Lebanon's cabinet Monday night approved the creation of a 12-member, half-Muslim, half-Christian committee that is charged with drafting a new election law. The country conducted elections in May and June under the 2000 election law , which was drawn up while Lebanon was under Syrian control and is said by critics to limit Christian representation [...]

British Prime Minister Tony Blair's latest plans to fight terror have drawn cross-party criticism and have led one senior MP from Blair's own Labour Party to level accusations that the government response to terror threats is panicked. Blair's recent initiatives include plans to deport advocates of terrorism and ban two radical groups and a controversial [...]

A long-awaited FDA ruling on access to an emergency contraceptive called Plan B is expected to be announced by the end of the month, as part of a deal that got Lester Crawford approved by the Senate as the new Food and Drug Administration chief. However, the ruling is unlikely to settle much, as individual [...]

Lawyers for Guantanamo detainee Salim Ahmed Hamdan filed a petition of certiorari on Monday, asking the US Supreme Court to block military tribunals for terror suspects. The high court had once before denied cert on a request for an expedited hearing, instead sending the case to the DC Circuit Court . A judge there initially [...]

Third Interim Report, Independent Inquiry Committee, August 8, 2005 . Read the full text of the report here . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

Leading Monday's corporations and securities law brief, Warren Buffett company Berkshire Hathaway has revealed that the management company is being investigated by the SEC and the state of New York, among others. In a filing with the SEC, the company said that the government has been investigating Berkshire's activities related to its accounting practices and [...]

Leading Monday's states brief, the US Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has denied a request to suspend an Iowa state law that prohibits certain sex offenders from living within 2000 feet of a school or day care center, pending a possible US Supreme Court review. The court said that the Iowa Civil Liberties Union , [...]

Argentinian police announced on Monday the arrest of Milan Lukic, a former Bosnian Serb paramilitary commander who in July was convicted in absentia by a Serbian war crimes court and sentenced to 20 years for his role in the 1993 abduction and killing of 20 Bosnian Muslims. The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia [...]

A new Florida policy that took effect on June 1 bans sex offenders from public hurricane shelters if they are under state supervision and not permitted near children. Instead, they must report to a prison, where they are kept under supervision by authorities though not incarcerated. Six offenders reported to a prison during Hurricane Dennis [...]

According to US military leaders, the Pentagon has established new contingency plans for domestic military deployment in the event of a terrorist attack, but the procedures may challenge traditional doctrines constraining military roles in national law enforcement. The plans envisage US military forces under the aegis of the new US Northern Command engaging in a [...]