[JURIST] Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHRP) [official website] chair Leila de Lima [official profile] said Tuesday that torture is prevalent in the country's prison system and that her organization has documented over 300 cases of abuse in the past three years. De Lima said that in an effort to end the mistreatment, her office has tried to plan unscheduled visits to prisoners suspected of being tortured, but last week was denied access to three military prisoners. In response to the lack of access and prevalence of abuse, De Lima sent a letter to General Alexander Yano [official profile] demanding access to military detention facilities under the CHRP's constitutional mandate [text], and has urged lawmakers to ratify the Optional Protocol to the United Nations Convention Against Torture (OPCAT)[PDF text]. The Senate of the Philippines [official website] was expected to ratify the protocol, which would establish stronger monitoring standards, later this year, but on Tuesday Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita [official profile] said the government would likely seek to defer the implementation of OPCAT [GMANews report] for at least three years in order to ensure compliance with the agreement. Reuters has more.

With the support of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo [official website; BBC profile], the Philippines signed on to OPCAT in April, but the agreement will not take effect until it is ratified by the country's senate. In March, Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] urged the United Nations to scrutinize the government's response [JURIST report] to accusations that the military has engaged in extrajudicial killings of left-wing activists, as the UN Human Rights Council [official website] asserted in its Universal Periodic Review of the Philippines [UN backgrounder, PDF].

[JURIST] Myanmar state media outlets announced Tuesday that the state's ruling junta released 9,002 prisoners for good behavior, including U Win Tin [BBC report; AI backgrounder], a founder of Myanmar opposition group the National League for Democracy (NLD) and the state's longest-incarcerated political prisoner. Officials for the state newspaper New Light of Myanmar wrote:

The government terminated the prison terms of 9,002 prisoners with good conduct and discipline for social consideration of their families and released from the respective jails on 23 September 2008 to enable them to serve the interests of the regions and their own and the fair election to be held in 2010 together with the people after realizing the government's loving kindness and goodwill.

[JURIST] A US district judge in enjoined the Dallas suburb of Farmers Branch [official website; JURIST news archive] on Monday from enforcing an ordinance [DOC text] that prohibits illegal immigrants from occupying leased property. US District Judge Jane J. Boyle of the Northern District of Texas [official websites] issued a preliminary injunction, replacing a temporary restraining order [Dallas Morning News report] entered earlier this month, as she set an expedited schedule that would bring the case to trial by early December. A spokeswoman for the ACLU of Texas [advocacy website], which is representing some of the plaintiffs, said [press release] after the judge's decision that

[e]very court in the country that has reviewed these local anti-immigrant housing ordinances has put a stop to them. Farmers Branch has taken the curious approach of recreating their ordinance to be even more intrusive and offensive, to the point of subjecting everyone to an intrusive, Big Brother-like licensing regime. The city has lost sight not only of the law, but of common sense, in this case.

[JURIST] A spokesman for South African President Thabo Mbeki [official profile; ANC profile] said Tuesday that Mbeki has challenged in the county's Constitutional Court [official website] allegations that he interfered with a case against Mbeki's political rival and current African National Congress (ANC) [party website] leader Jacob Zuma [JURIST news archive], calling the accusations unjust. Earlier this month Judge Chris Nicholson of the Pietermaritzburg High Court effectively dismissed [JURIST report] the latest case against Zuma on the grounds that Zuma had been deprived of the chance to respond to claims made against him and that "political meddling" in the case by Mbeki and others could not be excluded. ANC officials called for Mbeki's resignation on Friday, and during his resignation speech [text; JURIST report] Sunday, Mbeki insisted that the allegations were without merit. According to AFP, Mbeki wrote in his court filing:

It is unfair and unjust for me to be judged and condemned on the basis of the findings in the Zuma matter. ... These adverse findings have led to my being recalled by my political party, the ANC -- a request I have acceded to as a committed and loyal member of the ANC for the past 52 years.

[JURIST] Complaints filed with a Senegal prosecutor [JURIST report] last week by fourteen Chadian and Senegalese citizens alleging that former Chadian dictator Hissene Habre [HRW materials; JURIST news archive] was responsible for war crimes and torture are merely "judicial persecution," lawyers for Habre said in a statement [text, in French] Tuesday. Habre counsel Francois Serres of France and El Hadj Diouf of Senegal called the latest action as "unacceptable" and "poorly founded" [Le Monde report, in French] as previous complaints against Habre, and argued that the complainants' central grievance is against Habre's political police force, Direction de la documentation et de la securite (DDS), rather than Habre himself. The case has not yet been opened, with concerns that trial costs may reach $40 million. AFP has more.

Habre fled Chad for Senegal after being overthrown in 1990, and has been accused of involvement in the murder or torture of more than 40,000 political opponents during his rule from 1982 to 1990. Last month a Chadian court sentenced him to death in absentia [JURIST report] for crimes committed against the state. The latest complaints filed against Habre are seen as an attempt to hasten Habre's Senegal trial. Senegal courts have long refused to extradite Habre, despite the issuance of an international arrest warrant [JURIST reports] by Belgium pursuant to its universal jurisdiction laws [HRW backgrounder]. Under growing international pressure to either try Habre locally or extradite him to Belgium, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade [official profile, in French; BBC profile] agreed in April 2006 to try him in Senegal and the Senegalese government later determined [JURIST report] he would face charges in a criminal court, rather than in front of a special tribunal. Previously the Senegalese courts dismissed an action against him in 2001 [HRW case backgrounder], claiming that they lacked jurisdiction over crimes committed elsewhere. In July this year Senegal formally adopted [JURIST report] a constitutional amendment giving the nation's courts jurisdiction over Habre's trial.

[JURIST] International Criminal Court (ICC) chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo [official profile] traveled to New York Monday to seek support [press release] from members of the United Nations and the African Union for the arrest of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir [BBC profile, JURIST news archive], as the UN General Assembly opened its 63rd annual session Tuesday. Moreno-Ocampo has faced criticism from international leaders and organizations [JURIST reports] for his July application for a warrant to arrest Bashir [JURIST report] on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes for atrocities committed in Darfur. On Monday, the Organization of the Islamic Conference joined calls [IHT report] for the ICC to delay any prosecution until peace negotiations with Sudan have been exhausted. The UN Security Council (UNSC) has authority [Rome Statute Article 16 text, PDF; HRW backgrounder] to suspend ICC prosecution for one year, [AFP report] if the move is backed by a majority vote and a consensus among its five permanent members. Last week, France - a UNSC permanent member - suggested that such suspension may be appropriate as a "gesture" [AFP report] to encourage more Sudanese cooperation in peacekeeping efforts.

In August, Bashir threatened to ignore any ICC-issued arrest warrant, saying he would not "deal with or respond to" the ICC. Moreno-Ocampo has criticized Sudan's own investigation [JURIST reports] of war crimes in Darfur, calling it "part of the cover-up." Sudan's justice minister recently appointed several prosecutors to locally investigate and try war crimes suspects in internationally monitored courts [JURIST reports]. Criticism of Moreno-Ocampo's warrant application from the African Union (AU) and Arab League [official website, in Arabic], among others, stems from the belief that the move threatens to destabilize the region and poses a risk to joint AU-UN peacekeeping forces in the country.

[JURIST] Human Rights Watch(HRW) [advocacy website] on Monday called on the Saudi Arabian government to end its 'systematic discrimination' against its Ismaili religious minority [official website; Global Security backgrounder]. HRW urged Saudi officials to create a national institution to recommend remedies for discriminatory policies and to consider individual claims. HRW's deputy Middle East director said [HRW press release]:

The Saudi government preaches religious tolerance abroad, but it has consistently penalized its Ismaili citizens for their religious beliefs. The government should stop treating Ismailis as second-class in employment, the justice system, and education...State-sponsored and officially tolerated discrimination against the Ismailis of Najran seriously threatens their identity and denies them basic rights

Official discrimination in Saudi Arabia against Ismailis encompasses government employment, religious practices, and the justice system. Government officials exclude Ismailis from decision making, and publicly disparage their faith. Following the clashes in April 2000, Saudi authorities imprisoned, tortured, and summarily sentenced hundreds of Ismailis, and transferred hundreds of Ismaili government employees outside the region. Underlying discriminatory practices have continued unabated.

This report calls for the end to religious and ethnic discrimination against the Ismailis of Saudi Arabia, and accountability for the abuses Ismailis suffered following the clashes of 2000. Over the past 10 years, Ismailis have repeatedly sent delegations and addressed petitions to the governor of Najran and the central authorities in Riyadh, including the Human Rights Commission (an official body), but found little attention to their concerns.

[JURIST] Stable, wealthier countries like Denmark, Sweden, and New Zealand have the least perceived corruption and poorer, less stable countries like Haiti, Iraq, Myanmar and Somalia have the most, according to government accountability advocacy group Transparency International (TI) [advocacy website] in a report published Tuesday. TI's 2008 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) [press release, PDF; TI materials], was a survey-based study of perceived governmental corruption in 180 states. TI called for international support to allow poorer countries to institute oversight reforms and anti-corruption enforcement, and for wealthier countries which have fallen in the rankings, most notably the UK [Deutsche Welle report], to take the threat of corruption more seriously. TI chair Huguette Labelle said that not only does poverty lead to corruption, but that the corruption itself often worsens economic and humanitarian problems in the most vulnerable countries:

In the poorest countries, corruption levels can mean the difference between life and death, when money for hospitals or clean water is in play... The continuing high levels of corruption and poverty plaguing many of the world’s societies amount to an ongoing humanitarian disaster and cannot be tolerated. But even in more privileged countries, with enforcement disturbingly uneven, a tougher approach to tackling corruption is needed.

[JURIST] A legal adviser to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) [official website; JURIST news archive] issued an opinion [ECJ materials] Tuesday that UK regulations permitting mandatory retirement policies do not violate an EU anti-discrimination law. ECJ Advocate General Jan Marzak concluded that although the UK's Employment Equality (Age) Regulations [text] fall within the scope of the European Directive on Equal Treatment [text, PDF], age-based classifications are justifiable in some circumstances. Marzak wrote:

[A] rule such as that at issue in the main proceedings, which permits employers to dismiss employees aged 65 or over if the reason for dismissal is retirement, can in principle be justified under Article 6(1) of Directive 2000/78 if that rule is objectively and reasonably justified in the context of national law by a legitimate aim relating to employment policy and the labour market and it is not apparent that the means put in place to achieve that aim of public interest are inappropriate and unnecessary for the purpose.

[JURIST] US Senate Democrats [party website] on Monday questioned the constitutionality of the Bush administration's proposal [fact sheet] to stabilize financial markets and introduced their own plan [materials] allowing courts to review purchases of troubled assets by the Treasury Department [official website]. The administration's proposed legislation, submitted to Congress [White House statement; AP report] on Saturday, would authorize the Treasury to acquire as much as $700 billion in mortgages and other loans. US Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT), chairman of the Senate Banking Committee [official websites], criticized a provision in the administration's proposal that would preclude judicial oversight of the purchases, which Dodd said "may be illegal." An alternative proposal by Dodd and other Democrats would permit courts to set aside purchases found to be "arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or not in accordance with the law." That language was written by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who said [press release]:

I would like to see progress toward a balanced bill to address the disastrous effects of eight years of the Bush administration's hands-off economic policies. But passing legislation that eliminates the role of the courts in reviewing the decisions and policies of the administration invites abuse.

I am pleased Senator Dodd has included my language to allow for court review in his proposal. As the Congress considers this important legislation, I hope we are careful to ensure that the American taxpayers’ money is not misspent, misplaced, and mishandled, without even so much as the possibility of review and recourse for bad decisions.