State media in China said Monday that a revised Chinese law submitted to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) calls for prison sentences of up to three years and heavy fines for doctors and other health workers who aid in telling the gender of unborn babies, leading to abortions. The new law [...]

Russian military prosecutors said Monday that they had dropped charges against former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko , accused of offering bribes to Russian Defense Department officials while managing Ukraine's state-run gas company. The warrant for Tymoshenko was suspended while she served as prime minister, reinstated after a falling out with President Viktor Yushchenko in [...]

Former US Secretary of State Colin Powell has defended the Bush administration's eavesdropping on phone and e-mail communications to prevent terrorism. Though Powell conceded in an interview with ABC's This Week that a major controversy over presidential powers could easily have been avoided through court warrants, he said he saw "absolutely nothing wrong with the [...]

Following more allegations Friday that Saddam Hussein has been tortured by his American captors, lawyers for the ousted ruler have asked his Baghdad court for an independent investigation. Chief Iraqi lawyer Khalil Dulaimi said Sunday that Saddam has expressed doubts about his ability to properly defends charges against him due to the effects of physical [...]

Libya's Supreme Court Sunday disposed of the death-by-firing-squad sentences given to five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor jailed since 1999 and convicted of infecting more than 400 children with the HIV virus . The case was sent back to the lower court for retrial. The six have continued to protest their innocence and said [...]

Iraqi National Security Adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie has said that he wants to see the re-arrest of Saddam Hussein's former top weapons aides after the US military confirmed the release from custody of 14 more high-ranking detainees, including Dr. Rihab Taha al-Azawi , also known in the Western media as, "Dr. Germ" and Huda Ammash , [...]

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) said Saturday that members of the US Senate Judiciary Committee intend to expand their probe into warrantless wiretaps within the US after the weekend disclosure that the National Security Agency had obtained access to the nation's telephone and Internet lines to track terrorists, in greater volumes than disclosed by the administration [...]

China announced Saturday on the last working day that prosecutors were able to bring the case that it is putting journalist Zhao Yan on trial for stealing state secrets and fraud within the next six weeks. Yan had worked at the New York Times' Beijing Bureau as a researcher. When the Times ran a scoop [...]

Election officials announced Saturday that citizens of the Democratic Republic of Congo approved a new constitution in a referendum held December 18. The charter is designed to bring peace to the country after five years of war and provides for national elections to be held next year. International observers declared the vote to have been [...]

The US military will not transfer detainees to Iraqi-operated prisons or transition US-run facilities to Iraqi control until military officials are satisfied that Iraqis have met US standards for the treatment of detainees, according to Maj. Gen. John D. Gardner, commanding US-run prisons in Iraq. The decision was made after two raids of Iraqi run [...]