JURIST Guest Columnist Peter Erlinder of William Mitchell College of Law, lead defense counsel in the Military-1 Trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and president of the Association des Avocats de la Defence (ADAD), the ICTR defense lawyers association, says that a recent UN-sanctioned agreement to turn prisoners convicted of war crimes [...]

Charge Sheet: Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud Al Qosi, US Department of Defense, March 5, 2008 . Read the full text of the Al Qosi charges as formally referred. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

The US Department of Defense said Wednesday that two charges have been referred against Guantanamo Bay detainee Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi . The military commission charges referred are "providing material support to terrorism and conspiring with Usama bin Laden and other al Qaeda members to target, attack and murder civilians; attack civilian objects; commit [...]

A federal jury in the US District Court for the District of Connecticut on Wednesday convicted a former sailor of providing material support to terrorists and disclosing confidential national defense information. Hassan Abu-Jihaad, formerly known as Paul R. Hall, was a signalman on the USS Benfold in 2001, when prosecutors alleged that he passed sensitive [...]

The government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki will refuse to execute Ali Hassan al-Mahid , better known in the Western media as "Chemical Ali," over the Iraqi Presidency Council's decision not to approve the death sentences of al-Mahid's two co-defendants, an Iraqi government spokesperson told AP Wednesday. The Presidency Council approved al-Mahid's execution last [...]

Mexican drug lord Francisco Rafael Arellano-Felix was released from a US prison Tuesday and has returned to Mexico, according to a source at the Mexican Attorney General's office . Arellano-Felix ran the Arellano-Felix cartel until his 1993 arrest. He served more than 11 years in prison in Mexico on drug and illegal-weapons charges, before he [...]

The UK House of Commons Wednesday voted 311-248 against putting ratification of the new EU reform treaty , properly known as the Treaty of Lisbon , to a public vote, thereby rejecting proposals for a national referendum. Parliament itself will now consider whether to ratify the treaty, drafted to replace the failed European Constitution . [...]

US District Judge Adalberto Jordan of the Southern District of Florida Tuesday ordered former Peruvian military official Maj. Telmo Ricardo Hurtado to pay $37 million in damages to two survivors of the 1985 Accomarca massacre and the estates of their slain family members after previously ruling that Hurtado had committed torture, war crimes and crimes [...]

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour told members of her staff Wednesday that she will not seek a second term when her four-year commission ends on June 30, confirming a Monday report by the Washington Post. Arbour reportedly did not specify a reason for her decision, but said she plans to make it [...]

The number of discrimination charges against private employers filed with the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) increased by nine percent in 2007 , the biggest annual increase since the early 1990s, according to EEOC statistics released Wednesday. Of the 82,792 complaints filed with the EEOC in 2007, 37 percent covered allegations of racial discrimination [...]