The Trump administration took its first step towards tighter pollution control on heavy-duty trucks and truck engines after US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler signed an advance notice of proposed rulemaking Monday. In 2016 more than 20 organizations petitioned the EPA to develop more strict emission standards after the EPA projected that heavy-duty [...]

In a special session on Sunday the Iraqi Parliament approved a resolution that calls for the Iraqi government to end the presence of foreign forces in the country. The vote comes in response to a US drone strike that killed Iranian General Qassim Suleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. Despite the potential difficulties [...]

Iran on Sunday announced its intention to no longer abide by the 2015 nuclear deal. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) is a deal signed between Iran, China, France, Germany, Russia, the UK and the US in 2015, whereby Iran pledged to limit its nuclear activities, particularly its uranium enrichment activities, in exchange for [...]

On 03 January, the US launched a drone strike against the Iranian defence chief Qasem Soleimani. The strike occurred while Soleimani was in Iraq and it killed both the general and a number of other personnel in the area, including Iraqis. The event raises questions that touch on various aspects of international law. For example, there is the [...]

John Bolton, former national security advisor to Donald Trump, issued a statement Monday that he is prepared to testify if he is subpoenaed by the Senate in its impeachment trial of the president. “The House has concluded its Constitutional responsibility by adopting Articles of Impeachment related to the Ukraine matter. It now falls to the [...]

The Nebraska Supreme Court on Friday rejected a death row inmate’s argument that the reinstatement of the death penalty in Nebraska violated his constitutional rights. In May 2015 the Nebraska legislature enacted LB 268, a law that aimed to repeal the death penalty in Nebraska and change death penalty sentences into life imprisonment sentences. LB 268 [...]

The Trump administration filed an amicus brief of Friday asking the Supreme Court to uphold a Louisiana law that requires abortion doctors to have admitting privileges at local hospitals. The law, Louisiana Act 620, would leave only one abortion clinic in the state. Opponents of the law argue that the law significantly restricts pregnant women’s [...]

Twenty states and the District of Columbia as well as Democratic members of the US House of Representatives filed two petitions Friday urging the Supreme Court to uphold the Affordable Care Act. The petitions are in response to a Fifth Circuit decision in December that upheld an action by Congress to take the alternative tax [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Friday upheld a the dismissal of a lawsuit seeking the reinstallation of Confederate statues on the University of Texas Austin campus and a Confederate monument in a San Antonio city park. The statues on campus had been installed in the 1930s, but following a 2017 [...]

In response to Thursday night’s drone strike that killed Iranian General Qassim Soleimani, UN Special Rapporteur on Extra-judicial Executions Agnes Callamard said that the assassination likely violated international human rights laws. Late Thursday evening the White House revealed that President Donald Trump had authorized a drone strike against Soleimani while the general visited Baghdad. Soleimani [...]