Human Rights Watch (HRW) urged the International Criminal Court (ICC) on Monday to improve its impact and stimulate cooperation amongst the international community as the court enters its second decade. HRW not only emphasized the importance for ICC member countries to strengthen their efforts in making arrests of known suspects harbored within their borders, but [...]

The EU announced Monday that it would halt for one year its policy of charging airlines for greenhouse gas emissions (CO2) for flights into and out of EU member state airports. As a result of this delay, the EU will not require airlines to pay for CO2 emissions for the entirety of 2012 and will [...]

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay on Tuesday urged Indonesia to end violence and discrimination against Christians and Muslim minorities, such as Shiites. During her visit to Indonesia, Pillay met with several government officials and the judges on the country’s Constitutional Court. Although Pillay commended Indonesia for ratifying several international human rights treaties [...]

A new protocol to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) intended to combat the illegal trade of tobacco products was unanimously approved on Monday. The protocol was approved by 176 countries during the Fifth session of the Conference of the Parties to the WHO FCTC , which is being held in South Korea this [...]

The Supreme Court of Brazil on Monday sentenced a former aide to ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva to over 10 years of imprisonment for his involvement in a vote-buying scheme. Jose Dirceu, Lula’s former chief of staff, was convicted of using public funds to pay coalition parties for political support. In addition to serving [...]

The UN General Assembly (UNGA) on Monday elected 18 countries , including the US, to a three-year term on the Human Rights Council (UNHRC) beginning January 1. The secret ballot election was held at the UN headquarters in New York, and the following UNGA members were elected to serve: Argentina, Brazil, Ivory Coast, Estonia, Ethiopia, [...]

Italian prosecutors on Monday filed suit against five former employees of Standard and Poor’s (S&P) and two former employees of Fitch for allegedly manipulating the market and abusing privileged information that led to the rating agencies’ downgrades of Italy. Though magistrates in Rome and Milan have refused to support the claim, prosecutors from the southern [...]

The UK Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) on Monday granted the appeal of Muslim cleric Abu Qatada , allowing him not to be extradited to Jordan. The judge ruled to not extradite Qatada because he could not receive a fair trial in Jordan where he is accused of organizing bomb attacks . Qatada has been [...]

The trial of former Libyan prime minister Al Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi began on Monday, but the hearing was postponed until December 10 to give counsel from both sides additional time to prepare for the case. Mahmoudi served as prime minister under Muammar Gaddafi from 2006 until he fled to Tunisia. Mahmoudi is charged with corruption [...]

JURIST Guest Columnist Gregory Gordon of the University of North Dakota School of Law and Benjamin Brockman-Hawe of the Bosman Law Firm say that some measure of justice could be brought to the conflict in Syria by amending the statute for the Special Tribunal for Lebanon…