The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and a number of UN officials on Thursday urged global leaders to abolish the death penalty. In in a presentation and accompanying report entitled “Moving Away from the Death Penalty,” UN Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson stated: All human rights rest on the right to [...]
US Attorney General Eric Holder announced his resignation from the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Thursday. Holder, appointed in February 2009, was the first African-American to hold the position of Attorney General in the US and has had one of the longest terms as Attorney General. In his remarks on Holder’s resignation, US President Barack [...]
The Pennsylvania State Senate approved legislation Thursday that would legalize several forms of medical marijuana. Senate Bill 1182 , proposed by state senator Daylin Leach , passed with strong support 43-7 and will now proceed to the State House of Representatives. The bill calls for the creation of a State Board of Medical Cannabis Licensing, [...]
A panel for the US Circuit Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled Wednesday that the district court’s order that expands Ohio’s voting schedule can remain in effect. Earlier this month US District Court Judge Peter Economus ruled that an Ohio law that cut down the 35 days of early in-person voting violates the [...]
According to an FBI report released Wednesday, the number of mass shootings in which a gunman wounds or kills multiple people has increased dramatically. The study focused on 160 active shooter incidents that occurred between 2000 and 2013, including the 2012 shootings at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado and at Sandy Hook Elementary School [...]
The Constitutional Court of Russia ruled Thursday that the law banning “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations” among minors is not in breach of the Russian Constitution . The controversial law , which entered into force in June 2013, was challenged by three LGBT-rights activists: Nikolay Alekseev, Yaroslav Evtushenko and Dmitry Isakov, who had each been [...]
China’s official Xinhua News Agency released a report on Wednesday detailing the evidence used to convict prominent ethnic minority scholar of separatism Ilham Tohti to life in prison. The report gives a lengthy summary of the case against Tohti, including the 210 pieces of evidence introduced by prosecutors. The report states that Tohti used his [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Jordan Paust of the University of Houston Law Center discusses the constitutionality and international legality of the war against ISIS in Iraq and Syria … President Obama and Secretary Kerry were reluctant to use the word “war” or the phrase “armed conflict” with respect to what they admit is our “fight” against [...]
UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Cambodia Surya Subedi on Wednesday commented on Cambodia’s recent efforts in human rights protection, noting that while there have been improvements, there are still substantial problems in the judicial system. Subedi stated, “The situation in Cambodia today is very different from the one that existed [...]
The head of the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court (ICC) , Fatou Bensouda, on Wednesday announced the office will open a second investigation into the situation in the Central African Republic (CAR) with respect to crimes allegedly committed since 2012. The alleged crimes against humanity include murder, torture, rape, attacking personnel [...]
