[JURIST] The High Court of Australia [official website] ruled [judgment text] Wednesday that the Australian Military Court (AMC) [Department of Defence backgrounder] is unconstitutional. The High Court held that the AMC employed the judicial power of the Commonwealth while AMC judges functioned within the hierarchy of the military, which was a violation of chapter three of the Australian Constitution [text]. The ruling casts doubt on approximately 170 cases that the AMC has ruled on since its inception in 2007. The case that prompted the ruling was brought as an appeal by a sailor, Brian Lane, over a 2005 charge of indecent assault on a superior officer. Lane had argued [The Australian report] the AMC did not have jurisdiction over the case and that the legislation creating the court was invalid. In response to the ruling, the Minister for Defence John Faulker [official profile] said [press release] that, "the Senate Committee had recommended a Chapter III court with oversight by the Attorney-General, and greater independence from the military. The legislation establishing the AMC fell short of these recommendations." Faulkner also said the previous military justice system will be reinstated, which consisted mainly of trials by court martial and Defence Force magistrates.

The AMC was established in October 2007 by the former government, after a series of Senate Committee reports were critical of the system of military justice and recommended extensive changes. While the AMC was created as a tribunal, the Senate Committee report had originally recommended that it be created as a court independent of the chain of command in the military and in full compliance with the constitution.

[JURIST] The Michigan Supreme Court [official website] has permitted lower courts to use "reasonable control" over the appearance of those who arrive in court, effectively allowing judges to ban certain religious clothing. In an order [text, PDF] issued Tuesday, the court amended the Michigan Rules of Evidence [text, PDF], motivated by the 2006 case of Ginnah Muhammad. Muhammad had filed a suit in a Michigan small claims court where she was asked by Judge Paul Paruk to remove her niqab [JURIST news archive], a form of veil, so he could gauge her veracity. Muhammad refused, saying she would not take off her veil in front of a male judge, and her case was dismissed. Muhammad filed a federal lawsuit over the incident that was eventually dismissed [JURIST reports] in May last year. Also Wednesday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations [official website] (CAIR) announced [press release] that it will file a federal lawsuit against another Michigan judge on behalf of a woman who was asked to remove her headscarf. CAIR lawyer Melanie Elturk said "the judge's actions contradict both the constitutional right to freedom of religion and President Obama's recent statement in support of the right to wear hijab."

Religious headscarves have become controversial in other states and several Western countries recently, as lawmakers struggle to balance an individual's right to practice their religion with public policy and security concerns. Last month, French lawmakers began considering a plan to ban burqas [JURIST report] and other "full veils." In December, a Muslim woman in Georgia was arrested and ordered to serve 10 days in jail [JURIST report] for contempt of court after she refused to remove her headscarf, or hijab, upon entering a security checkpoint in an Atlanta courtroom. Also in December, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) [official website] unanimously ruled [JURIST report] that there was no human rights violation when a French school expelled two students for refusing to remove their headscarves. In September 2007, Canadian chief electoral officer Marc Mayrand resisted calls by Canadian lawmakers [JURIST report] to invoke his discretionary powers to require women to remove traditional Muslim niqabs or burqas when voting in elections in the province of Quebec.

[JURIST] Spanish National Court Judge Baltasar Garzon [BBC profile] said during a visit to Honduras Tuesday that he is gravely concerned by the human rights situation in the country. Garzon, famed for indicting Osama bin Laden and former Latin American dictator Augusto Pinochet [JURIST news archives], spoke at a human rights forum [El Universal report, in Spanish] organized by the Center for Research and Promotion of Human Rights and the Committee of Relatives of Victims of Disappearance [advocacy websites, in Spanish]. Garzon arrived in Honduras [El Tiempo report, in Spanish] Sunday to investigate the human rights situation in the wake of the ouster of President Manual Zelaya [BBC profile]. Garzon reported hearing from victims who had suffered numerous violations of their fundamental rights. Meanwhile, interim leader Roberto Micheletti announced Tuesday that Honduras would go ahead with plans to hold elections, whether the rest of the world recognizes them or not.

Last week, the Supreme Court of Honduras [official website, in Spanish] warned that if Zelaya returns to the country, he will stand trial for treason and abuse of power [JURIST report]. Also last week, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (CIDH), which is part of the Organization of American States (OAS) [official website], released preliminary findings [press release, in Spanish] from their recent visit [JURIST report] to Honduras. The panel found that the interim government has committed human rights abuses and urged a return to democratic rule. Earlier this month, the Honduran Office of the Prosecutor of Common Crimes indicted 24 Zelaya supporters [JURIST report] on charges of sedition and damaging public property. Zelaya was ousted [JURIST report] on June 28 following a judicial order [press release] asserting he had broken Honduran law by attempting to conduct a controversial referendum on constitutional reform [JURIST report] contrary to a Honduran Supreme Court ruling.

[JURIST] The European Court of Human Rights [official website] ruled [judgment text; press release] Tuesday that Italy was negligent in completing an accurate investigation of the death of a protester at the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa [BBC backgrounder]. The court awarded €40,000 to the family of Carlo Giuliani, the protester who died after being shot by an Italian police officer as his van was mobbed, finding:

At no point was any attempt made to examine the overall context and consider whether the authorities had planned and managed the public-order operation in such a way as to prevent incidents of the kind that caused the death of Carlo Giuliani. ...

In the Court's view, the investigation should have examined these aspects at least of the organisation and management of the public-order operation, as it regards the fatal shot as being closely linked to the situation in which [the officers] found themselves. In other words, the investigation was not adequate in that it did not seek to determine who had been responsible for that situation.

[JURIST] The Argentine Supreme Court [official website, in Spanish] unanimously held [judgment, PDF, in Spanish; press release, in Spanish] Tuesday that possession of small amounts of marijuana for private, personal consumption that does not endanger or harm third parties is not punishable by law. The ruling reversed a lower court ruling that had convicted five defendants for possessing small amounts of marijuana. The court found the second paragraph of article 14 in Law 23.737 [text, in Spanish], which penalizes possession of small quantities of drugs for personal consumption, unconstitutional because it infringes on the privacy clause of Article 19 in the Argentine Constitution [text, PDF]. The clause exempts private actions that pose no danger to the public from lawful judgment, leaving them "only reserved for God." The decision emphasized that it does not purport to legalize marijuana, calling instead on governmental authorities to counter narcotrafficking and address the personal consumption as a public health problem.

Last week, Mexico adopted a law [text, in Spanish] that decriminalizes possession of small quantities of several drugs, including marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine, LSD, and heroin. The law explicitly defines what constitutes a small quantity for each of the drugs, and mandates treatment for individuals caught for a third time possessing quantities lower than the standard. In February, the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy [official website], a blue ribbon commission headed by former presidents from Colombia, Mexico, and Brazil, issued a report [text, PDF] that recommended "[t]reating drug users as a matter of public health and promoting the reduction of drug consumption are preconditions for focusing repressive action on two critical points: reduction and production and dismantling networks of drug trafficking," departing from prohibitionist policies that the commission characterized as a failure for the past 30 years and calling for public debate on the subject.

[JURIST] Iran on Tuesday began the trials of more reformers accused of attempting to overthrow the government in a "velvet revolution" following the disputed June 12 presidential election [JURIST news archive]. This trial is the fourth [ILNA report] of its kind to occur since reformists, protesters, and journalists were arrested during the widespread demonstrations that took place in the weeks following the election. Notable among the reformists who went on trial Tuesday are Saeed Hajjarian [NYT report], a former hero of the 1979 Revolution turned reformer, and Kian Tajbakhsh [advocacy website], an Iranian-American who worked for the Soros Foundation in Iran. Hajjarian, who served as an aide to former Iranian president Mohammad Khatami [BBC profile], confessed to being a communist and attempting to overthrow the government. Khatami has denounced [ILNA report] Hajjarian's confession. Tajbakhsh is accused of espionage for the US. All those on trial - more than 100 in this round - have allegedly been held for months without access to lawyers or family members.

Last week, Iran began the trial of 25 election protesters [JURIST report], after putting more than 100 on trial [JURIST reports] earlier this month. Iran has been experiencing turmoil in Tehran and elsewhere since President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] was declared the winner of the disputed June 12 election. Ahmadinejad was recently sworn in for a second term. Earlier in August, three UN human rights experts called on Iran's Revolutionary Court to reject protesters' confessions obtained through torture [JURIST report]. Also this month, Iran's Prosecutor General Ghorban Ali Dorri Najafabadi acknowledged [JURIST report] that some protesters arrested after the election were tortured. Human rights groups have called arrests political repression [JURIST report], saying that Iranian forces are using the protests to "engage in what appears to be a major purge of reform-oriented individuals." Last month, Iran released [JURIST report] some 140 detainees.

[JURIST] The British Department for Business Innovation and Skills [official website] on Tuesday proposed stricter sanctions [text, PDF] against illegal file-sharing that would include restricting and suspending user Internet access. The proposed regulations would be managed by the Office of Communications (Ofcom) [official website], which would report to Business Secretary Lord Peter Mandelson [BBC profile], recommending action against specific users. The proposals could be implemented sooner than the 2012 projected date of prior proposals to counter online piracy that are currently under public consultation [materials]. The changes target repeat offenders by requiring Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to block download sites, reduce a user's broadband speeds, and ultimately shut down the user's Internet access. Costs to implement these measures would be shared between users and service providers. While the proposal was welcomed by media industries, it provoked strong rejection among consumers and service providers. The ISP Association (ISPA) [advocacy website] decried [press release] the government proposal that Internet access should be taken away from users as a "disproportionate response" that failed to properly consult stakeholders, and expressed concern over the cost structure of the measures. Executive Director of the Open Rights Group [advocacy website] Jim Kollock called the measures [press release] a "knee-jerk reaction" to a problem that the market should solve on its own, while the Pirate Party UK [party website] characterized the measures [press release] as "draconian penalties." The government's consultation on the subject opened in mid-June for six weeks, but has been extended to September 29 after changes to the proposal were announced.

The French government has recently taken similar steps to counter illegal file-sharing by proposing an escalating series of responses for users that are caught. The French National Assembly [official website] voted in late July to delay a vote [JURIST report] on a new version [text, in French] of a controversial Internet piracy law. The new law gives discretion to suspend services to a judge after the infringer's third violation, after the Constitutional Council ruled [JURIST report] that the power to restrict the fundamental right of accessing the Internet should not be entrusted to an administrative authority as the original version had proposed. The original bill was challenged [JURIST report] by the Socialist party on the grounds that it failed to find a balance between the rights of Internet users and those of copyright holders.