A three-judge panel from the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has denied an appeal from a defense contractor to halt a lawsuit over their involvement in the 2004 Abu Ghraib prison scandal. The lawsuit was filed by a group of Iraqi citizens who alleged that numerous US military and civilian contractors conspired [...]

Chinese legislators on Monday approved a new law that will allow local governments to tax up to 164 resources at their own discretion. The new law is set to be implemented in September of next year. The rationale behind the new law is to provide local governments with the ability to assist their communities, especially [...]

Nineteen states, led by California, announced a lawsuit Monday challenging the Trump Administration’s attempt to alter federal agreements that limit the length of detention for immigrant children. The Trump administration announced these plans last week. The administration’s stated rationale for the new rule includes the desire to keep families together, combat child smuggling and respond [...]

A federal appeals court on Friday reversed a lower court decision and upheld the Pennsylvania House of Representatives policy barring atheists from delivering invocations. A group of nontheists challenged House Speaker Mike Turzai’s policy of limiting prayers at the start of legislative sessions to guest chaplains who believe in God or a divine higher power [...]

The UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar said in a report Thursday that the country’s military must stop using sexual and gender-based violence to terrorise and punish ethnic minorities. The Mission concluded that “rape and other sexual violence have been a particularly egregious and recurrent feature of the targeting of the civilian population in [...]

A bench of India’s Allahabad High Court, the constitutional court of record for the state of Uttar Pradesh, declared Tuesday that all disc jockey performances lead to noise that is “unpleasant and obnoxious,” directing the Uttar Pradesh government to not permit performances by disc jockeys in the state. “Even if they operate at the minimum [...]

US President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order discharging federal student loan debt for totally and permanently disabled veterans. The order seeks to alter the Higher Education Act of 1965 and its 2008 amendment, which already discharged federal student loans for this group of veterans. Previously though, disabled veterans were required to submit [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the District of Maryland ruled Tuesday that the lawsuit challenging the transgender military ban can continue. The ban will remain in place, but the plaintiffs will be able to continue their challenge of the ban as discriminatory against transgender individuals. The judge denied the defendant’s motion to [...]

South Africa’s Equality Court ruled Wednesday that the gratuitous display of the apartheid-era national flag constitutes hate speech. The Nelson Mandela Foundation (NMF) sought “an order declaring that any display of the Old Flag that does not serve any genuine journalistic, academic or artistic purpose in the public interest” constitutes hate speech, unfair discrimination, and [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit held Wednesday that the State of Colorado violated the rights of a presidential elector who refused to vote for Hillary Clinton, who had won the state. Michael Baca, the Presidential Elector, was removed by Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams when Baca refused to vote for [...]