Defense contractor Mitchell Wade pleaded guilty in US District Court in Washington, DC on Friday to conspiring to funnel more than $1 million in bribes to former US Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham . Wade, the former president of MZM Inc, a Washington firm that does classified intelligence work for the military, admitted that he intended [...]

AP is reporting that the South Dakota House of Representatives has given final approval to a bill that would ban nearly all abortions in the state. The state Senate approved the abortion ban earlier this week. Under the bill, doctors who perform abortions would face up to five years in jail, except when necessary to [...]

Philippines President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo declared a national emergency in a taped television address Friday after uncovering a plot to oust her from office. The state of national emergency declaration issued under Article 2, Section 4 of the Philippines Constitution keeps the judicial system intact and allows Arroyo to use the military to quash uprisings. Arroyo, [...]

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counterterrorism Martin Scheinin sharply criticized Turkey's anti-terrorism laws Thursday, claiming Turkey's definition of terrorism is too broad and vague with respect to local terrorist groups. In particular, Scheinin stated that the 2001 law "defines terrorism based on its purpose or aims rather than referring to specific [...]

Indian officials have arrested Alok Tomar, editor of the obscure Indian magazine Senior India, for publishing a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad. Officials charged Tomar with hurting religious sentiments in India, although it is unknown whether the cartoon published by Tomar resembled the Muhammad caricatures first published in a Danish newspaper that have ignited protest [...]

The International Committee of the Red Cross Friday called on individuals and groups in Iraq to comply with international humanitarian law while officials imposed daytime curfews in several Iraqi cities in an attempt to subdue a wave of violence resulting from Wednesday's bombing of the Askariya shrine , one of Shiite Islam's holiest sites. The [...]

Louisiana Attorney General Charles C. Foti, Jr. has launched a probe into the state's indigent defense system in response to funding and availability problems for public defenders, especially in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina , which has sharply decreased the number of traffic fines from which the program primarily derives its funding. Foti issued subpoenas [...]

A series of internal Canadian government memos newly declassified under the Canadian Access to Information Act has increased speculation that the US Central Intelligence Agency has flown terror suspects through Canada as part of an extraordinary rendition program transferring them to foreign prisons. One note stamped "secret" says that over 70 flights allegedly tied to [...]

A US federal judge has refused to grant an immediate injunction against Research in Motion , which would have shut down the company's BlackBerry wireless service in the United States. In 2003, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that RIM violated a patent held by NTP, Inc. and NTP had [...]

Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein, Jordan's UN ambassador and advisor to the secretary-general on the sexual exploitation and abuse in United Nations peacekeeping operations, has told the UN Security Council that it could be three or four more years before the "unacceptably high" number of sexual abuse charges against UN peacekeepers in the Democratic Republic [...]