A federal judge Monday overturned as unconstitutional a Louisiana law that would have moved the state's congressional primary from November to October. Louisiana passed the legislation under the impetus of its "open primary" system that allows all candidates to run together, regardless of party affiliation. If no candidate won over 50%, a run-off primary election [...]

A European Union spokesman said Monday that Turkey's action in dropping charges against novelist Orhan Pamuk for "insulting Turkishness" was "good news". EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn cautioned, however, that other "journalists, editors, writers and academics still face similar charges" in Turkey, and said that the country's lawmakers needed to revise Turkey's penal code to [...]

Cook County Circuit Court Judge Bernetta D. Bush Monday approved a $20 million final settlement in a class action suit against newspaper publishing giant Hollinger International Inc. . Advertisers brought the suit claiming they had been defrauded by inflated circulation numbers for the Chicago Sun-Times and Daily Southtown newspapers. The final settlement terms incorporated the [...]

The US Supreme Court on Monday refused to reconsider a federal court ruling that the BlackBerry , the hand-held internet and email device from Research in Motion (RIM) , violated existing patent rights. Last August, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld a trial court determination that RIM violated patents held by [...]

Iraq's newly-elected parliament will ignore a constitutional provision on setting the date for their first meeting, officials announced Monday. According to the constitution , approved in the 2005 October referendum , parliament is to meet 15 days after the final certification of an election to elect a speaker and president. Final results of the December [...]

A ban on public gatherings, night-time curfews and other restrictions in Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal capital, has been lifted by government officials. Nepalese officials have also lifted a ban on mobile phone use and released senior opposition leaders from house arrest. Nepal's government implemented the restrictions last week in anticipation of expected large-scale demonstrations; [...]

US President George Bush on Monday defended his authorization of the domestic surveillance program employed by the National Security Agency (NSA) , saying that he was acting under a Congressional mandate to protect the US from terrorist attacks. In a speech at Kansas State University, Bush said the Terrorist Surveillance Program , as it is [...]

Mikhail Khodorkovsky , the former owner of Russian oil giant Yukos convicted of tax fraud and now incarcerated in a Siberian prison , has appealed to the Russian Supreme Court against Siberian prison regulations which restrict prisoners' access to lawyers. Khodorkovsky's press service says that Khodorkovsky is allowed meetings with his lawyers for up to [...]

Russia's most senior judge has predicted that the Kremlin's growing power will eventually result in a dictatorship if it remains unchecked by the country's judiciary. Chairman of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation Valery Zorkin made his comments in a Reuters interview following criticism that the country's judiciary is weak, incompetent, and willing to [...]

Jury selection is slated to begin Tuesday in Rio Grande City, Texas, in the latest wrongful death case involving the painkiller Vioxx . The family of Leonel Garza is suing Merck Pharmaceutical Company after he suffered a fatal heart attack in 2001, one month after he discontinued using Vioxx. Outside council for Merck claims that [...]