[JURIST] A British Royal Air Force [official website] medical officer has become the first member of the UK military to face criminal charges for disobeying a lawful command because he refused to fight in Iraq, claiming the war there is illegal. Flight-Lieutenant Malcolm Kendall-Smith, decorated from operations in Afghanistan and two previous tours in Iraq, will be court-martialed at a military base in front of a senior judge and at least five high ranking officers, without a jury. Preliminary proceedings are expected to start later this year. Kendall-Smith studied the legal position of the war in Iraq after his first two tours there, and subsequently concluded the war was “manifestly unlawful.” A number of international lawyers have claimed there was no legal justification [opinion website] for invading Iraq because the US and Britain did not wait for the UN to pass a second resolution authorizing military force, and even English Attorney General Lord Goldsmith expressed reservations about the war [JURIST report]. Relying on the Royal Air Force manual, Kendall-Smith will argue that a serving officer may refuse to obey commands if an action is unlawful. The Times of London has local coverage.
[JURIST] Muslim leaders and rights groups in Indonesia [JURIST news archive] fear that plans to strengthen Indonesian anti-terror laws [JURIST report] in the wake a of a second round of Bali bombings earlier this month will return the country to the days when former dictator Suharto [Wikipedia profile] used security forces to stifle dissent. Indonesia’s government Saturday tried to reassure citizens that the planned laws will not allow suspects to be detained indefinitely without trial, as they can be in neighboring Malaysia and Singapore. President Susilo Yudhoyono [BBC prolife] would, however, like to increase the military’s intelligence role by using its network of bases to monitor suspicious activity. AP has more.
[JURIST] The UN human rights chief in Haiti [JURIST news archive] said Friday that the human rights situation in the Caribbean nation had become "catastrophic". Thierry Fagart, who heads a team of some 30 UN observers, cited numerous violations of basic human rights, such as arbitrary arrests, torture and summary executions committed by Haitian National Police, and street violence committed by gangs. Tensions in the country have increased with the approach of presidential and legislative elections [JURIST report] scheduled for November 13. Rights groups estimate that more than 1,500 people have died in political violence in Haiti since the ouster of former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide last year. AP has more.
[JURIST] Explicitly evoking images of Germany in the 1930s, senior British judges and lawyers are warning that the Blair government's efforts to put pressure on the judiciary in the interpretation of the Human Rights Act [text] while restricting traditional civil liberties in anti-terror legislation risks turning the country into a police state. Former law lord Lord Ackner has said "The judiciary has been put there by Parliament in order to ensure that the executive acts lawfully. If we take that away from the judiciary we are really apeing what happened in Nazi Germany." Anthony Scrivener QC, a former president of the Bar Council [profession website] lately in the headlines as a possible defense lawyer for ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, has meanwhile derided provisions for 90-days detention without charge in the government's new Terrorism Bill [PDF text; Home Office overview] as "street justice", rather than the "summary justice" described by Downing Street. Leading human rights advocate Lord Lester QC has suggested that "If the Prime Minister and other members of the Government continue to threaten to undermine the Human Rights Act and interfere with judicial independence we shall have to secure our basic human rights and freedoms with a written constitution." In December, the law lords turned back a British government effort [JURIST report] to authorize indefinite detention of foreign citizens without charge or trial; this week, they are scheduled to consider whether evidence obtained under torture abroad is admissible in British courts. The Independent has more.
[JURIST] A spokesman for the UN-Afghan Joint Election Management Body [official website] said Sunday that "approximately 50" Afghan election workers had been dismissed under suspicion of fraud committed in last month's parliamentary elections [JURIST report]. Some 680 ballot boxes alleged to have been stuffed - about 3% of the total - have been removed from the counting process. The spokesman reiterated that the instances of fraud were isolated and did "not affect the integrity of the election". Counting is still in process from the September 18 poll; so far provisional results have been published for only 20 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces [JEMB electoral map]. Popular dissatisfaction with the vote, which is alleged to have been rife with irregularities, has prompted demonstrations in several cities including the capital, Kabul. A number of elected candidates have ties to the Taliban or are local warlords accused of war crimes by Western human rights groups. Aljazeera has more.
[JURIST] Fears have arisen in The Netherlands over the safety of Dutch Integration Minister Rita Verdonk [official profile] after police Friday arrested seven people suspected of planning to assassinate two other Dutch politicians named on a Islamist "hit list" pinned to the body of assassinated Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh [BBC report] last November. Last week Verdonk triggered outrage in the almost 1 million-strong Dutch Muslim community [Wikipedia backgrounder] by suggesting the government might take the unprecedented step of banning the burka [JURIST report], the Muslim covering for women that leaves open only a small region about the eyes. There are concerns she too might be targeted on or near the anniversary of Van Gogh's murder. The Times of London has more.
[JURIST] Military prosecutors have re-charged US Army Second Lt. Erick Anderson in connection with the killing of a wounded Iraqi teenager in August 2004, according to Anderson's uncle. Anderson and the other soldiers involved in what witnesses described as a rescue attempt say the teen was inside a burning truck and they decided the best course of action was to "put him out of his misery." The original charges against Anderson [JURIST report] were dropped in January [Cleveland Sun report] while investigation of the incident continued; it was anticipated at the time that they would be re-filed. The Anderson family and their supporters, including two members of Congress, are scheduled to hold a press conference on his case in Cleveland Monday. Aljazeera has more.
[JURIST] US and local Iraqi sources suggested Sunday that the draft Iraqi constitution [JURIST news archive] was heading towards approval after initial vote counts in Saturday's referendum [JURIST report]. No formal results have as yet been issued, but local election officials described returns that would likely allow the charter to avoid defeat by two-thirds of voters in three of Iraq's 18 provinces. Voters in the Sunni-dominatred provinces of Anbar and Salahaddin were still expected to reject the constitution, but figures from the "swing" province of Nineveh and its capital Mosul indicated a massive "Yes" vote there with 260 of 300 polling stations reporting. The Baghdad-based author of the Iraq the Model weblog has posted video from al-Iraqiya TV [WMP file] of Iraqi men celebrating the success of the referendum in Mosul itself. The other potentially-problematic province of Diyala, with a Sunni population of only 40%, is unlikely to muster a sufficient number of "No" votes to stop the charter. Election officials Sunday raised their turnout estimates from 61% to 63-64%, up from 58% in the January parliamentary elections. Official results from the poll are not expected until at least Monday. Approval of the Iraqi constitution means that elections for the first permanent Natinal Aeembly constituted under the document will take place December 15. AP has more.
[JURIST] New York Times reporter Judith Miller [JURIST news archive] wrote in an extensive article published on the Times website Saturday that although the special prosecutor investigating the leak of the identity of CIA analyst Valerie Plame [JURIST news archive] pressed her during grand jury testimony on details about her meetings with Dick Cheney aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in the weeks leading up to the leak, she "didn't think" she got the name from him, and said she couldn't recall who she heard the name from, although a misspelled version of the name and an alias appeared in her notebooks. Miller reported that Libby himself had been very careful in handling classified information, and was interested in insulating the Vice-President from accusations leveled by Plame's husband, US ambassador Joseph Wilson, that the administration had mishandled Iraq intelligence in the run-up to war. Miller was released from a federal prison in Virginia in late September after spending 85 days there on a judge's contempt order for refusing to reveal the source of her information related to the Plame affair. The contempt order against her was lifted last week [JURIST report] after her second grand jury appearance. Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation of the leak is said to coming to its concluson; top White House political advisor Karl Rove testified for a fourth time [JURIST report] before the grand jury on Friday. AP has more. Other New York Times reporters offer their own view of the Miller controversy here [NYT report], noting that Miller and the Times itself have not come away from it unscathed.
[JURIST] Toledo Ohio police arrested at least 60 people Saturday after rioting broke out following the cancellation of a planned march by American Nazis through a Toledo neighborhood. The march by the National Socialist Movement, which calls itself "America's Nazi Party", had been organized to highlight what party members called "black criminal behavior" in a neighborhood dispute. A number of Nazis gathered for the march, but that was cancelled before it ever took place, and the violence largely broke out between angry residents and the police. A crowd of some 500 threw rocks at police and were met with tear gas as police reinforcements converged on the area. Toledo Mayor Jack Ford [official profile] came to the scene and tried to disperse the crowd, addressing them over a loud-hailer, only to be met with curses and at least one threat to shoot him. Several businesses and cars were set on fire and a number of officers were injured before the riot was brought under control in the late afternoon. Ford declared an 8 PM curfew, and the city appeared calm but shaken Sunday. The National Socialist Movement offers its version of events [NSM release]. The Toledo Blade has local coverage.
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Paper Chase is JURIST's real-time legal news service, powered by a team of 30 law student reporters and editors led by law professor Bernard Hibbitts at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. As an educational service, Paper Chase is dedicated to presenting important legal news and materials rapidly, objectively and intelligibly in an accessible, ad-free format.
PAPER CHASE ARCHIVE
Legal news from Sunday, October 16, 2005
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