Former French president and author of the beleaguered European Constitution , Valery Giscard d'Estaing is calling for the EU constitution rejected by French and Dutch voters in 2005 to be put to new referendums. Citing domestic political issues as the culprit in derailing the ratification of the regional charter, especially in France , he suggested [...]

Report 2006, Amnesty International, May 23, 2006 . Excerpt: The…"war on terror" is failing and will continue to fail until human rights….are given precedence over narrow national security interests… Doublespeak and double standards by powerful governments are dangerous because they weaken the ability of the international community to address human rights problems. Read the full [...]

Studs Terkel et al. v. AT&T Inc. . Read the complaint . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

The Israeli Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that construction on a section of the West Bank separation barrier is legal and may continue. Rejecting a petition by Palestinian settlers who will be unable to access Jerusalem once construction is complete, the court said the Israeli government properly balanced the effect of the barrier on Palestinians [...]

US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Kevin Martin has written a letter to US Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) saying that the watchdog agency will not investigate the collection of millions of phone records by the National Security Agency (NSA) . In the letter, dated Monday, Martin contends that the FCC cannot perform an effective investigation [...]

The US Senate Intelligence Committee voted 12-3 Tuesday to approve the nomination of US Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) . Despite the recent controversy over Hayden’s role in the collection and turnover of US citizens’ phone records to the National Security Agency (NSA) , Hayden easily [...]

New Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has announced he will focus on fighting corruption, which Iraqi and US officials say is rampant in the government. The problem is a long-standing one, but documents obtained by the Los Angeles Times indicate that it has become pervasive, manifested in everything from government contracts to the purchase of [...]

A Los Angeles lawyer on Tuesday became the third person to plead guilty in connection with alleged kickbacks at Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman , the leading class action law firm that was indicted last week. The US Attorney's Office for the Central District of California said Richard R. Purtich funneled $879,868 to a former [...]

The US detention center in Guantanamo Bay is a legal black hole, an Australian High Court judge has said. Justice Michael Kirby made the statement Monday in a speech to the Sydney Peace Foundation . David Hicks , an Australian who is awaiting trial before a US military commission on charges of aiding al Qaeda [...]

German police may not trawl databases to identify possible terrorists without a specific threat to national security, human life or freedom, the German Constitutional Court ruled Tuesday. "A general threat situation, of the kind that has existed continuously in regard to terrorist attacks since September 11, 2001, or external political tensions, is not sufficient," the [...]