JURIST - Paper Chase: Sunday, January 2, 2011

[JURIST] The Obama administration has filed a motion [text; PDF] with the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website] to delay the briefing schedule in US v. Log Cabin Republicans, a case regarding the constitutionality of the military's "Don't Ask Don't Tell" (DADT) policy [10 USC § 654 text; JURIST news archive]. The government asked Wednesday for a 90-day delay in the briefing schedule in light of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010 [text and materials], which President Barack Obama signed into law [JURIST report] on December 22. Under the current briefing schedule, the government's opening brief would be due on January 24. The government argues that proceeding with briefs would interfere with the repeal schedule that the act already sets in place. The repeal will become effective 60 days after the Secretary of Defense [official profile] receives a plan for the repeal's implementation from the Department of Defense [official website] and the plan is approved by the president, secretary, and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) [official website]. Until that time, the current DADT policy is to remain in effect. The government argues in its motion that the repeal act brings about a significant change in the law and that notions of judicial economy and respect for political branches mandates that the process outlined in the act is allowed to proceed without interference. The motion further states that the court action questioning the constitutionality of DADT would be unnecessary following the enactment of the repeal act. The government stated that it will advise the court within 90 days about the status of the certification process for the repeal's implementation. The Log Cabin Republicans [advocacy website], the group that initiated suit in 2004, stated that it will continue its lawsuit [press release] during the act's implementation until DADT is not longer in force.

In October, Judge Virginia Phillips of the US District Court of the Central District of California [official website] ordered the US military to end enforcement of the DADT policy [JURIST report]. The order came more than a month after the court declared the policy unconstitutional [JURIST report]. Following the ruling, the Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website] asked the district court not to enforce its decision [JURIST report], arguing that the ruling was overbroad and that the military should be permitted time to implement a non-judicial solution to the issue. The Ninth Circuit granted [order; PDF] the government's motion to stay the district court's order pending appeal in November. Since its enactment in 1993, approximately 13,000 servicemen and women have been discharged from the armed forces as a result of DADT.

[JURIST] Iranian chief prosecutor Abbas Jafari-Dolatabadi delivered a speech at Tehran University on Friday indicating that he would prosecute opposition leaders for political unrest that took place after the country's 2009 presidential election [JURIST news archive]. Dolatabadi threatened to prosecute [NYT report] former presidential candidates Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahdi Karroubi and former Iranian president Mohammad Khatami [BBC profiles]. Mousavi and the other leaders called for continuing protests [JURIST report] to oppose the results of the 2009 presidential election, arguing that it was fraudulent. Dolatabadi referred to the opposition leaders as criminals [WP report] who threatened the country's security and public trust. Dolatabadi's remarks echoed those made in a speech delivered the previous day by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei [BBC profile], Iran's highest authority, during a pro-government rally.

The three leaders would join a long line of individuals detained or already prosecuted for their roles during the election protests. In September, Shiva Nazar Ahari, a journalist arrested after the 2009 elections, was sentenced to six years in prison [JURIST report] for charges including "warring against God" and distributing anti-government propaganda. Also in September, Nasrin Sotoudeh, a prominent Iranian human rights lawyer known for representing political activists following the 2009 election, was detained for allegedly spreading propaganda and colluding against national security [JURIST report]. In August, an Iranian court sentenced Qorban Behzadianejad, Mousavi's campaign manager, to five years in prison [JURIST report]. The Iranian government detained hundreds of protesters and sentenced several to death [JURIST report]. Khamenei pardoned or commuted the sentences of 81 protesters [JURIST report] in June.

[JURIST] The Yemeni Parliament [official website, in Arabic] on Saturday agreed in principle to adopt a constitutional amendment that will abolish presidential term limits. Currently, the Yemeni constitution [text, PDF] permits the president to sit for a maximum of two consecutive seven-year terms, but the draft amendment would shorten the term length to five years and eliminate the two-term cap. The measure was adopted with 170 votes by a parliament dominated by the ruling General People's Congress (GPC) [party website] of President Ali Abdullah Saleh [official website]. In an interview with al-Saeeda TV last week, Sultan al-Barakani, head of the GPC's parliamentary bloc, said that the party's aim in adopting the measure is to make Saleh president for life [News Yemen report]. Saleh was elected for the first time in 1999 and began his second term in 2006. On Sunday, the Yemeni Socialist Party (YSP) [NationMaster backgrounder], the GPC's primary opposition, joined with a coalition of minority parties and independents in the Yemeni parliament in accusing the GPC of undermining the republic's democratic rule and called for protests [AFP report] opposing the amendments. In anticipation of the vote Friday, US State Department spokesman Mark Toner issued a statement [text] "urgently calling on all parties to delay parliamentary action and to return to the negotiating table" before adopting any such amendments. The GPC rebuffed [Azer-News report] the statement Saturday as undue interference in the nation's affairs. The Yemeni Parliament is expected to hear more detailed debate on the amendments in March before putting the matter to a referendum along with parliamentary voting on April 27.

The popular Saleh, who has been in power in Yemen since 1978, has generally been considered friendly to the US and an ally in the war on terror, but his GPC's efforts to amend the Yemeni constitution in recent years have caused mounting political tensions in the Arabian Peninsula's only republic. In December, the parliament stoked outrage among opposition parties and independents when it amended the constitution [AFP report] to eliminate provisions requiring that opposition parties be represented on the high election commission. That amendment was part of a package of measures, along with Saturday's abolition of term limits, that was originally proposed in 2009 after the GPC and YSP agreed in an EU-brokered deal to delay elections until the electoral process could be reformed. In 2008, the Yemeni parliament failed to adopt a bill [JURIST report] that would have restricted government officials from influencing parliamentary ballots. The GPC majority voted as a bloc against the bill, while the YSP, eight senior members of which were being tried on corruption charges at the time, boycotted the vote.

[JURIST] Lawyers for jailed former Russian oil executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky [defense profile; JURIST news archive] and his business partner, Platon Lebedev [defense profile], filed an appeal Friday challenging their six-year extended sentences for embezzlement and fraud. Unless the appeal succeeds, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev are expected to remain imprisoned through 2017 after being convicted and sentenced [JURIST report] last week in the Khamovinchesky District Court [olfficial website, in Russian] on charges connected with his embezzlement of more than $27 billion [AFP report] from Yukos oil. Before their conviction last week, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev were already serving eight-year prison sentences for fraud and tax evasion [JURIST report].

Defense counsel have staunchly criticized last week's verdict, claiming [press release] that the court blocked significant amounts of testimony and evidence submitted by the defense and systematically quashed objections to their omission. The verdict drew vehement international criticism [JURIST report], including from US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton [official profile], who said [press release] that the ruling "raises serious questions about selective prosecution." The Russian Ministry for Foreign Affairs [official website, in Russian] dismissed critics, saying [press release, in Russian] that "[a]ttempts to exert pressure on the court are unacceptable." In May, former Russian prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov [BBC profile] testified [JURIST report] that Putin ordered Khodorkovsky's arrest for political reasons, indicating that Khodorkovsky had funded the Communist Party [party website, in Russian] without first getting approval to do so from the president. In March, Khodorkovsky criticized the Russian justice system [JURIST report] as an "assembly line" that inevitably finds the government's political enemies to be guilty. The statement echoed concerns Khodorkovsky had previously expressed about the fairness of Russian trials and the need for widespread reform of the Russian court system [JURIST reports].