The US Department of Defense (DOD) announced Friday that a top al Qaeda operative has been tranferred to Guantanamo Bay by the CIA. Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi , an Iraqi citizen who is suspected of coordinating cross-border attacks on US forces in Afghanistan from Pakistan and plotting to assassinate Pakistan president Gen. Pervez Musharraf , was [...]
New York Governor Eliot Spitzer (D) introduced a bill Friday to legalize gay marriage in New York. In a press release, Spitzer said : Under current law, partners unable to enter into a civil marriage – and their children – lack legal protections taken for granted by married couples. In such areas as property ownership, [...]
Former Canadian advertising executive Jean LaFleur plead guilty Friday to 28 counts of fraud for his alleged role in the federal sponsorship scandal . Lafleur is accused of billing the Canadian federal government for work which was never done, and ultimately bilking the government of almost $1.6 million in contracts his advertising firm obtained through [...]
US Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) Thursday introduced a bill to restrict gun sales to terror suspects. S. 1237 would give the US attorney general the power and discretion to block gun sales to people listed as suspected terrorists. Under the bill, potential buyers who were denied firearms could appeal that decision to the attorney general. [...]
The office of the German Federal Prosecutor Friday declined to investigate a war crimes claim against former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and other high-ranking US officials filed by human rights groups seeking accountability for acts of torture allegedly committed at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and in Afghanistan . The Center for Constitutional Rights, [...]
A UK special court ruled on Friday that two Libyan men suspected of involvement in terrorist activities could not be deported to Libya , overriding an agreement between the two governments. The Special Immigration Appeals Commission ordered the two men released on bail, citing concerns that they would face torture and be denied a fair [...]
Three US soldiers were indicted Friday for the 2003 death of a Spanish reporter who was killed when their tank fired a shell at a Baghdad hotel. A Spanish judge charged Sgt. Shawn Gibson, Capt. Philip Wolford and Lt. Col. Philip DeCamp with homicide and "a crime against the international community" in the death of [...]
An appeals court in Milan upheld a lower court decision Friday clearing former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of charges that he bribed judges to prevent the sale of food company SME to rivals in 1985. After the lower court acquitted , then-Prime Minister Berlusconi in 2004, he passed legislation precluding an appeal of the [...]
Giovanni Di Stefano : "On the 17th March 2007 I wrote to the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, seeking leave to prosecute in the criminal courts in accordance with the Geneva Conventions Act 1957 Judge Raouf Abdel Rahman, the judge that sentenced Saddam Hussein et al to death. I am pleased to confirm that the Attorney [...]
US Democratic and Republic senators sparred over the habeas corpus rights of Guantanamo Bay detainees at a US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing Wednesday. In a rare appearance as a committee witness , US Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) called the detention of 400 Guantanamo prisoners without charge and without recourse to traditional [...]