North Korea called on the newly-elected Japanese government Monday to apologize for its use of Asian "comfort women" by the Japanese Army in World War II. In an editorial published in the communist party newspaper Rodong Sinmum, North Korea called on Japan to repudiate its past and urged it to emulate Germany, which apologized for [...]

The US has released more than 5,000 Iraqi prisoners and transferred more than 1,000 more to Iraqi control in 2009, according to a Sunday statement by the US-led Multinational Force in Iraq . This year's releases and transfers, conducted in accordance with the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) , brings the number of prisoners detained [...]

Former US vice president Dick Cheney accused President Barack Obama of backtracking on his promise to not prosecute Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agents for alleged abuses of suspected terrorist detainees under the Bush administration during an interview with Fox News Sunday, calling it a political move. Cheney's statements come after Attorney General Eric Holder announced [...]

Vietnamese Vice Minister of Public Security Le The Tiem said Monday that President Nguyen Minh Triet will grant amnesty to more than 5,000 prisoners on Wednesday in honor of National Day. Catholic priest Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly , who was sentenced to eight years in prison for anti-government activities in Vietnam in 2007, will [...]

John Wesley Hall, Jr. : "This fiscal year, through August 11, 2009, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) tells us that there were about 1,000 laptop computer searches, only 46 of which were in-depth. This out of 221 million border crossings. It simply is not possible for CBP to widely search laptop computers at the [...]

Former Israel Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was indicted on three charges of corruption and fraud on Sunday after a lengthy period of accusations following his resignation from government a year ago. He is the first Israeli head of government to be indicted for alleged crimes. The three charges all involve some monetary mismanagement, from the [...]

Iranian judiciary chief Ayatollah Sadeq Larijani has removed controversial Tehran Prosecutor General Saeed Mortazavi from office, according to state media reports Saturday. The reason for the dismissal is as yet unclear. Mortazavi was appointed as prosecutor general in 2003 and has been derisively called the "butcher of the press" and "torturer of Tehran" by reformists [...]

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Friday that two Guantanamo Bay detainees have been transferred to Portugal under an agreement between the countries. The Syrian nationals were released from the detention facility following a comprehensive review of their cases by the Guantanamo Review Task Force. Portugal's Internal Administration Ministry confirmed Saturday that the men [...]

A federal court ruled Thursday that a Connecticut campaign finance law discriminated against minor party candidates in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments . The state's Campaign Finance Reform Act , which provided public funding to candidates in elections for state offices, established a Citizens' Election Program under the supervision of the State Elections [...]

Mexican Director General for Protection of Mexicans Abroad Daniel Hernandez told a Mexico City audience Friday that discrimination against Mexicans in US has increased, specifically citing the case of Cirila Baltazar Cruz, a Mexican immigrant from Oaxaca, who lost custody of her child while in the US because of alleged child neglect. According to documents [...]