The trial of 22-year-old Egyptian blogger Abdel Kareem Nabil , who has been in detention since November on charges of insulting Islam and causing sectarian strife in his blog , has begun in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria. Nabil’s writings are often critical of Islamic authorities and Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak , who he has [...]

A jury in California could not reach a decision on the third of a series of questions on a verdict form in the consolidated cases of two men who blamed their heart attacks on the painkiller Vioxx , leading Judge Victoria Chaney of the Superior Court of California for Los Angeles County to declare a [...]

US District Judge Reggie B. Walton has placed 10 more potential jurors on standby in the CIA leak trial of former vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby . On Thursday the court still did not have a full jury pool and lacked six of the required 36 impartial jurors for final jury selection. Jury [...]

Turkish-Armenian author Hrant Dink, journalist and editor of the newspaper Agos , was shot and killed Friday in Istanbul. Dink was one of several writers to have been charged recently with "insulting the Turkish identity" in violation of Article 301 of Turkey's penal code. The controversial author had previously received death threats from Turkish nationalists [...]

Speaker of the US House Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) committed House Democrats to joining the Senate Democrats Thursday in supporting nonbinding legislation declaring that "it is not in the national interest of the United States to deepen its military involvement in Iraq, particularly by escalating the United States military force presence in Iraq." Pelosi's statement [...]

The Venezuelan National Assembly gave preliminary approval Thursday to a measure that would allow Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to rule by decree for 18 months. The initial vote was unanimous and the measure is expected to pass easily next week when it comes up again in the Chavez-dominated legislature. Since winning his third re-election late [...]

The Rwandan cabinet has agreed to abolish capital punishment, the country's justice minister said Friday, clearing the way for the extradition of defendants facing trial for the 1994 Rwandan genocide , during which over 800,000 people were killed. The ban must still be approved by parliament, but since the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) , the [...]

The US Senate passed the Legislative Transparency and Accountability Act of 2007 by a 96-2 vote Thursday, but declined to create a Senate Office of Public Integrity to investigate ethics breaches. The bill was the first major initiative taken by the Senate in the new Democrat-dominated session of Congress. The measure regulates lobbying activities by [...]

A second US soldier has reached a plea deal with prosecutors, and is expected to plead guilty to charges stemming from the rape and murder of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and the murder of her family in the Mahmudiya (also "Mahmoudiya") area last March, his attorney announced Thursday. According to William Cassara, Sgt. Paul E. [...]

Manual for Military Commissions, US Department of Defense, January 18, 2007 . Read the full text of the manual . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.