A Kenyan court on Thursday convicted seven Somali pirates and sentenced them to five years in prison. The group was tried and convicted in the coastal town of Mombasa where they had been held since their capture by a Spanish warship in May 2009 after attempting to attack the Maltese-flagged merchant ship Anny Petrakis. The [...]

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) filed an objection Thursday in the US District Court for the Central District of California asking the court not to issue a proposed injunction prohibiting the military from enforcing its “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” (DADT) policy. The court declared the policy unconstitutional earlier this month. The DOJ stated that [...]

The Washington Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a state ban on online gambling is constitutional. Washington resident Lee Rousso gambled online in the past and wanted to continue doing so, arguing that a new statewide ban on online gambling violates the Dormant Commerce Clause, an implication in the US Constitution’s Commerce Clause that states cannot [...]

Attorneys for the US Department of Justice (DOJ) on Thursday filed an appellate brief in the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, arguing that the district court did not abuse its discretion when it enjoined four provisions of Arizona’s controversial immigration law . In the brief, the US argued that, because immigration is [...]

David Krieger : “In April 2009, President Obama went to Prague and spoke out for a world free of nuclear weapons. “I state clearly and with conviction,” he said, “America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” He indicated that he was prepared to take necessary steps to advance [...]

Amnesty International (AI) on Thursday urged the government of Myanmar to release all political prisoners ahead of the nation’s November elections—the first to be held in 20 years. Myanmar currently holds 2,200 political prisoners, the majority of whom were arrested for peaceful activism. AI’s statement marks the third anniversary of the violent government crackdown on [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on Thursday sentenced Aafia Siddiqui , a Pakistani woman convicted of attempting to murder US personnel at the Afghan facility where she was being held, to 86 years in prison. Prosecutors claimed that, while in US custody in Afghanistan, Siddiqui lunged [...]

A Cambodian court on Thursday sentenced opposition leader Sam Rainsy in absentia to 10 years in prison following his conviction on charges of forging and disseminating a false map of the Cambodia-Vietnam border on his political party’s website. The map posted on the Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) website shows an area along the border of [...]

The War Crimes Department of the Higher Court in Belgrade on Wednesday sentenced former paramilitary officer Zeljko Djukic to 20 years in prison for his involvement in the deaths of 14 civilians in March 1999 during the 1998-1999 Kosovo war . Djukic, a member of the Serbian paramilitary group known as Scorpion , was originally [...]

Israel’s interception of a Gaza-bound flotilla violated international law, according to a report released Wednesday by the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) . After conducting numerous interviews with eye-witnesses and viewing other evidence, the fact-finding mission determined that Israeli forces committed several international law violations, including violations of the International Covenant on Civil and Political [...]