in hostilities. [...]
Nazi-hunter and director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center Efraim Zuroff told the BBC Monday that he is certain that wanted Nazi war criminal Alois Brunner died in Syria four years ago. Zuroff said that new information from a former German secret service agent indicates that Brunner died in 2010 and is buried in an unknown [...]
Access to Justice (A2Justice) and eight other civil rights groups brought Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan before the Federal High Court in Abuja Monday with the goal of forcing an investigation into alleged war crimes committed by members of the Nigerian military and the state-sponsored militias, the Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) . The rights groups [...]
Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Monday that the new UK Counterterrorism and Securities Bill infringes on human rights . The bill, presented by Prime Mininster David Cameron to Parliament last Wednesday , proposes temporary restrictions on travel, exclusion from the UK for suspicion of involvement in terrorist activity and instructions for granting those who were [...]
According to casualty figures released on Monday by the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq , at least 1,232 Iraqis were killed in November as a result of acts of terrorism and violence, while 2,434 were wounded. Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Iraq Nickolay Mladenov commented on the figures: I take this opportunity to [...]
The UN Committee Against Torture released a report on Friday that found the US has fallen short of full compliance with the Convention Against Torture international treaty . Police brutality , detention facilities, military interrogations and the criminalization of torture itself were several of the top concerns. The committee raised particular concern regarding the Guantanamo [...]
