In his first interview since being released from prison to house arrest in August 2014, leading Chinese rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng told the Associated Press that he was subject to torture. Zhisheng revealed that while he was held in a Chinese prison from 2010-14 he was tortured with an electric baton to his face and [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on Wednesday ordered the release of Sudanese funds held by New York banks to satisfy a $315 million default judgment in the USS Cole case. The lower court found in 2012 that Sudan had provided “material support” to al Qaeda and ordered compensation for the 17 [...]

The Supreme Court of Cyprus unanimously ruled Thursday that Deputy Attorney General Rikkos Erotokritou should be impeached for his inappropriate actions when he accused Attorney General Costas Clerides of bribery during a nationally televised press conference in April. The court concluded that publicly announcing these serious, criminal and unfounded allegations was “false, morally reprehensible, and [...]

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi pardoned two Al Jazeera journalists Wednesday who had been sentenced in late August for releasing video footage that allegedly contained false news in support of the Muslim Brotherhood . Mohamed Fahmy and Baher Mohamed, along with nearly 100 other prisoners, were freed from jail following el-Sisi’s announcement on his Facebook [...]

A group of UN human rights experts on Tuesday urged authorities in Saudi Arabia to block the execution of Ali Mohammed al-Nimr , who was convicted of involvement in the Arab Spring protests when he was 17. The experts said, “ny judgment imposing the death penalty upon persons who were children at the time of [...]

The advocate general of the European Court of Justice proclaimed on Wednesday that the copious amount of EU user data transferred to the US by various technology companies violates EU’s data protection and rights to privacy laws. The Luxembourg court’s advocate general Yves Bot suggested that the court do away with the “Safe Harbor” rules [...]

Denis Sassou Nguesso , President of the Republic of the Congo, announced on Tuesday that he is moving forward with a national constitutional referendum, in what many call a ploy to extend his presidency. The referendum will concern issues such as raising the maximum age for presidential candidates and eliminating the two-term limit for presidents. [...]

The US Department of Defense (DOD) announced Tuesday that it had transferred Guantanamo detainee Abdul Shalabi. Shalabi, who likely was a bodyguard for Osama Bin Laden , was transferred to the government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia after a Periodic Review Board determined in June that, although he may still sympathize with extremists, his [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the Central District of California on Tuesday invalidated the copyright claim to the lyrics of the song “Happy Birthday.” The court considered the question of whether Warner/Chapelle Music, inc. , as the successors of Summy Co., had a valid copyright claim to the lyrics of “Happy Birthday.” [...]

The US Senate on Tuesday voted against a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of gestation. Supporters of the bill, which needed 60 votes but only received 54, contend that fetuses begin to feel pain around this time in the gestation period. All but two Senate democrats voted nay. The vote was an [...]