Russian President Dmitry Medvedev promised Tuesday to take steps to tackle corruption and intimidation in the Russian judicial system, calling for reforms to better train and support judges and to preserve the rule of law. Speaking at a meeting of top Russian legal officials, Medvedev said : Our main objective is to achieve independence for [...]

US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents were present during interrogations of terrorism suspects in which Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or Department of Defense (DOD) officers used "borderline torture" interrogation tactics, but they did not participate in those interrogations, according to a report released Tuesday by the US Department of Justice Office of the Inspector [...]

Former Guantanamo Bay detainee Murat Kurnaz , a Turkish citizen born in Germany, testified Tuesday before the US House Foreign Affairs Committee Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights, and Oversight regarding torture he allegedly suffered while in US custody in Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay . Appearing by videoconference from Germany, Kurnaz said he was [...]

Former Khmer Rouge minister for social affairs Ieng Thirith made her first appearance in court Tuesday at a bail hearing before the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) . Thirith was arrested in November 2007 along with her husband, former Khmer Rouge foreign minister Ieng Sary . The couple were subsequently charged with [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled Tuesday that a Virginia law banning certain types of late-term abortions is unconstitutional. In 2005, a panel of judges on the same court declared the law unconstitutional because it lacked an an exception to protect the mother's health, but the US Supreme Court ordered the [...]

Lee Stein and Elizabeth Kruschek : "Last week, the Arizona Court of Appeals held that two school voucher programs created by the Arizona Legislature in 2006 were unconstitutional. Those programs provided scholarships or grants of state money to the parents or guardians of foster children and students with disabilities to allow those children to attend [...]

The US has been unable to close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay because it has been stymied by legal and practical questions about what to do with the center's detainees, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said at a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing Tuesday. Gates said that the US has not found a way to [...]

A Guantanamo Bay detainee accused of involvement in the September 11 attacks attempted to commit suicide last month, his lawyer said Tuesday. Mohammad al-Qahtani , a Saudi Arabian citizen known as the "20th hijacker" for his alleged role in 9/11, was reportedly upset about charges brought by the US Department of Defense that could have [...]

The White House played a "significant role" in a decision by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to reject California's request for a waiver allowing the state to impose stricter greenhouse gas emissions standards on cars and light duty trucks, a Majority Staff report by the US House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform suggested Monday. [...]

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) Tuesday indicted a Kosovar journalist on contempt of court charges for allegedly revealing the identity of a witness in the war crimes trial of former Kosovar Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj . Baton Haxhiu was promptly arrested on the charge . Haradinaj was acquitted in April, but [...]