UN Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment Manfred Nowak said Thursday that European countries should grant asylum to Guantanamo detainees who are eligible for release, but who risk persecution if returned to their home countries. Nowak called on the countries to accept the estimated 50-60 detainees to allow [...]

Prosecutors for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) met Thursday with Rwandan prosecutor general Martin Ngoga to discuss the possible future transfer of cases from the ICTR to Rwandan courts. In a decision by the court earlier this week again denying the transfer of genocide suspect Jean-Baptiste Gatete , the ICTR commended Rwanda for [...]

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) announced Thursday that they will lift restrictions on former Australian Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks . The announcement came after Hicks issued a plea by posting a video on the website of Australian advocacy group GetUp! , asking for members' help in lifting the restrictions so that he could "get [...]

Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Luis Moreno-Ocampo on Thursday formally asked ICC judges to issue arrest warrants for the leaders of rebel groups in Sudan's Darfur region . Ocampo had said last Friday at a meeting of states party to the ICC treaty that he would seek the warrants. The arrest warrants [...]

A judge for the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday ordered the release of five Algerian Guantanamo Bay detainees. In the first ruling on detainees' rights since the June Supreme Court decision in Boumediene v. Bush , Judge Richard Leon decided that the government's evidence was insufficient to persuade him that [...]

Former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has been ordered to stand trial for "complicity in slanderous denunciation" in connection with the a long-running political scandal know as the Clearstream Affair . De Villepin is accused of having orchestrated the release of a fabricated list of government officials and business people who profited from illegal [...]

Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Thomas Hammarberg released a report Thursday saying that "French detention and immigration policies risk reducing human rights protection." laying out the findings of his visit to France in May, Hammarberg expressed specific concern with overcrowding and poor conditions in detention facilities already noted in a February memo , [...]

Media reports that Clinton-era Deputy US Attorney General Eric Holder has been selected for nomination to the position of US Attorney General by President-elect Barack Obama prompted the the Republican National Committee (RNC) to circulate an e-mail Wednesday criticizing Holder for his role in the 2001 pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich . The email, [...]

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) on Tuesday filed a government motion asking a federal judge to review the procedure for handling appeals by detainees being held at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay . The DOJ claims that the current rules, as established by US District Court for the District of Columbia Chief [...]

Lakhdar Boumediene, et al., v. George W. Bush, et al., US District Court for the District of Columbia, November 20, 2008 . Read the full text of the order . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.