A spokesman for California Attorney General Bill Lockyer Friday criticized the California State Office of Homeland Security for tracking antiwar protests over the past few months, calling it a violation of civil liberties. Reports obtained by the Los Angeles Times document protests including a demonstration where US Rep. George Miller (D-CA) spoke against the war [...]

Lawyers for several Guantanamo detainees claimed Friday that the US military had seized letters from them to their clients and had also taken other legal papers from their clients in an investigation into three inmate suicides at the camp last month. Defense Department officials have refused to comment on the allegations. A lawyer for one [...]

Sen. John Warner (R-VA) said Friday that Congress must be cautious about passing an alternative to military commissions at Guantanamo Bay , which were struck down by the US Supreme Court earlier this week. Warner is chairman of the US Senate Armed Services Committee and will lead hearings on the issue in July. He said [...]

Secretary of State for the Home Department v JJ & Ors EWHC 1623 (Admin), June 28, 2006, UK High Court of Justice Queen's Bench Division Adminitrative Court, in the matter of the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005, Mr. Justice Jeremy Sullivan . Excerpt: The importance of protecting members of the public from the risk of [...]

UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, UN Human Rights Council, June 30, 2006 . Read the full text of the declaration. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

The International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on Friday convicted Naser Oric , a former senior commander of Bosnian Muslim forces in Srebrenica, for failing to prevent the murder and inhumane treatment of Serb prisoners. Oric, sentenced to two years in prison , will be released immediately for time already served. Oric's indictment alleged [...]

The Iraqi High Tribunal said on Friday that while coalition forces still provide physical protection for former Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz , he has been safe and in no danger in the legal custody of the Iraqi judiciary since June 30, 2004, when the US-led coalition forces handed Iraq over to the transitional government. [...]

USA Today reported Friday that its inside sources at BellSouth and Verizon are unable to "document a contractual relationship" between the two phone companies and the National Security Agency, or document that "the companies turned over bulk calling records" for the alleged NSA phone records database . Lawmakers sitting on the House and Senate intelligence [...]

Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee said on Friday that he would like the state legislature to consider reinstating a ban on same-sex foster parents after the Arkansas Supreme Court Thursday struck down a regulatory provision barring same-sex couples from raising foster children. The court upheld a lower court decision, saying that it found no connection between [...]

The US military is investigating reports that five US soldiers raped a young woman in the city of Mahmudiyah and then killed her and three family members last March, an anonymous official told AP Friday. According to another official, one of the soldiers under investigation came forward on June 22 to confess to the rape [...]