The government of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) formally asked the International Court of Justice Thursday to review a 2007 ruling clearing Serbia of genocide during their 1990 civil war. President Izetbegovic of the President of the Democratic Party of Action, engaged a lawyer to draft the request before the 10-year statute of limitations runs out [...]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Friday that the Israeli government denied a work permit to researcher Omar Shakir, citing anti-Israel bias from the organization. According to a translation of the letter sent from Israel’s Interior Ministry, the letter said “The opinion received from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs noted that, for some time now, this [...]

A Slovenian law allowing same-sex marriage took effect Friday, and the country’s first same-sex marriage will take place Saturday, according to an administrator in Maribor , the city where the wedding will take place. Ksenija Klampfer said a lesbian couple will be the first to get married under a law passed by the Slovenian government [...]

The UN Security Council on Wednesday condemned the February 16 terrorist attack in Baghdad that left at least 55 people dead. A terrorist group linked to the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for the attack, which was reportedly a car bomb on a busy street in the Bayaa neighborhood. Current Council President Volodymyr Yelchenko [...]

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued a memo made public Thursday that rescinds an Obama administration memo calling for the phasing out of the Department of Justice (DOJ) use of private prisons. In the memo, Sessions states that the Obama-era memo “changed long-standing policy and practice, and impaired the Bureau (of Prisons’) ability to meet [...]

The UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances urged Bangladesh on Friday to end enforced disappearances. The Working Group says that the number of enforced disappearances in Bangladesh has risen from a few cases to around 40 in the past few years. Many of the cases involve political opponents, including three men who disappeared [...]

A Volkswagen (VW) executive pleaded not guilty in the wake of VW’s emissions scandal. Oliver Schmidt, the former general manager of VW’s environmental and engineering office, was arrested in Miami last month and charged with conspiracy to defraud the US, alleged violations of the Clean Air Act and wire fraud in the US District Court [...]

UN human rights experts are called on global leaders Friday to take urgent action on air pollution to ensure world citizens enjoy what the UN calls “the human rights to life and health in environments free from contamination.” The experts stated that, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) , approximately seven million deaths are [...]

The UN Special Rapporteur for North Korean human rights, Tomas Ojea Quintana , is urging the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and the UN member states to bring human rights violations committed by North Korea before the International Criminal Court (ICC) and address “the grave human rights situation” in the country. In a detailed report [...]

The Illinois State Board of Education voted on Thursday to approve a settlement of a lawsuit claiming discriminatory school funding. The vote resolved litigation over the Chicago Urban League’s (CUL) 2008 lawsuit claiming that the state’s funding model had a “demonstrable, disparate and adverse impact” on minorities. The settlement provides that the board will cap [...]