The Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament approved a report Monday taking Turkey to task for slow progress on a variety of legal and other reforms agreed to by Ankara as part of its bid for membership in the European Union . Among other things, Turkey was criticized for its “persistent shortcomings in areas [...]

Federal prosecutors have asked that a judge sentence civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart to 30 years in prison, saying that Stewart's "egregious, flagrant abuse of her profession … deserves to be severely punished." Stewart was convicted of conspiracy and providing material support to terrorists for helping imprisoned Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman communicate with his terrorist followers. [...]

UK Home Secretary John Reid has promised to go ahead with Tuesday's planned deportations of 32 Iraqis who sought asylum in the UK, saying that only a court injunction will prevent the plane carrying the Iraqis from leaving and that his office "may decide not to defer removal" despite last-minute applications for judicial review. This [...]

JURIST Special Guest Columnist Justice Arthur Chaskalson, President of the International Commission of Jurists and former Chief Justice of South Africa, says that although the threat of terrorism is real, five years after the September 11 attacks on the United States it's not at all clear that the legal response to that threat has been [...]

JURIST Guest Columnists Lawrence Friedman and Victor Hansen of New England School of Law say that Congress needs to step in to counter the Bush administration's apparent efforts to limit the ability of uniformed military lawyers to advise on future military commissions while it favors the input of its own political appointees… The U.S. Supreme [...]

Criminal Terrorism Enforcement in the United States During the Five Years Since the 9/11/01 Attacks, Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, September 4, 2006 . Read the full text of the report. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert denied rumors Monday that a deal was underway to trade Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Cpl. Gilad Shalit , an Israeli soldier held by Palestinian militants since June 25 . In a speech to parliament's foreign affairs and defense committee, Olmert said he heard of the negotiations from the press. [...]

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador , Mexico's leftist presidential candidate challenging the results of the disputed July 2nd presidential election , has told supporters that he plans to organize a constitutional convention to draft a new constitution. Lopez Obrador said Sunday that the country was in need of "radical transformation" and that he would call an [...]

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs has warned senior government and military officials that inflammatory statements some made about the recent conflict with Lebanon, such as advocating the bombing of villages that housed Hezbollah rebels, could lead to war crimes prosecutions abroad, the Israeli Army Radio reported Monday. Several Israeli Defense Forces generals have recently [...]

Eight men allegedly involved in a plot to blow up US-bound planes leaving a London airport will probably not go to trial until 2008, prosecutor Colin Gibbs told the Central Criminal Court during a brief hearing in London Monday. It is unclear why they will not be brought to trial sooner. All eight defendants are [...]