Pakistan agreed Tuesday to drop pending corruption charges against former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto , permitting Bhutto to enter the country for talks between her Pakistani People's Party and President Pervez Musharraf . Musharraf is seeking Bhutto's endorsement as he faces a controversial re-election October 6. Bhutto left the country in 1999 in the face [...]

Israel released 29 Palestinian detainees and returned them to Gaza Tuesday, adding to Monday's return of 57 prisoners to the West Bank for a total of 86 prisoners released this week. The releases are meant as a gesture of good will toward Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the eve of a meeting between Abbas and [...]

The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday in Kimbrough v. United States , 06-6330, in which the Court considered whether a district judge, in seeking to impose a sentence that is "sufficient but not greater than necessary," should have discretion to sentence a defendant to a prison term lesser than what is recommended by [...]

The South African Constitutional Court Tuesday dismissed the final appeal of businessman Schabir Shaik, a former business associate of former South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma , who was seeking to have his 2005 conviction for fraud and corruption overturned. The court found no merit in Shaik's allegations that his trial was unfair. The Court [...]

American Historical Association, et al., v. National Archives and Records Administration, US District Court for the District of Columbia, October 1, 2007 . Read the full text of the opinion . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

Jack Landman Goldsmith , former head of the US Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel and now a Harvard Law School professor, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday that he "could not find the legal support for" portions of the Bush Administration's controversial domestic surveillance program during his tenure with DOJ. Goldsmith nonetheless [...]

The Director of Administration of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia (ECCC) , the court established to try former Khmer Rouge leaders, agreed late Monday to make public the text of a controversial audit of the ECCC's human resources practices. The audit was authorized by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in February [...]

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa said Monday that he plans to disband the Ecuadorean congress and rewrite the country's constitution . Correa's statement comes only a day after unofficial results in the Constitutional Assembly elections indicated a landslide victory for his leftist coalition. Correa plans to push for a constitution free of foreign influence and to [...]

Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the US District for the District of Columbia ruled Monday that the National Archives cannot rely on an executive order by President George W. Bush that permits former presidents and vice-presidents to delay the release of administration records. Executive Order 13,233 , issued by Bush in November 2001 purportedly to further [...]

Former US Army Reserve Staff Sergeant Ivan "Chip" Frederick was released on parole Monday from a military prison in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where he was incarcerated for three years after pleading guilty to abusing prisoners at the Abu Ghraib detention facility in Iraq . Frederick pleaded guilty to five charges of abusing inmates in 2004, [...]