The International Court of Justice (ICJ) Wednesday rejected Djibouti's attempt to obtain records concerning murdered French judge Bernard Borrel . Djibouti claimed that France had breached its obligation under the 1986 Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters to execute Djibouti's request, but the ICJ held that the Convention imposed no obligation. The Court found [...]

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) will complete its caseload before its mandate expires in 2010, Serge Brammertz promised in his first address before the UN Security Council as ICTY Chief Prosecutor Wednesday. Brammertz said: I cannot think of a situation in which the Tribunal, which has been established to try those [...]

The Supreme Court of Japan Wednesday struck down part of a law which denied Japanese citizenship to children born out of wedlock to Japanese fathers and foreign mothers. The Court found that Article 3 of the Nationality Law, which restricts citizenship based on the parents' marital status, violated equal protection guarantees in Article 14 of [...]

The Supreme Court of California Wednesday denied bids by two conservative groups to stay the Court's May 15 decision overturning a ban on same-sex marriage in the state. Last month, the Proposition 22 Legal Defense and Education Fund and the Campaign for California Families had petitioned the Court to stay its ruling pending a November [...]

Bangladesh police have thusfar arrested at least 10,000 people in a major security sweep ahead of elections slated for later this year, national police chief Nur Mohammad told AFP Wednesday. The arrests, which began last week , are part of an expected month-long operation to suppress criminal and corruption-related activity. Bangladeshi political parties the Awami [...]

A Norwegian court Tuesday acquitted three suspects of terror charges laid for allegedly planning to attack the US and Israeli embassies in Oslo after finding that there was no binding and intentional agreement between them. The three had also been indicted for their roles in a September 2006 shooting at an Oslo synagogue. Charges relating [...]

Former Cambodian head of state Khieu Samphan was hospitalized Wednesday after suffering a stroke. The fifth senior Khmer Rouge leader to be detained by the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) , he was arrested in November 2007 upon release from the hospital where he was receiving treatment after having suffered an earlier [...]

The World Association of Newspapers (WAN) and the World Editors Forum (WEF) accused the UN Human Rights Council of "undermin the freedom of expression in the name of religious sensibilities" in a resolution the two groups adopted Tuesday. Passed at the 2008 World Newspaper Congress in Goteberg, Sweden, the statement concerns an amendment to a [...]

The Greek Minister of Justice Tuesday quickly condemned as legally "non-existent" the first same-sex marriages performed in the country by the mayor of a small Greek island. Sotiris Hatzigakis said in a statement that Tilos Mayor Anastassios Alferis had overstepped his authority. The ceremonies united two gay and lesbian couples despite preliminary warnings from top [...]

A Pakistan Supreme Court Bar Association (SBCA) committee Tuesday said the proposed constitutional amendment package is just an attempt by the Pakistan People's Party to delay addressing the reinstatement of ousted judges. The committee called for the immediate implementation of a Supreme Court decision invalidating Musharraf's November 3, 2007 declaration of emergency law and the [...]