The US will seek a seat on the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) this year, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and US Permanent Representative to the UN Susan Rice announced Tuesday. Clinton explained that the decision was based on a desire to increase US involvement in ensuring UN member nations act in accordance with [...]

JURIST Special Guest Columnist Amanda Klasing of the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights says that access to water and sanitation is a fundamental human right of all people, and that right must be promoted by the United States within its own borders and in its policies abroad… Nothing is more essential [...]

The US House of Representatives approved Tuesday a bill that would limit the government's ability to compel reporters to disclose confidential sources by delineating conditions under which it may do so. The Free Flow of Information Act of 2009 was approved swiftly through a voice vote, though several opponents noted law enforcement and national security [...]

The Supreme Court of Pakistan suspended its February decision Tuesday barring former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his brother from holding elected office, pending the high court's final review of the decision. Last week, the government of President Asif Ali Zardari petitioned the court to review the decision after Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and [...]

A Russian court heard arguments Tuesday at the start of the trial of former Russian oil executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his former business partner Platon Lebedev on embezzlement and money laundering charges . As the trial began, the court refused a request by Khodorkovsky's lawyers to call Russian prime minister and former president Vladimir Putin [...]

A Thai court on Tuesday ordered demonstrators to allow limited access to Thailand's seat of government in response to a complaint filed by the Office of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva . The Bangkok Civil Court issued an injunction ordering protesters to remove road blocks which had been erected to block access to Government House. Red-shirted [...]

The South African Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) on Tuesday held that the judges of the Constitutional Court acted lawfully in filing a grievance against Cape Judge President John Hlophe alleging that Hlophe had tried to influence their decision in a corruption case against African National Congress (ANC) leader Jacob Zuma . The judges appealed [...]

UN Deputy Secretary for Legal Affairs Pamela O'Brien apparently signaled a shift in official UN position by expressing sympathy for Rwanda's desire to try any remaining genocide suspects in Rwanda after the International Criminal Tribunal For Rwanda (ICTR) is supposed to stop functioning in 2010, according to a Monday report . O'Brien, who was visiting [...]

Erik Stanley : "The Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission case is pending for decision before the US Supreme Court, and the case raises some serious constitutional questions. ADF filed a friend-of-the-court brief focusing on one specific – and highly important – portion of the case. The primary issue in the case is whether a [...]

The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Monday in Gross v. FBL Financial Services , in which the Court will decide whether a plaintiff must present direct evidence of discrimination in order to obtain a mixed-motive instruction in a non-Title VII discrimination case. The case involves an executive, Jack Gross, who claims he was passed [...]