British Army Corporal David Payne, convicted of abusing Iraqi detainees in 2003, was sent to jail for one year on Monday. Payne, who was one of seven British soldiers who faced court-martial for charges of detainee abuse, had pleaded guilty to charges of inhumane treatment in September. The court-martial of the seven was the first [...]

The US Supreme Court granted certiorari Monday in Medellin v. Texas , 06-984, where the Court will consider whether the Bush administration has the authority to direct a state court to comply with a ruling from the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Jose Ernesto Medellin , a Mexican national sentenced to death in Texas for [...]

Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine issued an executive order Monday closing the loophole that allowed Virginia Tech gunman Seung-Hui Cho to purchase a firearm despite having been ordered to receive psychiatric treatment by a Virginia court in 2005. The executive order amends Virginia law so that any person who has received involuntary outpatient or inpatient [...]

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko dismissed Ukrainian Constitutional Court Judge Valeriy Pshenichny from office for an "oath violation," according to the presidential press service Monday. No details were released on the exact nature of the "violation." On April 25, Pshenichny said that Yushchenko had requested a transcript of the court proceedings mulling the legality of Yushchenko's [...]

Kurdish legislators in the Iraq National Assembly will vote against a draft law to regulate the country's oil because some provisions of the bill violate a February agreement with Kurdish lawmakers, a Kurdish official said Monday. In February, the Kurds agreed to support the draft bill after lengthy negotiations , but the bill was since [...]

Former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser said Monday that the treatment and trial of Australian detainee David Hicks at Guantanamo Bay demonstrate that the US and Australian governments are "prepared to throw every legal principle out the window and establish a process that we would expect of tyrannical regimes." In an op-ed published on JURIST, [...]

The US Supreme Court Monday declined to hear a lawsuit brought by two Guantanamo Bay detainees challenging the legality of their military commissions. In Hamdan v. Gates and Khadr v. Bush , 06-1169, Yemeni Salim Ahmed Hamdan and Canadian Omar Khadr sought to challenge the constitutionality of Congress' decision to deny habeas challenges by suspected [...]

Israeli nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu was convicted Monday of violating the terms of his 2004 release from prison by granting interviews to foreign news media. Vanunu completed an 18-year prison sentence in 2004 for leaking Israel's atomic weapons secrets to the Sunday Times newspaper. Following his release, Vanunu was subject to strict restrictions, including a [...]

A judge sitting at London's Old Bailey criminal court sentenced five British men of Pakistani descent to life imprisonment Monday at the end of a year-long terrorism trial – the largest UK terrorism trial since al Qaeda's September 11 attacks on the United States – that culminated in the longest deliberation by a jury in [...]

Australian Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said Monday that the government would amend an existing federal law preventing convicted criminals from profiting from their offenses if it became apparent that it allowed Guantanamo detainee David Hicks to sell his story. Hicks is currently set to be returned to Australia to serve out an additional prison term after [...]