A Chinese land rights activist arrested for circulating a petition declaring "we want human rights, not the Olympics" will be tried next week, according to Thursday media reports. Yang Chunlin was arrested in July 2007 and charged with "inciting subversion of state power" after obtaining over 10,000 signatures on a petition that said improving human [...]

Chadian President Idriss Deby Thursday declared a state of emergency throughout Chad , citing increased violence between government forces and rebels in the capital city of N'Djamena. The order bans most public meetings, imposes a curfew, authorizes government censorship of the press, and allows regional governments to regulate travel. Under Article 87 of Chad's constitution [...]

US District Judge Richard W. Roberts Thursday extended the deadline for the government to comply with an order issued last month requiring it to submit a report to the court by February 14 detailing why the CIA destroyed videotapes showing the interrogation of terror suspects , whether other evidence connected to a lawsuit filed by [...]

Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and opposition candidate Raila Odinga Thursday agreed to write a new constitution, an agreement that could put an end to the violence that erupted in the wake of January's disputed presidential election . A spokesman for former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan , who is currently in the country to help mediate [...]

The US House of Representatives voted Thursday to hold former White House legal counsel Harriet Miers and White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten in contempt for failing to cooperate with an inquiry into the US Attorneys firing scandal . Members of the House voted 223-32 to issue contempt citations for Miers for failing to [...]

Mexico's National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) is not doing enough to promote remedies and reforms needed to end abuses, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a report released Wednesday. After examining the commission's work on more than 40 human rights cases, HRW said that CNDH often fails to push for accountability for human rights abuses [...]

Acting head of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Legal Counsel Steven G. Bradbury testified at a US House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties hearing Thursday that the use of waterboarding has been barred by measures enacted since it the interrogation technique was used on three terror detainees [...]

Argentinean police Wednesday arrested retired naval officer Luis Emilio Sosa in Buenos Aires in connection with the August 1972 massacre of 16 leftist guerrillas on a military base in the southern city of Trelew . Two other former officers, Paccagnini Ruben and Emilio Del Real, were also arrested over the weekend for their alleged roles [...]

US Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) said Wednesday that he has introduced a bill in Congress aimed at guaranteeing unfettered access to the Internet and limiting the ability of Internet providers to restrict users' access. Markey said that the Internet Freedom Preservation Act would ensure so-called "net neutrality:" The open architecture nature of the Internet is [...]

The US Marine Corps has ordered Lance Cpl. Stephen Tatum to testify against Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich about the killing of 24 Iraqi civilians at Haditha in November 2005, according to Wednesday media reports. Both men currently face court-martial for their alleged roles in the incident. Tatum's lawyer said that Tatum has received an immunity [...]