Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Joan Orie Melvin tendered her resignation to Governor Tom Corbett on Monday. Melvin and her sister were convicted in February of corruption for misusing state-paid staffers to do campaign work to aid Melvin in winning a seat on the bench. Pennsylvania Bar Association president Thomas Wilkinson commented on the resignation: As [...]
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The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Monday in two cases . In Oxford Health Plans LLC v. Sutter the court is considering whether an arbitrator acts within his powers under the Federal Arbitration Act or exceeds those powers by determining that parties affirmatively agreed to authorize class arbitration based solely on their use of [...]
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Sunday condemned a coup by Central African Republic (CAR) Seleka rebels after they seized the country’s capital of Bangui, causing President Francois Bozize to flee the country. Ban appealed for calm and demanded the “swift restoration of constitutional order.” The fighting began on Friday after a January peace agreement collapsed [...]
Amnesty International (AI) urged Monday that Rwandan opposition leader Victoire Ingabire be allowed an appeal in line with international standards after being convicted and sentenced to eight years imprisonment for denying the 1994 Rwanda genocide . According to AI’s report , Ingabire, president of the United Democratic Forces (FDU-Inkingi) , was treated unfairly during her [...]
The Supreme Court of Kenya on Monday ordered scrutiny of two documents used to tally votes in the March 4 presidential election and ordered a recount of all votes from 22 polling stations. The Coalition for Reform and Democracy (CORD) and two other groups reportedly petitioned the court for a recount of the election results, [...]
Two Bahraini human rights activists have intensified their hunger strike and are refusing fluids, according to a report released Monday by the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR) . According to the report Zainab al-Khawaja and her father, prominent human rights activist Abdulhadi al-Khawaja began refusing fluids in response to being denied visits from their [...]
Zambian authorities on Monday arrested former president Rupiah Banda on allegations that he misappropriated over USD $11 million during his three-year tenure in office. Banda allegedly channelled money from the sale of Nigerian crude oil into a private account instead of the nation’s treasury. The Zambian Parliament officially charged Banda with abuse of authority, fraud [...]
Zimbabwe’s High Court on Monday ordered the immediate release of Beatrice Mtetwa, a prominent human rights lawyer who was detained for eight days for obstructing the course of justice. Mtetwa was arrested on March 17 along with four officials from the party of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai . The officials are accused of illegally compiling [...]
The US gave full control of Bagram Prison to Afghanistan on Monday, winding down US military presence in Afghanistan. Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai sought to regain control of the detention center in efforts to reclaim sovereignty over the country, as the US begins withdrawing troops from the region. The US was concerned that turning over [...]
European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) prosecutor Jonathan Ratel filed additional charges on Friday against seven Kosovo citizens on trial for illegal kidney trafficking. This is the first time Ratel alleged that a link existed between the suspects and high-ranking Kosovo officials. Among the officials, the indictment lists Kosovo Ministry of Health [...]
