[JURIST] Participants in the United Nations Climate Change Conference [official website] agreed in Bali, Indonesia Saturday to a timetable for negotiating a new international treaty on global warming [EPA materials; JURIST news archive]. Under the "Bali Roadmap" [PDF text; press release, PDF], the 187 participating nations pledged to a negotiate a new agreement to replace the expiring Kyoto Protocol [text; JURIST news archive] by 2009:

The decision includes a clear agenda for the key issues to be negotiated up to 2009. These are: action for adapting to the negative consequences of climate change, such as droughts and floods; ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions; ways to widely deploy climate-friendly technologies and financing both adaptation and mitigation measures.

Concluding negotiations in 2009 will ensure that the new deal can enter into force by 2013, following the expiry of the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol.

[JURIST] Republican senators Friday blocked US Senate agreement to provisions in a House of Representatives intelligence funding bill passed [JURIST report] Thursday limiting CIA interrogation methods by invoking a Senate rule against the late insertion of new language in legislation. House and Senate negotiators had added language to HR 2082 [materials] that would bar the CIA from using techniques not authorized in a 2006 Army Field Manual, Field Manual 2-22.3 [PDF text], which explicitly prohibits the use of waterboarding, electrocution, sensory deprivation, inducing hypothermia, or depriving the subject of food, water, or medical care. Adding language in the process of legislative negotiation between houses of Congress is hardly unprecedented, but it can be challenged on the principle that lawmakers did not have a chance to consider it in original versions of the legislation they approved. Under Senate rules the added language is dropped.

The proposed restriction on CIA interrogations was already facing a likely veto challenge from President Bush, who in July 2007 signed [JURIST report] a controversial executive order [text] that prohibits cruel and inhuman treatment during the interrogation of terror suspects detained by the CIA, but allows "enhanced interrogation techniques" and may exempt the CIA from Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. The order does not specify what specific interrogation techniques are now disallowed, but the order prohibits "acts intended to denigrate the religion, religious practices, or religious objects of the individual," and "torture" as defined in 18 USC 2340.

[JURIST] Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf Saturday lifted emergency rule over the country as anticipated [JURIST report], issuing an order [official version, PDF; HTML text] reviving the suspended constitution, entrenching members of the country's post-emergency judiciary, and insulating actions taken under the emergency from any future legal challenges. The Revocation of Proclamation of Emergency Order 2007 also provides that the parliamentary elections scheduled for January 8 will take place as scheduled. In a televised ceremony afterwards, Musharraf personally swore in [Straits Times report] Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar of the Supreme Court of Pakistan under a new oath under the revived constitution replacing the one he had originally taken to the regime under the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO) promulgated when the emergency was declared on November 3. Dogar then reswore the other PCO top court judges.

Rights groups expressed ambivalence about the lifting of the emergency, criticizing Musharraf's self-accorded impunity, his refusal to reinstate ousted members of the pre-emergency Supreme Court and provincial High Courts and his unilateral addition of restrictive amendments [JURIST report] to the restored constitution. In a statement [text] Saturday, a spokesman for Human Rights Watch said that:

Musharraf’s so-called return to constitutional rule provides legal cover to laws that muzzle the media and lawyers and gives the army a license to abuse. A genuine restoration of Pakistan’s constitution would require Musharraf to return to the constitution and judiciary that existed before November 3.

Since November 3, Musharraf has repeatedly and arbitrarily amended the constitution to enshrine the legality of various laws and provide himself and the military blanket immunity for all actions taken during emergency rule. The executive order to amend the constitution includes a number of amendments that would normally require a two-thirds majority in parliament to become law. Among them, Musharraf has withdrawn from Pakistan’s courts the power to review all governmental actions for which he, his government or the military may be responsible, since the imposition of emergency rule on November 3.

[JURIST] US Attorney General Michael Mukasey said Friday that the Department of Justice will not provide information to congressional officials regarding its ongoing probe into the CIA's destruction of videotapes [JURIST reports] showing the interrogation of terror suspects. In a letter [PDF text] to top members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Mukasey wrote:

the Department has a long-standing policy of declining to provide non-public information about pending matters. This policy is based in part on our interest in avoiding any perception that our law enforcement decisions are subject to political influence. Accordingly, I will not at this time provide further information in response to your letter, but appreciate the Committee's interests in this matter. At my confirmation hearing, I testified that I would act independently, resist political pressure and ensure that politics plays no role in cases brought by the Department of Justice. Consistent with that testimony, the facts will be followed wherever they lead in this inquiry, and the relevant law applied.

Finally, with regard to the suggestion that I appoint a special counsel, I am aware of no facts at present to suggest that Department attorneys cannot conduct this inquiry in an impartial manner. If I become aware of information that leads me to a different conclusion, I will act on it.

The Judiciary Committee has an important role in the oversight of the Department of Justice. Oversight fosters accountability. This Committee needs to fully understand whether the government used cruel interrogation techniques and torture, contrary to our basic values.

Just two days ago, CIA Director Michael Hayden appeared before our Committee to address the CIA's destruction of videotapes. In that hearing, he committed to providing materials relevant to our investigation. Earlier today, our staff was notified that the Department of Justice has advised CIA not cooperate with our investigation.

We are stunned that the Justice Department would move to block our investigation. Parallel investigations occur all of the time, and there is no basis upon which the Attorney General can stand in the way of our work. ...

It's clear that there's more to this story than we have been told, and it is unfortunate that we are being prevented from learning the facts. The Executive Branch can't be trusted to oversee itself. Congress must conduct its own investigation.

[JURIST] The UN Human Rights Council [official website] voted Friday to end the mandate of a group of seven human rights experts tasked with monitoring the rights situation in the Darfur region [JURIST news archive] in Sudan. The council did, however, extend the mandate of its Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Sudan [OHCHR materials] and adopted a resolution [press release] urging "the Government to continue and to intensify its efforts to implement the recommendations identified by the Group of Experts in accordance with the specified time frames and indicators."

The council's actions follow demands by several African countries that political pressure on Sudan be eased, and rights groups, including Human Rights Watch, condemned the decision to disband the group of experts. AP has more. The UN News Centre has additional coverage.