US Reps. Christopher Shays (R-CT) and Martin Meehan (D-MA) have filed a lawsuit against the Federal Election Commission (FEC) challenging new rules regarding campaign communications that can be narrow FEC standard of what constitutes "coordination" would permit groups or individuals with economic or political clout to have too strong a voice in elections. Such groups [...]

US District Judge Harold Murphy on Wednesday issued a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of Georgia's voter ID law until a full trial can be held in a challenge brought by civil rights groups . Murphy, the same federal judge who struck down a previous version of the law last year, said that the current law [...]

House Republicans have agreed to hold a vote Thursday on extending provisions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act for another 25 years, House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) announced Wednesday. In June Southern lawmakers unexpectedly balked at two key provisions – one requiring nine mostly Southern states with a history of race-based voter discrimination to seek [...]

British Members of Parliament voted to adjourn the House of Commons early Wednesday in protest against the pending extradition of three British NatWest bankers to the US to face charges in the Enron fraud scandal . During a three-hour debate before the vote, Liberal Democrat shadow Home Secretary MP Nick Clegg criticized Prime Minister Tony [...]

Ugandan Security Minister Amama Mbabazi on Wednesday asked the International Criminal Court (ICC) to retract its indictments against several leaders of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) for war crimes in an effort to encourage senior LRA rebels to attend peace talks with the Ugandan government. The peace talks, scheduled to begin Wednesday, have been delayed [...]

The Malaysian Federal Court on Wednesday upheld the expulsion of three students who refused to abide by School Regulations 1997, which prohibits the wearing of Islamic turbans at school. The challenge to the religious dress regulation was brought under Article 11(1) of the Malaysian Constitution , which reads, "very person has the right to profess [...]

The Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) , part of Europe's human rights watchdog the Council of Europe , called on Albania Wednesday to improve prisoner treatment in the country's network of prisons. The CPT published reports from a July 2003 visit and a May-June 2005 visit [...]

Ohio authorities on Wednesday morning executed the first inmate under new lethal injection guidelines implemented last month in a move to prevent extreme pain during an execution. In a June report and letter to Ohio Governor Bob Taft, Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction director Terry Collins set forth several changes in Ohio's lethal injection [...]

The fundamental rights of two terror suspects were not violated when EU member states froze their assets, the European Court of First Instance ruled Wednesday. Ireland and the UK froze the bank accounts of a Tunisian and Libyan national, respectively, after European Council Regulation 881/2002 , which implemented several UN Security Council resolutions, authorized member [...]

The Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Wednesday overturned a lower court decision that had allowed law enforcement to temporarily carry out covert surveillance. Justice Michael Hartmann of the Hong Kong High Court ruled in February that an executive order on covert surveillance operations made last year by Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen was unconstitutional, [...]