The widow of assassinated Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana , Agathe Habyarimana, was arrested Tuesday in France on suspicions of complicity in genocide and was later released on bail. French police complied with an international arrest warrant issued by the Rwandan government that accused Habyarimana of helping to plan the 1994 genocide between Hutus and Tutsis [...]

Germany's Federal Constitutional Court on Tuesday overturned a law requiring telecommunications providers to store information on telephone calls, e-mails, and Internet use for six months for use in possible terrorism investigations, citing privacy issues. The court found that Section 113 of the Telecommunications Act violates the privacy of German citizens and that the law lacks [...]

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay on Tuesday urged Egypt to investigate the shootings of 60 unarmed migrants since July 2007 on the Egyptian side of the Egypt-Israeli border. The majority of those killed have been Ethiopians, Eritreans, and Sudanese. Pillay stated that "the sheer number of victims suggests that at least some [...]

Several human rights groups and anti-mine activists on Monday urged the US to join the Mine Ban Treaty , marking the eleventh anniversary of the treaty's status as binding international law. Despite initial statements from the US State Department in November that the US would be maintaining its current policy , the US government announced [...]

The Paris Criminal Court on Monday asked the highest court of appeal, the Court of Cassation , to determine the constitutionality of police custody under article 63-4 of the code of criminal procedure. The request follows Monday's entry into force of a constitutional amendment allowing individuals indirectly to seek review before the French Constitutional Council [...]

UK police on Monday arrested former Bosnian vice president Ejup Ganic for war crimes in connection with a 1992 attack against Serbian soldiers. Ganic, vice president during the outset of the 1992-1995 Bosnian civil war , was arrested by the Scotland Yard Extradition Unit at a London airport on the day he was to return [...]

The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Monday in three cases, including the case of former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling . In Skilling v. United States , the court heard arguments on whether the federal honest services fraud statute is unconstitutionally vague. The court also heard arguments on whether and to what extent the government [...]

A Spanish National Court judge on Monday accused the Venezuelan government of aiding two rebel groups in a plot to assassinate members of the Colombian government in Spain. Judge Eloy Velasco charged six members of the Basque separatist group ETA and seven members of the Colombian rebel group Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) with [...]

Joshua L. Dratel : "The advantages of federal criminal trials over military commissions for terrorist prosecutions are certainly too numerous to list in a few short paragraphs. However, seeking to avoid redundancy, there are three that merit mention, not only because of their importance, but also because they either are often touted as advantages of [...]

Claire Kaplun : "The Universal Periodic Review of the Human Rights Council is an innovative mechanism under which each of the United Nations 192 Member States is periodically (once every four years) reviewed. At this occasion, the fulfillment of the concerned country's obligations and commitments in the field of human rights is considered. All issues [...]