Lane Dilg : "In 2006, Ginnah Muhammad went to Michigan small claims court to recover $3000 from a rental-car company that she believed unfairly charged her for repairs. A state judge gave her a choice: remove the niqab she wore as a matter of religious practice before testifying, or he would dismiss her claim. As [...]

The curator of a Russian art gallery has been charged with "inciting hatred" for hosting an exhibit of art banned from other galleries, including pieces that mocked the Russian Orthodox Church and the nation's military, the Independent reported Wednesday. Yury Samodurov, director of the Sakharov Museum in Moscow, named after Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov, said [...]

A coalition of anti-war activists represented by the Constitutional Law Clinic at Rutgers University Law School-Newark Tuesday filed a lawsuit in US District Court for New Jersey seeking a declaratory judgment that the war in Iraq violates the US constitution. The groups argue that under the US Constitution only Congress has the authority to declare [...]

The US Department of Defense has still not issued security clearances to civilian lawyers seeking to participate in the defense of alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said Tuesday. ACLU Anthony Romero said that not one of eight lawyers who had recently [...]

US immigration agents transiting involuntarily sedated immigration deportees through foreign countries have been challenged by local authorities, the Washington Post reported Wednesday. The paper said French and Belgian law enforcement officials had raised objections to the sedation of individuals by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents at stopovers during two recent deportation flights from [...]

Italian Judge Oscar Magi ruled on Wednesday that Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi can be called to testify in the trial of 26 Americans and several former Italian intelligence officials for the 2003 abduction and rendition of Egyptian cleric Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr . Defense lawyers for former Italian Intelligence and Security Service (SISMI) chief Nicolo [...]

Ecuador's election court announced Wednesday that a two-year suspension from politics for former Ecuadorian President Lucio Gutierrez, had formally come to an end Sunday, leaving him free to run for office again. Gutierrez was suspended from politics and barred from running in the country's 2006 elections because he declined to report campaign donations in his [...]

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told Australian news service Sky News Wednesday that his government is considering bringing a lawsuit against Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for alleged incitement of genocide. Rudd characterized some of Ahmadinejad's comments in recent years regarding Israel and Zionism and denying the Jewish Holocaust [...]

Awzar Thi : "May 10 was supposed to be a big day for Burma's military, the day that it legitimated itself through the ballot box. On that day, millions of eligible voters were supposed to come and freely express their approval of a constitution that would guarantee the army a quarter of seats in parliament [...]

The Federal Court of Malaysia Wednesday rejected an appeal by five ethnic Indian protesters being detained by Malaysian authorities under a controversial security law. The five detainees, prominent members of the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) , had appealed a judgment by a lower court which found that their detention was legal under Malaysian law. [...]