A Bosnian state court refused to extradite Glavas [JURIST report] to Croatia to serve a sentence for war crimes in 2009. Glavas, who holds dual Bosnian and Croatian citizenship, fled to Bosnia to avoid serving his sentence. Shortly after fleeing Croatia in an effort to avoid the sentence, Glavas was arrested on an Interpol warrant in Bosnia. In 2008, Glavas was stripped of his parliamentary immunity [JURIST report] so that lawyers could proceed with his prosecution in Croatia. Glavas is a former prominent member of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union [party website, in Croatian], and was re-elected [JURIST report] to office under the new parliament during the Croatia's November 2007 elections. Glavas staged a 40-day hunger strike in 2006 when he was detained [JURIST report] after the criminal investigation against him initially opened. rder of two Serbs in a separate incident in Osijek.

Arroyo was elected to the lower house of parliament in April after receiving permission to run for the seat [JURIST report] despite protests that her presidency gave her an unfair advantage. In March, Aquino and other presidential candidates criticized as "unjust" a Supreme Court ruling that allowed Arroyo to appoint a replacement for the retiring chief justice [JURIST report], who planned to step down a week after the May presidential elections. Arroyo declared martial law [JURIST report] in December for the first time in 23 years in the wake of a massacre in the Maguindanao province that left 57 dead. In February, prosecutors charged 197 people with murder [JURIST report] in connection with the massacre. A Manila trial court ordered the arrest of 189 more suspects [JURIST report] in March. Eleven policemen and militia members pleaded not guilty [JURIST report] to the charges in April.

California voters were lured into an insidious trap [by Proposition 14]. Eager to reform the way our elections are conducted, a slim majority of voters approved [it], which promised to "protect and preserve the right of every Californian to vote for the candidate of his or her choice." However, many voters did not know that by voting for Proposition 14, they were also approving ... a pernicious law that tramples on our fundamental right to vote and run for office[.] ... Because SB 6 now threatens to disenfranchise voters and muzzle candidates, time is of the essence. Unless this Court swiftly issues a preliminary injunction, Plaintiffs and similarly situated voters and candidates will suffer imminent and irreparable harm.

In June, the proposition was approved by 54.2 percent [results] of voters. Supporters of the change have described it as necessary [LAT report] to alleviate the strong ideological opposition in the state legislature [official website]. California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger [official website], who included the ballot initiative in his 2010 budget, praised the measure [statement], describing it as a sign of a "sweeping change." The new primary system immediately faced heavy criticism from third parties. The Green Party of California described the new system [press release] as designed to "keep dissenting voices off the ... November ballot." Proposition 14 was based largely on the system used in Washington state, which was implemented there in 2004 after the passage of Initiative 872 [text, PDF]. In 2008, the US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] upheld Washington's primary election system [JURIST report] as constitutional against a First Amendment [Cornell LII backgrounder] challenge, overturning a contrary decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website]. Louisiana has a similar system, but, under that system, a candidate who garners over 50 percent of the vote in the primary will forgo the general election.

While noting the preliminary findings of the State party's investigation into the incident, the Committee is concerned at the absence of independence of the commission of inquiry and the prohibition to question the officials of the State party's armed forces involved in the incident. The State party should lift its military blockade of the Gaza Strip, insofar as it adversely affects the civilian population. The State party should invite an independent, international fact-finding mission to establish the circumstances of the boarding of the flotilla, including its compatibility with the Covenant.

Earlier this week, a senior Israeli official announced that his government would not cooperate with an investigation into the incident conducted by the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) [official website], but will comply with a separate UN investigation created under the authority of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon [official website]. Also in July, an Israeli military probe found insufficient intelligence and planning in the raid, but also concluded that no punishments were necessary. The military probe was conducted at the same time as a civilian one established by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu [official profile; BBC profile] last month. In June, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) [official website] called for an end to the blockade [JURIST report], which it labeled a violation of international humanitarian law. The organization described the blockade as collective punishment, a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Conventions [text; ICRC backgrounder], and called on the international community to work to persuade Israel to lift the closure.

The State's relegation of same-sex couples to the inadequate status of reciprocal beneficiaries subjects the Plaintiff couples to legal vulnerability and related stress, while depriving them of the dignity and legitimacy of a legal status that, while still unequal to marriage, would at least recognize their equal entitlement to the same rights, benefits and obligations as are provided to different-sex couples who marry. The State's family relationship scheme ... sends a clear and purposeful message that the State views lesbian and gay people as secondclass citizens who are undeserving of the legal sanction, protections and support that heterosexual people and their families enjoy.

The ACLU first indicated it would be filing the lawsuit [press release] earlier this month shortly after Lingle's veto. Last week, the ACLU filed a lawsuit seeking to force Montana [JURIST report] to provide legal status to same-sex relationships. The lawsuit seeks declaratory judgment that the state must provide a legal status to same-sex couples that confers the same rights and obligations as marriage under the equal protection, due process, privacy and dignity under provisions of the Montana Constitution [text]. Several jurisdictions in the US have legalized same-sex marriage or recognized same-sex civil unions. Same-sex civil unions that confer the same rights as marriage are currently recognized in Washington, New Jersey, Oregon and Nevada [JURIST reports]. In March, DC legalized same-sex marriage, joining Vermont, New Hampshire, Iowa, Connecticut and Massachusetts [JURIST reports].

The BiH war crimes court was set up in 2005 to relieve the caseload of the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website] and is authorized to try lower-level war crime suspects. The court delivered its first sentences [JURIST report] against war crimes suspects from Yugoslavia's violent ethnic conflicts of the 1990s in July 2008, convicting seven of genocide for their involvement in killings committed at the Srebrenica [JURIST news archive] prison camp. The ICTY retains jurisdiction over high-level war crimes, such as those against Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic [ICTY materials; JURIST news archive] and General Ratko Mladic [ICTY materials, JURIST news archive], who are charged with genocide for their alleged roles is the 1995 Srebrenica massacre. Karadzic, on trial before the ICTY, denies all charges while Mladic, a fugitive since 1995, has yet to be arrested [JURIST reports].

If the federal government wants to be in charge of illegal immigration and they want no help from states, it then needs to do its job...Illegal immigration is an ongoing crisis the State of Arizona did not create and the federal government has refused to fix. SB 1070 protects all of us, every Arizona citizen and everyone here in our state lawfully. It ensures that the constitutional rights of ALL in Arizona are undiminished. ... Our state taxpayers cannot sustain the outrageous costs of illegal immigration, and its continued erosion of our time-honored legal immigration traditions.

In its complaint, the DOJ argued that the Constitution and federal law "do not permit the development of a patchwork of state and local immigration policies throughout the country." The DOJ also claims that the federal government has preeminent authority to regulate immigration matters and that the enforcement of the Arizona law is counterproductive to the national immigration policy and will interfere with foreign relations with Mexico and other countries. The law has been widely criticized as unconstitutional and allegedly legalizing racial profiling. Also in July, the American Bar Association (ABA) [official website] filed an amicus curiae brief [JURIST report] in support of the DOJ lawsuit, following the submission of another amicus curiae brief [JURIST report] in support of a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website]. In the brief filed in support of the US, the ABA also argues that the Arizona law would interfere with law enforcement officers' public safety functions and infringe on both citizens' and noncitizens' constitutional rights by placing upon them the burden of proving their citizenship.

In May, a lawyer for Thaksin filed an appeal against a previous arrest warrant [JURIST report] issued on charges of terrorism in relation to the protests. Thaksin's lawyer was accompanied by two additional red shirt leaders [Bangkok Post report], who have sworn they will testify that Thaksin was not involved in any acts of terrorism if the court chooses to hear the appeal. The red shirts' protests in the capital's central commercial district paralyzed the country for two months, and Thaksin has been repeatedly accused of organizing and financing the campaign. The former prime minster was removed from power in 2006 [JURIST report] by a military coup and has been living abroad in Cambodia where the government has refused to extradite him [JURIST report] to Thailand for criminal prosecution.

[H]is second full day in office ... President Obama signed a series of executive orders that squarely repudiated some of the most egregious abuses of the Bush administration ... These auspicious first steps toward fulfilling candidate Obama's promise of change ... placed the power and prestige of the presidency behind restoration of the rule of law ... But ... on a range of issues including accountability for torture, [indefinite] detention of terrorism suspects, and use of lethal force against civilians, there is a very real danger that the Obama administration will enshrine permanently within the law policies and practices that were widely considered extreme and unlawful during the Bush administration.

Last month, the ACLU called [press release; JURIST report] on the Obama administration to stop shielding Bush administration officials from civil suit and criminal prosecution stemming from treatment of detainees in US custody, touching on issues prominently addressed in today's report. Throughout June, the organization publicized previously classified documents detailing the detainee abuses of the Bush administration in honor of Torture Awareness Month [official website]. In April, an ACLU Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) [text] suit resulted in the release [JURIST report] of internal Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) [official website] documents [part 1, PDF; part 2, PDF; part 3, PDF] revealing that a former agency head may have agreed to the destruction of videotapes [JURIST news archive] showing harsh interrogations of terror suspects. Last May, the ACLU harshly criticized [press release; JURIST report] the Obama administration's plans to revive [JURIST report] the military commissions system to try Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archives] detainees, another of the major issues in today's report.

The President ... found [the] situation of lawlessness that characterized the Roma people [totally unacceptable]. 200 illegal settlements have been ... identified [as] sources of illicit trafficking, deeply unworthy living conditions, exploitation of children for begging, prostitution or crime. He asked the Government to proceed, within three months, the evacuation of these facilities whenever the existing law allows. [Additionally], legislative reform will be undertaken to make [the dismantling of illegal settlements] more efficient.

In July, the Council of Europe's European Commission Against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) [official website] reported that racist violence and rhetoric has risen [JURIST report] in Europe during 2009, following the recent economic crisis. The report cites increasing hostility toward the Roma minority as well as the continuing discrimination against Muslims as seen in the proposed burqa bans [JURIST news archive] as two examples of groups facing more discriminatory actions. In February, Italian authorities began dismantling illegal immigrant camps [JURIST report] around Rome heavily populated by members of the Roma minority following the alleged rape of a 14-year-old girl by East European immigrants, which led to public outcry and vigilante reprisals. Opposition parties have voiced disapproval of the move, and the Vatican has warned against scapegoating.

In April, Fonseka appeared before the Sri Lankan Parliament [official website] to call for his freedom [JURIST report] and respect for the rule of law. Fonseka argued for his release from what he characterized as an illegal detention and a byproduct of injustice, while also insisting on democratic improvements [BBC report] and institution of the rule of law. He was temporarily released from military custody in order to attend the session, to which he traveled under guard. Earlier that month, Fonseka's trials were postponed [JURIST report] to allow the Court of Appeals of Sri Lanka [official website] to examine the legality of the court-martials. Fonseka was arrested by the military in February [JURIST report] after losing presidential elections held the previous month. In March, the former chief justice of the Supreme Court criticized the treatment of the general [JURIST report]. Sarath Nanda Silva, who retired from the Supreme Court [official website] last year, accused the government of using the military justice system to prevent Fonseka from participating in April elections, and of violating Fonseka's civil rights in violation of the Constitution [text].

Earlier this month, the Spanish Supreme Court [official website, in Spanish] ordered a lower court to reopen the investigation [JURIST report] into Couso's death. Pedraz reinstated the homicide charges [JURIST report] in May 2009 after they were dropped in 2007 due to lack of evidence. Pedraz initially ordered [text, in Spanish; JURIST report] the soldiers' arrest in 2005 after initiating investigations [JURIST report] into the incident in June of that year. The order was reversed by a panel of judges for the National Court in 2006. The reversal was then overturned by Spain's Supreme Court, resulting in arrest warrants being reissued [JURIST report] in January 2007. The soldiers were indicted [JURIST report] in April that year.

Several suspected Somali pirates have faced charges in federal court this year. A Somali man charged with piracy pleaded guilty [JURIST report] in May to charges of hijacking, kidnapping and hostage taking related to an April 2009 attack on the US container ship Maersk Alabama [GlobalSecurity backgrounder]. Another group of nine pleaded not guilty to piracy charges [JURIST report] in May. Somali officials have criticized [BBC report] the US for exercising jurisdiction over Muse and other pirate suspects, insisting that piracy prosecutions should be conducted by an international tribunal. They have also asked that Somali pirate suspects be returned to Somalia, which lacks a functioning central government to address the piracy problem. Piracy remains an issue of international concern, as few countries have been willing to prosecute suspected pirates. The few that have attempted to do so include Kenya, Seychelles, the Netherlands, Mauritius, Yemen, Somalia and Spain [JURIST reports].

Russia faces ongoing criticism from the international community regarding its human rights record. In October, the the UN Human Rights Committee [official website] issued a report [text; JURIST report] criticizing Russia's record on human rights and calling on the country to take extensive legal reform in order to guarantee its citizens rights such as fair trials and freedoms of speech and press. Last June, the Council of Europe (COE) [official website] urged substantial reforms [JURIST report] to correct systemic problems in the Russian legal system, including the prevalence of political prosecutions and a lack of judicial independence. Medvedev has acknowledged the need for judicial reform [JURIST report], saying that transparent courts would restore faith in the justice system and prevent people from seeking redress in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) [official website].

[T]he second paragraph of the Preamble of the original Constitution ... spells out the high ideals of nationalism, socialism, democracy and secularism which was also reflected in Article 8 of the Constitution. [O]ur liberation war was fought on those high ideals and those high ideals inspired our heroic people to dedicate themselves and our brave martyrs to sacrifice their lives in the national liberation struggle and those ideals being the basis of our nationhood shall be the fundamental principles of the Constitution. ... [T]hose fundamental principles shall remain permanently as the guiding principles and as the ever lasting light house for our Republic.

The Fifth Amendment was passed in 1979 by the military government. Since this time, religious parties have grown in Bangladesh, numbering at more than two dozen before the court's decision. In 2008, the party of current Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina won in a landslide over the party of former prime minister Khaleda Zia [BBC profiles], which was backed by several Islamist parties. Zia was also backed by the largest Islamist party, Jamaat e Islami (JI) [GlobalSecurity backgrounder]. Bangladesh's International Criminal Tribunal (ICT) issued four arrest warrants [JURIST report] for several of JI's leaders for genocide, murder and torture, allegedly committed during 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War [GlobalSecurity backgrounder]. The ICT was established in March [JURIST report] to try those accused of committing war crimes during the 1971 war, in which Bangladeshi forces succeeded in gaining independence from Pakistan.

Crack cocaine is associated with a greater degree of violence than most other drugs. And more than any other drug, the majority of crack defendants have prior criminal convictions. ... I cannot support legislation that might enable the violent and devastating crack cocaine epidemic of the past to become a clear and present danger.

The bill was introduced in the Senate by Dick Durbin (D-IL) [official websites] and was passed in March, less than a week after the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approved the bill [JURIST reports]. Last year, the House Judiciary Committee voted 16-9 to approve a bill [JURIST report] that would have completely eliminated the sentencing disparity between the offenses. In April 2008, a study released by the US Sentencing Commission (USSC) [official website] reported [study, PDF; JURIST report] that more than 3,000 prison inmates convicted of crack cocaine offenses had their sentences reduced under an amendment to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines [materials]. In 2007, the USSC voted unanimously [JURIST report] to give retroactive effect to an earlier sentencing guideline amendment that reduced crack cocaine penalties [press release].

In March, Bolivian President Evo Morales [BBC profile] called on the UN [JURIST report] to declare access to safe drinking water a basic human right and introduced the resolution. Morales' administration has been working to increase access [NNN-Prensa Latina report] for Bolivian citizens to clean water since 2006, investing in new water and sewage systems throughout the country. Earlier this month, the Botswana High Court [SAFLII database] ruled that the indigenous Bushmen [National Geographic backgrounder], or San, people cannot reopen a well [JURIST report] or dig new wells in their village in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve [official website]. The closest source of water for the Bushmen is 25 miles from their village. The Botswana government has argued that the tribe's village in the game reserve is not a formal settlement and, therefore, the government is not required to provide the Bushmen with water. Spokesmen for the tribe announced in January [JURIST report] that they plan to take the land dispute issue to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) [official website; JURIST news archive] because the government continues to ignore court orders granting land rights.

This bill will take a long overdue, comprehensive review of our criminal justice system - taking a look at what's broken and what works. ... Essentially all elements in our country that are involved in this issues agree that we need to find the type of solution that's going to make our system more fair, more efficient, and reduce crime and criminal recidivism in our communities.

The legislation joins a series of recent US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] rulings scrutinizing the criminal justice system. In June, the Court decided [JURIST report] that federal sentencing guidelines [materials] do not provide for special consideration of changes in sentencing guidelines during USC § 3582(c)(2) [text] sentence modification hearings, and are advisory only, although they had never ruled on the application to sentence modification hearings. A week earlier, the court upheld [JURIST report] the Sentencing Reform Act [18 USC § 3624(b) text] method used by the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) [official website] permitting federal prison authorities to award prisoners credit against prison time as a reward for good behavior. In May, the court held [JURIST report] that the Eighth Amendment [text] ban on cruel and unusual punishments prohibits the imprisonment of a juvenile for life without the possibility of parole as punishment for the juvenile's commission of a non-homicide offense.

[I]n my judgment, the appropriate remedy in all these cases is one of quashing ab initio ... I agree with the submission made on behalf of the controlees that, if the appropriate remedy were merely revocation, there is a risk that a breach of Convention rights would go substantially unremedied ... I would dismiss the appeal of the Secretary of State in AF and AE.

In June, the UK Supreme Court ruled [JURIST report] that a control order requiring an anonymous appellant to live 150 miles away from his family and operated under a 16-hour curfew violated his rights under the ECHR. Such orders were created by the Prevention of Terrorism ACT of 2005 (PTA) [text], which allows the British government to conduct surveillance and impose house arrest on suspects where there does not exist enough evidence to prosecute. The orders can also be used to forbid the use of mobile phones and the Internet. The system set up under PTA has been criticized by Amnesty International (AI) [advocacy website] for what the human rights organization describes as criminal sanctions without trial [press release] that are not compatible with the principles of human rights. AI has called for the repeal of the PTA and the abandonment of control orders, which it has described as "fundamentally flawed." In September, then-Home Secretary Alan Johnson [BBC profile] said that the government would undertake a review [JURIST report] of the system. Johnson issued a ministerial statement [text] saying that his "current assessment is ... that the control order regime remains viable," but that he would "be keeping this assessment under review." In October 2007, the UK Law Lords ruled in a series of decisions that the government can continue to impose control orders [JURIST report] on terror suspects in lieu of detention, but said that some elements of the orders violate human rights.

The DOJ filed its complaint earlier this month, arguing that the Constitution and federal law "do not permit the development of a patchwork of state and local immigration policies throughout the country." The DOJ also claims that the federal government has preeminent authority to regulate immigration matters and that the enforcement of the Arizona law is counterproductive to the national immigration policy and will interfere with foreign relations with Mexico and other countries. The law has been widely criticized as unconstitutional and allegedly legalizing racial profiling. Also in July, the American Bar Association (ABA) [official website] filed an amicus curiae brief [JURIST report] in support of the DOJ lawsuit, following the submission of another amicus curiae brief [JURIST report] in support of a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website]. In the brief filed in support of the US, the ABA also argues that the Arizona law would interfere with law enforcement officers' public safety functions and infringe on both citizens' and noncitizens' constitutional rights by placing upon them the burden of proving their citizenship.

Last month, a Pakistani court reimposed a ban on YouTube [JURIST report] after content deemed offensive to Muslims resurfaced on the website when a previous ban was lifted in May. The court ordered the ban after evidence of content on the websites regarding the Prophet Muhammad and the Koran was presented at a hearing. Last year, Bangladeshi officials lifted a ban on YouTube [JURIST report] that had been imposed after a recording was posted in which Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina [official profile, BBC profile] is criticized by army officers over how she handled the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) [official website] mutiny [BBC backgrounder] in late February 2009. In 2008, the Chinese government blocked Internet users [JURIST report] in the country from accessing YouTube after videos of a government crackdown on Tibetan protesters challenging Chinese rule were posted on the site.

In March, a German court sentenced former Nazi SS member Heinrich Boere to life in prison for the 1944 murders [JURIST report] of three Dutch civilians. Boere was sentenced to death in absentia by a Dutch court in 1949, but the sentence was later commuted to life in prison. Boere never served his sentence, as one German court refused to extradite him because of the probability that he was a German national, and another refused the request that he serve his sentence in a German jail due to the likelihood the trial was unfair because Boere was not present for the proceedings. Boere plans to appeal the court's decision and will not begin serving his sentence until the appellate process is finished. In August, a German district court sentenced former Nazi army officer Josef Scheungraber to life in prison [JURIST report] for the 1944 reprisal killing of 10 Italian civilians. Scheungraber was convicted on 10 counts of murder and one count of attempted murder for ordering soldiers to blow up a barn in Falzano di Cortona, Tuscany, after forcing 11 civilians inside.

Chinese law enforcement practices have fallen under fire in recent months as police have been accused of brutality and corruption. Earlier this month, Amnesty International (AI) [advocacy website] urged [JURIST report] the Chinese government to launch an independent investigation into law enforcement conduct during the July 2009 Xinjiang riots [JURIST news archive], accusing police of executing arbitrary arrests and employing excessive force. Last October, Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] reported [JURIST report] that more than 40 Uighur Muslims [JURIST news archive] had disappeared while in the custody of Chinese authorities after large-scale police sweeps. Residents of the region claim that the majority of the deaths were at the hands of Chinese authorities, but Chinese state media has reported that most of the deaths were due to protesters. The Chinese government has admitted that police were responsible for 12 of the deaths [JURIST report].

Japan continues to go against the international trend toward abolition and mete out this cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. A day that should have marked one year without executions has instead seen Japan return to carrying out state-sponsored killings. ... A working group to discuss the death penalty is not enough. There needs to be an open and public debate and an immediate moratorium on executions while the discussion takes place.

In recent years, Japan has experienced a sharp upswing in both violent crime [BBC report] and the perceived risk of violent crime [Japan Focus study], factors used as justification for increasing the use of capital punishment. In January 2009, the Justice Ministry announced that four death row inmates were executed [JURIST report], despite international pressure to end the practice. In 2008, the ministry carried out the execution of 15 prisoners, including three inmates in June [JURIST report], as well as an additional two in October. AI issued a statement urging Japan to stop executions [press release] after the hanging of four men in April 2009. In February 2009, a group of parliamentarians proposed a four-year moratorium on the practice [JURIST report]. In November 2008, the UN Human Rights Committee urged Japan to take steps to abolish the death penalty [JURIST report]. In August 2007, Japan's national bar association called for a moratorium on the death penalty [JURIST report] until new safeguards are enacted to prevent wrongful executions.

Two lawsuits were filed last week seeking injunctive relief against the ordinance, which was passed by city voters in a referendum [JURIST reports] last month. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) [advocacy websites] filed their lawsuits in the US District Court for the District of Nebraska [official website]. In its lawsuit [complaint, PDF], the ACLU challenged the law based on the Equal Protection and Supremacy [Cornell LII backgrounder] clauses of the US Constitution [text]. MALDEF's lawsuit [complaint, PDF] makes nearly identical arguments, adding that the ordinance interferes with a person's right to enter into and enforce contracts under federal law [42 USC § 1981 text] and violates Article 11 of the Nebraska Constitution [text] because the Fremont municipal government has not been empowered by the Nebraska Legislature [official website] to enforce immigration law. Additionally, MALDEF cites five cases of similar local laws that were struck down by federal and state courts, including a nearly identical law struck down [JURIST report] by a federal district court in Texas. The ACLU is also challenging the Arizona immigration law [JURIST report] on similar grounds.