UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown Tuesday spoke in favor of a controversial anti-terror bill that would allow authorities to detain terror suspects without charge for up to 42 days in a speech he presented to the Institute for Public Policy Research . Brown said that stronger safeguards are needed to protect national security: I agree [...]

The trial of British national Simon Mann , accused of participating in a 2004 coup attempt against Equatorial Guinea President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo , began Tuesday in Malabo. Government officials charged Mann, a former Special Air Service officer who allegedly signed the contract for the coup, with crimes against the head of state, crimes [...]

The Supreme Court of California ruling which overturned a state ban on same-sex marriage took effect Monday, allowing same-sex marriage ceremonies in the state to go ahead. The Court's decision has so far withstood challenges from both in-state conservative groups and out-of-state attorneys general who object to the ruling because it also allows couples from [...]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) called on the government of Pakistan to abolish the country's death penalty in a letter sent Tuesday to Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gillani . In the letter, HRW expresses concern over the number of executions in the country, the high number of executable offenses in Pakistan's penal code, and the availability [...]

Russia will not recognize the new Kosovar constitution because it is illegal, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation announced Monday. The Assembly of Kosovo adopted the constitution in April, and the EU later certified it as guaranteeing the individual and community rights of all its citizens. The constitution went into effect Sunday [...]

The district court in The Hague Monday began hearing the first civil action against the Dutch State for the actions of its peacekeeping troops during the 1995 Srebrenica massacre . The plaintiffs – UN translator Hasan Nuhanovic , whose family was killed in the massacre, and the family members of murdered electrician Rizo Mustafic – [...]

The International Criminal Court (ICC) Monday announced it has imposed an indefinite stay on the war crimes trial of Congolese ex-militia leader Thomas Lubanga . The court said it may consider releasing Lubanga because prosecutorial misconduct could deny him a fair trial; the court accused the prosecution of using confidentiality agreements to withhold possible exonerating [...]

A judge in the US District Court for the District of Columbia Monday dismissed a lawsuit brought by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) seeking access to e-mail records from the White House Office of Administration (OA) under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The court held that the OA "is not an [...]

A man accused of hacking US government computers in 2001 and 2002 appealed to the judicial panel of the UK House of Lords Monday, arguing that his extradition to the US would violate his human rights. British police arrested systems analyst Gary McKinnon in 2002, and US authorities indicted him later that year on charges [...]

Dozens of accused terror detainees held in US military prisons actually have no ties to terrorism, according to an investigative report published Sunday by McClatchy Newspapers . McClatchy reporters found that many of the 66 former terror detainees interviewed were ordinary civilians or petty criminals; only 34 had ties to militant groups or activities and [...]