JURIST Guest Columnist Jesse Oppenheim, Brooklyn Law School Class of 2013, offers legal context to Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s recent opinion in The Observer… On August 28, word leaked out that Archbishop Desmond Tutu had pulled out of an international summit in South Africa because he refused to share a platform with the “morally indefensible” former [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on Wednesday permanently enjoined a US law that allows authorities to detain certain suspects indefinitely if they are found to have aided al Qaeda, the Taliban or “associated forces.” Section 1021(b)(2) of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) affirms the authority [...]

The Missouri Senate and House of Representatives on Wednesday voted to override a veto Governor Jay Nixon of a bill that prohibits mandatory insurance coverage of birth control for anyone with ethical or religious objections. The Senate voted 26-6 to override the veto, while the House narrowly secured the required endorsements , voting 109-45. Representative [...]

A military judge ruled Monday that he lacks authority to allow media to broadcast the trial of accused USS Cole bomber Abd al-Rahim Nashiri . Al-Nashiri’s defense lawyers moved in July for the trial to be televised because there is a public interest in viewing the trial and seeing potential issues with the judicial process. [...]

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev called Wednesday for the release of members of the rock band Pussy Riot , saying that time served has been severe enough and that anymore time in prison would be counterproductive. Medvedev also said, however, that he does not in any way condone the actions of the group. His statements [...]

The Montana Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that there is no constitutional right to the cultivation, distribution and use of medical marijuana . The plaintiffs in the case sought to prevent the enactment and enforcement of a 2011 law that repealed an earlier law permitting the use of marijuana for medical purposes in Montana. They claimed [...]

UN Special Rapporteur on torture Juan Mendez on Wednesday called on the Egyptian government and courts to stop permitting evidence acquired through torture to be admitted in any legal proceedings including military trials. The announcement comes after three men were sentenced to death on terrorism charges based on confessions alleged to have been obtained through [...]

Amnesty International (AI) on Wednesday urged Italy to change its discriminatory policies against the country’s Roma . In its report , AI revealed that in the 10 months after the “Nomad Emergency” was deemed unlawful by the Council of State, the highest administrative court, discrimination against Roma including housing and education across the country is [...]

The UN Independent Expert on the situation of human rights in Somalia Shamsul Bari on Wednesday welcomed the elections of the new president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and the new Speaker of the Parliament Mohamed Sheikh Osman Jawaari, urging them to respect the rule of law and human rights. He warned the government that it will [...]

The Federal Constitutional Court of Germany on Wednesday rejected a preliminary injunction to halt the implementation of the the 500 billion euro (USD $632 billion) European Stability Mechanism (ESM) and the fiscal compact, but imposed a cap on Germany’s contribution to the fund. The ESM and fiscal compact—measures intended to deal with the European debt [...]