Romanian President Traian Basescu survived a national referendum on Sunday when the vote was invalidated for failing to achieve the required threshold of 50 percent voter turnout. The controversial attempt to remove Basescu from office was largely orchestrated by Prime Minister Victor Ponta , whose Social Liberal Union (USL) party in May gained control of [...]

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday signed a bill into the law that re-criminalizes slander and libel in the country. The law defines slander as “knowingly disseminating false information defaming the honour and dignity or undermining the reputation of another person.” The legislation was approved by the Russian State Duma earlier this month. Russia decriminalized [...]

A lawmaker from the centrist political party United Russia on Friday announced a bill that would ban the media from disclosing the ethnic backgrounds of suspects, victims and other individuals during reports on crimes and trials. The law was proposed by State Duma Deputy Shamsail Saraliyev , who described the bill effort to reduce racial [...]

The United Nations and the Arab League on Sunday each expressed concern over the recent increased violence in Syria . UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Valerie Amos expressed particular concern over the impact of shelling and use of tanks and other heavy weapons at Aleppo , Syria’s most populous city, where [...]

The Pennsylvania’s Public Utility Commission and the Department of Environmental Protection filed an appeal on Friday challenging this week’s Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court ruling that Pennsylvania’s new oil and gas law violates the state constitution. The two agencies are questioning whether the judges had erred in stating that the seven municipalities and two council members challenging [...]

The US District Court for the Southern District of New York granted an emergency order Friday freezing the assets of traders operating in Hong Kong and Singapore. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is accusing the brokers of insider trading related to the July 23 acquisition of Canadian oil firm Nexen by China-based CNOOC Limited [...]

JURIST Contributing Editor David Crane of Syracuse University College of Law says the actions of Vladimir Putin’s regime against the life and legacy of deceased Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky threaten international progress in basic human rights and have attracted the ire of the US Congress, the European Union and individual nations around the world…

Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt on Friday filed a motion asking the US District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma to lift a stay on the state’s challenge to the federal health care law, despite last month’s US Supreme Court ruling that the act is constitutional. Oklahoma filed its lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of [...]

Pakistan Ambassador to the US Sherry Rehman on Friday called on the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to stop using drone strikes in a video conference debate with White House War Adviser Douglas Lute. Rehman stated earlier this month that she believes the use of unilateral drone attacks violates international human rights laws and standards [...]

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on Friday ordered a stay of execution for convicted killer Marcus Druery who had been scheduled for execution on August 1st. Druery has been diagnosed as schizophrenic by both prison and private doctors, and a county judge on Tuesday refused to order a psychiatric evaluation prior to his execution. [...]