Leading Monday's corporations and securities law news, the SEC has started an informal investigation into aluminum producer Alcoa Inc. over the classification of trade accounts payable transactions starting in 2003. Alcoa has said it will cooperate with the probe. The Pittsburgh Business Times has more. In other news… A MCI shareholder has filed a lawsuit [...]

ChoicePoint announced Monday that residents in all 50 states and D.C. may have been affected by a security breach which resulted in criminals gaining access to its massive database of consumer information. California authorities say as many as 500,000 people may have been affected, but ChoicePoint believes that number to be closer to 145,000. Last [...]

Retired Bosnian Serb general Milan Gvero agreed on Monday to voluntarily surrender to the UN war crimes tribunal at The Hague. The Serbian government said that Belgrade had received an indictment against the general from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia , although the charges against Gvero have not yet been made public. [...]

In an unprecedented move, Irish Justice Minister Michael McDowell has publicly claimed that three of the most prominent figures in the Sinn Fein political party, including party leader Gerry Adams , are members of the IRA Army Council, the internal group in charge of the terrorist organization. Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein's deputy leader and one [...]

European Union officials are encouraged by Spain's overwhelming support in Sunday's referendum for the body's proposed new Constitution , but remain guarded because there are still many challenges ahead in the numerous countries set to cast similar ballots over the next 18 months. According to the official results , more than 76 percent of Spaniards [...]

Haitian police are still hunting several hundred prisoners who escaped when an armed commando attacked Haiti's national penitentiary in what sources close to Haiti's president are calling an attempt to free those "imprisoned for money crimes," an apparent reference to drug traffickers and kidnappers. In the melee following the attack Yvon Neptune and Jocelerme Privert, [...]

A national conference on constitutional change meets Monday in Nigeria to review and propose amendments to the nation's 45-year-old constitution . Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo has traditionally opposed a reform movement, but agreed to the constitutional conference last year in an attempt to find a solution to the myriad of problems that face Africa's most [...]

Final results of the Spanish referendum on the treaty establishing a European constitution, February 20, 2005 . Review the final vote totals from the Spanish Ministry of the Interior. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

The Royal Navy has become the first branch of the British Armed Forces to actively promote the protection of the civil rights of its homosexual and bisexual members. Navy officials signed the Diversity Champions Programme from the alternative lifestyle equal rights group Stonewall on Monday. Homosexuals have been permitted in the UK Armed Forces since [...]

Israel released 500 prisoners Monday in a 'goodwill gesture' that was first proposed at the Sharm al-Sheikh summit held nearly two weeks ago and was approved by the Israeli parliament last Sunday. The 500 prisoners are the first to be released under the new truce; 400 more are expected to be released in the near [...]