[JURIST] Belgian school officials announced Friday that Muslim headscarves [JURIST news archive] will be banned in about 700 schools in the Dutch-speaking northern region of Flanders. The move came after an administrative tribunal ruled Tuesday that individual schools could not impose a ban [AFP report] in response to complaints after two Antwerp schools banned headscarves at the beginning of the shcool year. The Flemish school board said that the regional ban will take effect immediately, but there will be a one-year grace period [DPA report] for schools that did not previously have a ban. There will also be an exception for religious classes.

Religious headscarves have been banned in schools in several European countries. The Dutch government announced plans [JURIST report] last September to ban burqas in schools. In 2004, France banned religious clothing and symbols in public schools [JURIST report]. A German court has upheld a similar ban [JURIST report]. 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 in 1999 for refusing to remove their headscarves.

[JURIST] Military lawyers for Guantanamo Bay detainee and alleged 9/11 co-conspirator Ramzi bin al-Shibh [JURIST news archives] on Wednesday asked [petition, PDF] the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit [official website] to declare the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (MCA) [text, PDF] unconstitutional. Commander Suzanne Lachelier and Lt. Commander Richard Federico of the US Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps [official website] argued that the MCA exceeds Congress' constitutional authority and that the military commissions formed under the MCA are not "regularly constituted" courts within the meaning of Common Article 3 [ICRC backgrounder] of the Geneva Convention:

These cases were never intended to do justice. Instead, what the government has sought, and to date received, is not a legitimate judicial proceeding but a political show trial. The process has been corrupted by illegitimate political considerations at every step. Political distortions of the judicial process begin with the MCA itself. The provision limiting its jurisdiction to aliens ... was designed to avoid the political consequences of imposing the MCA's facially unconstitutional procedures like this on American citizens. ... No other American criminal court system is so obviously founded on such politicized and illegitimate premises.

[JURIST] UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband [official profile] announced [press release] Friday that the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) [official website] has referred allegations of torture by its officers to Attorney General Patricia Scotland [official profile] and the Metropolitan Police [official website] for investigation. In an open letter to Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague [official website], Miliband called the "scope and handling" of the investigation "a matter for the police" and noted that the SIS acted "on its own initiative, unprompted by any accusation against the Service or the individual concerned." Hague had written Miliband and Prime Minister Gordon Brown [official website] last month, asking [letter text] whether the government intended to investigate allegations that agents from SIS, commonly called MI6, and its domestic counterpart participated in the torture of detainees in Egypt, Pakistan, and Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive].

Hague's letter came in response to a report [text] published in August by the UK Parliament Joint Committee on Human Rights [official website] calling for an independent inquiry [JURIST report] into allegations regarding government complicity in the torture of UK terrorism suspects. Miliband, joined by Home Secretary Alan Johnson [official profile] and MI6 Chief John Scarlett, denied the allegations [JURIST report], saying that the UK does not participate in or condone the use of torture. Allegations in the report include the complicity in torture of UK resident Binyam Mohamed [Reprieve profile; JURIST news archive] before he was brought to Guantanamo Bay. In July, the UK Metropolitan Police Service announced that it was investigating the alleged mistreatment [JURIST report] of Mohamed by intelligence officers. Mohamed claims that he was tortured by Pakistani agents and interrogated by FBI and MI5 agents complicit in his abuse. He was transferred to Morocco, allegedly part of the CIA's extraordinary rendition [JURIST news archive] program, where he claims that British agents supplied his torturers with questions.

[JURIST] US Department of Defense (DOD) [official website] general counsel Jeh Johnson [official profile] said Thursday that the Obama administration remains committed to closing the military detention facility at Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] by early next year. Speaking before the American Bar Association Standing Committee on Law and National Security [association website], Johnson said that the administration was still hoping to meet the January deadline [AP report] for the facility's closure but that there were many challenges. Johnson also criticized [Politico reoprt] recently released memos and reports [JURIST reports] that authorized harsh interrogation techniques, but made no comment on Attorney General Eric Holder's pending investigation [JURIST report] into torture allegations.

The primary obstacle to closing the detention center at Guantanamo is the question of what should be done with detainees who cannot be released. Officials are reportedly still considering creating a military-civilian prison facility that would house its own court at a site in Michigan, but local residents have strongly opposed [JURIST reports] the plan. Officials are also considering trying detainees in federal courts, with cases assigned to federal prosecutors [JURIST report] last month. There are currently 226 detainees remaining at Guantanamo.

[JURIST] Former Taiwanese president Chen Shui-bian [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] was found guilty Friday on corruption charges and sentenced to life in prison. Chen's wife Wu Shu-Chen was also given a life sentence [CNA report] after the pair were convicted on charges of embezzlement, receiving bribes, forgery, and money laundering. A three-judge panel of the Taipei District Court [official website, in Chinese] also sentenced their son to two-and-a-half years in prison and their daughter-in-law to one year and eight months. Two former presidential aides received 20 and 16-year sentences, respectively, while a third former aide, who confessed and expressed remorse, was found guilty but received no jail time. Before the verdict was delivered, Chen wrote in article [text, in Chinese] for Formosa News [media website, in Chinese] that he was a victim of political persecution and that his "heart is free" no matter what the verdict was. Under Taiwanese law, the life sentences will be automatically appealed.

Last week, the Taipei District Court sentenced [JURIST report] Wu to one year in prison on obstruction of justice charges for instructing her children how to respond to investigators probing the corruption allegations. Her son, daughter, and son-in-law were also sentenced to six months each in jail for misappropriating state funds. Last month, Chen filed suit [JURIST report] against the three judges hearing his corruption case, accusing them of illegally prolonging his detention. Chen was indicted [JURIST report] on corruption charges in December. He has staged three hunger strikes in protest of the charges against him, and in January he unsuccessfully appealed [JURIST reports] his pretrial detention. Chen has long argued that current Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou [official website; JURIST news archive] is using Chen's trial to distance himself from Chen's anti-China views.

[JURIST] The UN-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) [official website] on Thursday invalidated ballots from last month's presidential election from certain polls in Kandahar, Ghazni, and Paktika [press releases, PDF] provinces. The ECC found "clear and convincing evidence of fraud" at 51 polling stations in Kandahar, 27 polling stations in Ghazni, and five polling stations in Paktika, including "unfolded ballots, votes for candidates inserted inside bundles for other candidates, miscounted ballots, missing material, uniformity of markings, seal numbers which did not match numbers on the record of seals and lists of voters with numerous fictitious card numbers." Ballots were invalidated from both presidential and provincial council races, and no repeat vote will be conducted [AFP report]. The ECC also ordered a recount of ballots from several other polling stations. Meanwhile, preliminary results appear to name President Hamid Karzai [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] the winner with more than 50 percent of the vote.

Earlier this week, the ECC ordered the Independent Election Commission (IEC) [official website] to conduct a partial recount [JURIST report] of votes from polling stations with high irregularities. The IEC said Saturday that it is conducting its role faithfully and impartially [JURIST report] in an attempt to reassure the Afghan public amid allegations of voter fraud, mainly in response to complaints by Abdullah Abdullah [BBC profile], who was the central challenger to Karzai. The IEC previously announced that it had invalidated [AP report] the results of 447 polling stations because of claims of fraud, but retracted on Monday alleging lack of authority to exclude such ballots. Abdullah's campaign filed more than 100 complaints [JURIST report] with the ECC alleging ballot stuffing, inflated vote counts, and intimidation at the polls by Karzai supporters. Election observers also reported at least two instances of voters fingers, marked with indelible ink to avoid voter fraud, being cut off by Taliban insurgents [Los Angeles Times report].