[JURIST] The US Department of Defense said Monday that charges have been referred [press release] against Afghan Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] detainee Mohammed Kamin, who is accused of providing material support to terrorism [sworn charges, PDF; JURIST report]. If convicted, Kamin faces a maximum life sentence.

Kamin is accused of conducting surveillance on US military bases in Afghanistan for al Qaeda and setting explosives along US military routes in the country, among other activities. The charges fall under the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (MCA) [PDF text; JURIST news archive]. Kamin was the fourteenth detainee to be charged under the military commission system. AP has more.

[JURIST] New EU anti-terror laws proposed by the European Commission [official website] fail to adequately reconcile human rights concerns and may conflict with the Council of Europe's Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism [COE materials], Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) Rapporteur Dick Marty [personal website; JURIST news archive] said Monday in a statement [text; press release] before the European Parliament's Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs [official website]. Marty expressed surprise that the new package of counter terrorism proposals [press release; news conference recorded video]:

borrows selectively from the Council of Europe convention when the convention itself provides for EU accession to it. As the EU (and all its member states) actively took part in the negotiations when the Council of Europe convention was being drawn up, there has to be a question mark about the duplication which the proposals would create and about their compatibility with the spirit and letter of the Memorandum of Understanding which the Council of Europe and the EU signed in May 2007.

[JURIST] Slovakia has signed an enforcement of sentences agreement [PDF text] with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website; JURIST news archive] to allow ICTY convicts to be held in Slovakian prisons, the ICTY announced [press release] Monday. Under the agreement, ICTY suspects who are held at a detention unit [ICTY backgrounder] in The Hague during trial may be moved to Slovakian jails after conviction. Sentences to be served under the agreement cannot exceed the Slovakian maximum sentence for the crime.

Slovakia is the fifteenth UN member state to offer its jails to house prisoners convicted by the ICTY. Last August, Ukraine became the first Eastern European country to agree to house ICTY convicts [JURIST report]; most recently, Estonia signed an enforcement of sentences agreement [JURIST report] with the ICTY in February. Over 35 ICTY convicts have used the enforcement of sentence agreements to serve their sentences in an offering country, and five transfers are pending. The UN News Centre has more.

[JURIST] War crimes suspect Vinko Kondic [case materials] pleaded not guilty [press release] Monday in the War Crimes Chamber [HRW backgrounder] of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina to crimes against humanity and incitement to genocide charges allegedly committed during the Bosnian war. A former police deputy for the Prijedor region, Kondic is suspected of overseeing the torture, murder, and forced relocation of Muslims and Croats. Kondic was indicted [text] March 4 under Articles 172 and 176 of the Criminal Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina [PDF text].

Kondic's case came before the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina [official website] through a deal with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website] to lighten the ICTY case load. Under the ICTY's completion strategy [ICTY materials], all trials are supposed to finish this year, and all appeals are scheduled to finish by the end of 2010. AP has more.

[JURIST] Top officials in Kosovo [JURIST news archive] signed [press release, in Albanian] the country's new draft constitution [text] Monday. The constitution now goes to the Assembly of Kosovo [official website], which is expected to approve it. Last Thursday, the European Union certified [JURIST report] that the seceded Serbian province's constitution is in line with its international obligations, guaranteeing the individual and community rights of all its citizens.

Kosovo's constitution is slated to come into effect on June 15, close to the date that EULEX Kosovo [planning website], a 1,800-strong European Union police and justice mission [Reuters report], will assume authority from the UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) [official website], despite reservations from some EU member states that have declined to recognize [JURIST reports] the Assembly of Kosovo's February unilateral declaration of Kosovo's independence [text; JURIST report] from Serbia. RIA Novosti has more.

[JURIST] Egypt's opposition Muslim Brotherhood [party website; FAS backgrounder] Monday announced that it would boycott municipal elections [MP statement; press release] set for April 8, saying that the government has continuously blocked the group's efforts to field candidates in the election. Party Deputy Chairman Dr. Mohamed Habib said that the government has ignored court rulings requiring it to allow Muslim Brotherhood candidates to register for candidacy. He further called the elections a "farce" and called for Egyptians to boycott the vote. Reuters has more.

Last week, five Muslim Brotherhood members were arrested [JURIST report] as they tried to hang campaign posters, joining the over 800 party members already in custody, including 148 council election candidates. Prosecutors also announced that an additional 147 members are under investigation [JURIST report] for causing riots during unauthorized protests against the government. Human Rights Watch has criticized the Egyptian government [HRW statement; JURIST report] for the arrests, calling them a "shameless attempt to fix the upcoming elections." Muslim Brotherhood members officially run as independents in elections as the organization has been banned in Egypt [JURIST news archive] since 1954. The Egyptian government has accused the group of trying to create an Islamic theocracy through violence.

[JURIST] Turkey's ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) [party website, in Turkish] Monday submitted to parliament a proposed amendment to the controversial Article 301 [Amnesty backgrounder; JURIST news archive] of Turkey's penal code [text, in Turkish], which makes "insulting the Turkish identity" a crime. The amendment was promised last fall [JURIST report] after critical comments from EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn. If approved by the Grand National Assembly of Turkey [official website, in Turkish], the amendment would re-characterize the crime of "insulting the Turkish identity" as insulting the "Turkish nation," reduce the maximum possible punishment from three years to two years in prison, and require the president's approval for any Article 301 prosecution.

Many prominent Turkish journalists, authors, and academics have been tried for insulting "Turkishness" [JURIST report] under Article 301. Critics accuse Turkey of using the law to silence government critics, making it a major stumbling block [JURIST report] to Turkey's accession to the European Union. AP has more.

[JURIST] Women face legalized discrimination in nearly every country in the world despite pledges by 185 members to eliminate laws favoring men by 2005, according to a UN-commissioned report [PDF text] released Sunday. Prepared by University of London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) [university website] law professor Fareda Banda [academic profile] for UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour [official profile], the report suggests finding new ways to fight discrimination since existing human rights laws are not being honored. It also calls for the appointment of a special rapporteur on laws that discriminate against women and notes:

If the UN is to maintain its credibility and not be dismissed as a mere talking shop, then it will have to ensure that the failure to meet what should be a simple pledge, the removal of laws that discriminate against women made in conference documents in 1995 (Beijing), reviewed in 2000 (Beijing+5) and which remained unfulfilled a decade later in 2005 (Beijing+10), is dealt with as a matter of urgency.

[JURIST] Ohio's lethal injection [DPIC backgrounder] procedures fall short of standards used to euthanize animals, according to Monday testimony from an anesthesiologist before a court hearing [ACLU press release] on the constitutionality of Ohio's death penalty procedure [JURIST news archive]. Dr. Mark Heath said that the state's method does not comport with the Eighth Amendment [text] of the US Constitution or with Ohio's requirement that executions be carried out "in a professional, humane, sensitive and dignified manner." Under 2001's HB No. 362 [text], lethal injection is the only death penalty option available in Ohio. The state government is scheduled to provide its own expert witness to defend the protocols when the evidentiary hearing resumes on Tuesday. AP has more.

Last year, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit rejected a lawsuit [JURIST report] challenging Ohio's lethal injection practice on procedural grounds. Ohio lethal injections came under fire after a difficult May 2006 execution where staff struggled to find a vein to administer the lethal injection cocktail, and the one they did use collapsed before injection. A modified procedure was introduced in June 2006 and employed [JURIST reports] the following month. Last September, the American Bar Association death penalty assessment team called for a temporary halt on Ohio executions [ABA materials; JURIST report] on due process grounds. Several states have placed a moratorium on lethal injections pending US Supreme Court review in Baze v. Rees (07-5439) [docket; merit briefs], including Texas, Arizona, Nevada, Virginia, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida [JURIST reports].

[JURIST] Pakistani Law and Justice Minister Farooq H. Naik has prepared a constitutional package that could restore judges ousted by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf [official profile; JURIST news archive], the Pakistani Nation daily reported Monday. The package, which has reportedly been forwarded to Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani [official profile], calls for a parliamentary committee to limit the tenure of the chief justice to three years. The constitutional amendments also call for restoration of the 1973 Constitution and the abolition of Article 58(2)b [texts], which empowers the president to dissolve the government and the parliament. ANI has more.

The new coalition government, formed by the Pakistan People's Party and the Pakistan Muslim League [party website], has vowed to establish a fully independent judiciary and work together to reinstate judges [JURIST reports] ousted by Musharraf's declaration of emergency rule [proclamation, PDF; JURIST report] last November. Pakistani Attorney General Malik Qayyum has said reinstating the judges would require a constitutional amendment [JURIST report] with a two-thirds majority vote in parliament.

[JURIST] The UN Human Rights Council [official website] held its first Universal Periodic Review (UPR) [official website; OHCHR backgrounder] Monday, reviewing the human rights record of Bahrain. Under the UPR, the 47-member Council will systematically investigate the human rights situations in all 192 UN member nations. Bahrain's review [UPR materials; recorded video] focused on issues relating to foreign workers, freedom of expression and gender equality.

The Council has faced accusations of bias, but Human Rights Watch praised the creation of the UPR [press release] as

one of the most significant innovations in this new Human Rights Council. Under this system, for the first time, the human rights records of all UN Member States regardless of their size, wealth, or military or political importance will be regularly examined through a common mechanism.

[JURIST] A High Court judge in Harare said Monday that the court has jurisdiction to hear a lawsuit seeking a court order to compel the Zimbabwean Electoral Commission (ZEC) to immediately release the results [JURIST report] of the nation's March 29 presidential elections, but refused to issue an immediate ruling in the case. Instead, the judge scheduled further hearings on Tuesday in the lawsuit [JURIST reports] brought by opposition party Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) [party website]. Independent observers say that MDC candidate Morgan Tsvangirai [BBC profile] won more votes than current president Robert Mugabe [BBC profile; JURIST news archive], but Mugabe and his Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) [party website] party are demanding a recount [JURIST report]. While Zanu-PF has asked the ZEC for a further delay in declaring the results because of "errors and miscalculations" in their compilation, the MDC has characterized the request as a tactic to keep Mugabe in power. Mugabe's administration has denied any improper delays in the vote count, with Electoral Commission officials attributing the lag to the task of tallying all the results together for the first time in the country's history. BBC News has more. Reuters has additional coverage.

The court on Saturday postponed hearing the case [JURIST report] when lawyers for the MDC were barred from entering the court. On Thursday, Zimbabwean security forces detained journalists [CPJ press release; JURIST report] working for the New York Times and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and raided offices belonging to opposition candidates. Some see both as indications that Mugabe may refuse to relinquish power if he is found to have lost the general election. Although the Electoral Commission has already announced that the MDC defeated the ruling ZANU-PF in the parliamentary vote, opposition parties allege that the government rigged the country's local, senate, assembly and presidential elections.

4:11 PM ET - The two foreign journalists detained last week have been released on bail, a lawyer said Monday. The journalists have been accused of reporting illegally, and have been prevented from leaving the country. AP has more.

[JURIST] The Belfast High Court on Monday heard arguments in a civil lawsuit against five suspected Real IRA [BBC backgrounder] members accused of involvement in the deadly 1998 Omagh bombing [BBC backgrounder], in which a car loaded with explosives killed 29 people and wounded 220 on a busy shopping street in the Northern Ireland town. Six families whose relatives died in the bombing brought the lawsuit against Liam Campbell, Seamus Daly, Seamus McKenna, Michael McKevitt, and Colm Murphy. The family members are seeking approximately $20 million in damages. The court hearing will temporarily be relocated to Dublin to allow the presiding judge to hear evidence from the Irish national police.

In December 2007, a Belfast judge found alleged Real IRA member Sean Gerard Hoey not guilty of murder [JURIST report] in relation to the bombing, ruling that there was insufficient DNA evidence linking Hoey to the bomb to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he made the device. The only conviction in connection with the Omagh bombing was in 2002 against Murphy, but that was later quashed for mishandling of evidence [JURIST report]. Murphy's retrial is pending. In 2005, the Irish Public Prosecution Service dropped charges [JURIST report] against another suspect, Anthony Joseph Donegan. The Real IRA is a splinter group of the former provisional Irish Republican Army opposed to the Northern Ireland peace process. AP has more. BBC News has local coverage.

[JURIST] A district court in the Netherlands on Monday rejected [press release, in Dutch] the Dutch Islamic Federation's efforts to prevent anti-Quran statements by right-wing lawmaker Geert Wilders [personal website, in Dutch; BBC profile]. The court said that that Wilders' controversial statements against Islam and the Quran are protected by the right of free expression and do not constitute speech that incites hate or violence.

In March, the Dutch Islamic Federation filed a lawsuit seeking to ban a release [JURIST report] of a film by Wilders depicting Islam in a highly negative light. The federation dropped its bid to ban the film after it was released on the Internet a day before the case was to be heard in court, but still sought an order preventing Wilders from statements perceived to be against Islam. The film, dismissed by the UN Secretary-General as "offensively anti-Islamic" [JURIST report], shows images of the Quran contrasted with images of violence and protest. AP has more.

[JURIST] A former Nigerien slave appeared before the Community Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West Africa States (ECOWAS) [official websites] Monday, alleging that the government of Niger failed to fully enforce [Antislavery International press release, PDF] a 2003 law criminalizing the ownership of slaves. Hadijatou Mani Koraou, sold into slavery at the age of 12 in 1996, accuses the Nigerien government of continuing to enforce Niger's customary law, which says that a former slave girl is de facto married to her former master once she is released. Hadijatou was "freed" by her slave owner in 2005, but the former master has argued that she remained his wife. The trial is expected to last five days.

Slavery is officially prohibited by Niger's 1999 Constitution [PDF text, in French] and Penal Code. The Community Court of Justice of ECOWAS was established in 1991 and is currently located in Lagos, Nigeria. BBC News has more.