JURIST Guest Columnist Benjamin Zipursky of Fordham University School of Law says that the ongoing Vioxx litigation is exposing serious shortcomings in America's products liability system… In August, a jury in Texas arrived at a huge verdict of $253 million against Merck Pharmaceutical Company, reportedly aiming to “send a message” to Merck that it is [...]

The UK High Court Monday rejected a review of guidelines that do not require parental consent for minors to receive contraception or abortion advice. Sue Axon of Manchester, a mother of five, had brought a lawsuit hoping to change the law to prevent girls under 16 from getting confidential advice without parental notification. The UK [...]

Leading Monday's international brief, the 2006 African Union summit opened Monday in Khartoum, Sudan, with a sharp controversy over the potential chairmanship of the organization by a regime accused of directly contributing to over 300,000 deaths and nearly two million Internally Displaced Persons in Darfur over the past several years. Traditionally the chairmanship of the [...]

The case against Orhan Pamuk , Turkey's most prominent writer, was dropped by an Istanbul court Sunday following a statement from the Turkish Justice Ministry. Pamuk, whose work often examines the clashes between society and the role of Islam, was on trial for "public denigration of the Turkish identity" after he made allegedly unfavorable remarks [...]

Former US attorney general Ramsey Clark , currently a member of the defense team representing deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein , told Reuters Sunday that Hussein's trial should be suspended. Referring to the Iraqi High Criminal Court (formerly, the Iraqi Special Tribunal ), Clark stated that "it's unthinkable they would press forward" after chief judge [...]

Delegates from human rights groups sent to attend the African Union summit now underway in Khartoum were detained Sunday by Sudanese authorities. Representatives of Amnesty International , Anti-Slavery International and the International Bar Association were among those taken into custody, without explanation, by Sudanese security forces. The delegates are at the summit to discuss cooperation [...]

Iraq's Justice Ministry said Sunday that it anticipates US authorities will release six detained Iraqi women this week despite US denials . An anonymous Justice Ministry official said a review board made up of six Iraqi officials and three US officers met on January 17 and agreed to release the prisoners. The official suggested that [...]

A jury of US Army officers late Saturday night found Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshofer, Jr. guilty of negligent homicide and negligent dereliction of duty in the death of Iraqi Major General Abed Hamed Mowhoush by suffocation in a sleeping bag during an interrogation in 2003, two days after he was allegedly beaten by CIA [...]

The Egyptian court that in December sentenced opposition leader Ayman Nour to five years in prison for forging signatures to register his Al-Ghad party in last year's presidential election said Saturday that it had convicted Nour and his six co-defendants because of the danger posed by the sophistication of their forgery techniques. In a report [...]

Activists opposed to the controversial June 2005 US Supreme Court eminent domain ruling in Kelo v. New London which allowed the city of New London, Connecticut to expropriate private property for private redevelopment conferring economic benefits on the community, are protesting this weekend near the Weare, New Hampshire home of Supreme Court Justice David Souter [...]