[JURIST] Prosecutors have asked that the the trial of US Rep. Tom DeLay [official website, JURIST news archive] be postponed while they appeal the dismissal of felony conspiracy charges against him. Texas Judge Pat Priest threw out the conspiracy charge [JURIST report] last week but refused to dismiss two charges of money laundering. DeLay is accused of funnelling $190,000 in corporate donations to seven candidates for the Texas State Legislature in violation of Texas law [text]. Priest has indicated reluctance to move forward with the trial while the District Attorney appeals the dismissal. DeLay had requested a speedy trial in the hopes of regaining his position as House Majority leader when Congress reconvenes in January. AP has more.

[JURIST] Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty [official profile] said Monday that outbreaks of racial violence that began in Sydney Sunday could undermine the country's strict new anti-terror law [JURIST report] by making it more difficult for police to build bridges with Muslim youth who might already feel targeted by the legislation. On Monday, eleven more people were arrested and seven injured in continuing violence following rioting on Sunday that involved 5,000 people. Prime Minister John Howard [official profile] has denied [JURIST report] that his government's new laws have motivated the riots in any way. The Australian has more.

[JURIST] The Afghan government has adopted a plan to investigate war crimes and human rights violations committed from 1978 until the end of the Taliban rule. The Action Plan for Peace, Reconciliation and Justice in Afghanistan comes after months of pressure from international human rights groups [JURIST report]. Members of the new parliament [JURIST report] are among those accused. In a July report [text], Human Rights Watch [advocacy website] called for President Hamid Karzai [BBC profile] to establish a special court to try people accused of committing atrocities in the civil war. The adopted plan does not specifically provide for a tribunal, but it allows for the possibility of either a truth and reconciliation commission or a criminal court. The plan has been seen as a major step forward, especially because it rules out granting immunity to anyone for past crimes. BBC News has more.

[JURIST] AP is reporting that California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has refused to grant clemency to Crips gang co-founder and convicted murderer Stanley Tookie Williams [advocacy website; clemency petition, PDF], set to be executed just after midnight tonight. In denying clemency, Schwarzenegger wrote:

Williams claims that he is particularly deserving of clemency because he has reformed and been redeemed for his violent past. Williams’ claim of redemption triggers an inquiry into his atonement for all his transgressions. Williams protests that he has no reason to apologize for these murders because he did not commit them. But he is guilty and a close look at Williams’ post-arrest and postconviction conduct tells a story that is different from redemption....

Williams has written books that instruct readers to avoid the gang lifestyle and to stay out of prison. In 1996, a Tookie Speaks Out Against Gang Violence children’s book series was published. In 1998, “Life in Prison” was published. In 2004, Williams published a memoir entitled “Blue Rage, Black Redemption.” He has also recently (since 1995) tried to preach a message of gang avoidance and peacemaking, including a protocol for street peace to be used by opposing gangs.

It is hard to assess the effect of such efforts in concrete terms, but the continued pervasiveness of gang violence leads one to question the efficacy of Williams’ message. Williams co-founded the Crips, a notorious street gang that has contributed and continues to contribute to predatory and exploitative violence.

The dedication of Williams’ book “Life in Prison” casts significant doubt on his personal redemption. This book was published in 1998, several years after Williams’ claimed redemptive experience. Specifically, the book is dedicated to “Nelson Mandela, Angela Davis, Malcolm X, Assata Shakur, Geronimo Ji Jaga Pratt, Ramona Africa, John Africa, Leonard Peltier, Dhoruba Al-Mujahid, George Jackson, Mumia Abu-Jamal, and the countless other men, women, and youths who have to endure the hellish oppression of living behind bars.” The mix of individuals on this list is curious. Most have violent pasts and some have been convicted of committing heinous murders, including the killing of law enforcement....

There is also little mention or atonement in his writings and his plea for clemency of the countless murders committed by the Crips following the lifestyle Williams once espoused. The senseless killing that has ruined many families, particularly in African-American communities, in the name of the Crips and gang warfare is a tragedy of our modern culture. One would expect more explicit and direct reference to this byproduct of his former lifestyle in Williams’ writings and apology for this tragedy, but it exists only through innuendo and inference.

Is Williams’ redemption complete and sincere, or is it just a hollow promise? Stanley Williams insists he is innocent, and that he will not and should not apologize or otherwise atone for the murders of the four victims in this case. Without an apology and atonement for these senseless and brutal killings there can be no redemption. In this case, the one thing that would be the clearest indication of complete remorse and full redemption is the one thing Williams will not do.

Clemency decisions are always difficult, and this one is no exception. After reviewing and weighing the showing Williams has made in support of his clemency request, there is nothing that compels me to nullify the jury’s decision of guilt and sentence and the many court decisions during the last 24 years upholding the jury’s decision with a grant of clemency.

• California Supreme Court denies gang founder execution stay
  
• NAACP head urges clemency for gang founder Williams

[JURIST] German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis Monday submitted a new report to the UN Security Council on the February bombing assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri [JURIST news archive], including additional evidence of Syrian involvement in the murder. Mehlis will brief the Council Tuesday on the latest report of his ongoing investigation [UN materials], the text of which has not yet been publicly released. Quoting from a copy, however, French press agency AFP says that a comprehensive deposition by a new witness "strengthens the evidence confirmed to date against the Lebanese officers in custody, as well as high-ranked Syrian officers." Mehlis has recommended that the probe be extended for an additional six months [UN News report] to gather more information, although he himself is stepping down. AFP has more.

[JURIST] Former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark [JURIST news archive], currently a member of the defense team representing deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, has said that Hussein is being poorly treated in detention, kept in isolation and forced to go for days without a shower or change of clothes. He told NBC's Today program that the Iraqi ex-president has also now been prevented from taking his Koran to court as part of an effort to anger him. Clark, who has previously represented Slobodan Milosevic and other unpopular criminal defendants, said that his representation of Hussein was a manifestation of his commitment after his public service in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations to defending human rights around the world. AP has more.

[JURIST] AP is reporting that a federal judge has ruled that FEMA cannot end its hotel accommodation program for hurricane refugees until Feb. 7, one month later than the agency had planned. Lawyers for Katrina victims launched a lawsuit [JURIST report; PDF complaint] against FEMA in November for denial of temporary housing; two weeks ago they filed for a court order [JURIST report] extending a program that allowed victims to stay in hotels [FEMA hotel use report] at government expense.

12:13 PM ET - Judge Stanwood Duval issued the temporary restaining order preventing the originally-scheduled termination of the program. AP has more.

[JURIST] A special high-security war crimes court sitting in Belgrade Monday convicted 14 former members of Serb militias for killing some 200 Croatian POWs and wounded at a pig farm near Vukovar [BBC backgrounder] in 1991 at the end of a three-month siege there. Sentences ranging from five to 20 years were handed down. Two accused were acquitted. Convictions were expected after one of the defendants confessed to the killings [JURIST report] in court last month. The Vukovar case, which opened in March 2004 [JURIST report] has been widely seen as a test of Serbia's domestic war crimes process. Three leaders of the massacre are currently being tried [JURIST report] in The Hague by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. BBC News has more.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court Monday granted certiorari in four consolidated cases concerning a 2003 Texas electoral redistricting plan [official website] strongly supported by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay that effectively reduced the number of Democratic US Representatives from the state and increased the Republican majority in the House. As revealed by press reports earlier this month, the plan was initially rejected [JURIST report; PDF memo text] by US Department of Justice staff responsible for oversight under the 1965 Voting Rights Act but was later approved by senior DOJ officials. Despite claims that it was partisan, politically motivated and diluted minority votes, it was mostly recently upheld [JURIST report; PDF ruling] as constitutional in June by a panel of three Texas federal court judges.

10:33 AM ET - Arguments in the case are expected to be set for next April. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] AP is reporting that the judge in the first federal Vioxx [JURIST news archive] case has declared a mistrial. The jury reported over the weekend that it was deadlocked, but US District Judge Eldon Fallon had urged them to resume their deliberations [JURIST report].

10:28 AM ET - Judge Fallon has said he will meet with lawyers from both sides to set a new trial date. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] Retired Croatian general Ante Gotovina [BBC profile; ICTY case backgrounder] pleaded not guilty Monday in his first appearance before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia at The Hague after he was transferred to its detention facility over the weekend following his arrest in Spain [JURIST report] on Wednesday. The tribunal's indictment [text] charges him in connection with the killing of Croatian Serb civilians during the Balkan wars in the 1990s, including failing to prevent the murder of 150 in Krajina during the 1995 Operation Storm offensive [Wikipedia backgrounder] which forced some 90,000 other Serbs from their homes. On Sunday, tens of thousands of protesting Croats took to the streets [AKI report] in Split and other Croatian cities, hailing Gotovina as a national hero. BBC News has more.

[JURIST Europe] An internal Israeli Foreign Ministry document disclosed Sunday claims that the European Union [official website] is breaching international laws against terrorism by permitting contact with the radical Islamist groups Hamas and Hezbollah in the course of monitoring the upcoming Palestinian parliamentary elections, in which Hamas is running candidates. The document cited UN Security Council Resolution 1373 [text], adopted after September 11th, 2001, according to which member states must refrain from providing active or passive support to those involved in terrorism. Many EU officials believe that placing Hamas on EU’s list of terrorist organizations has made its task of persuading the group to halt violence more difficult. EU foreign ministers on Monday are expected to discuss a draft of an EU report that criticizes Israeli policies in East Jerusalem [JURIST news archive]. The Financial Times has more [subscription required]. Haaretz has local coverage.

Tatyana Margolin is an Associate Editor for JURIST Europe, reporting European legal news from a European perspective. She is based in the UK.

[JURIST] Australian police arrested 16 people [NSW Police statement] Sunday after a massive race riot in a Sydney suburb set 5000 people, mostly white men and youths, against individuals of apparent Middle Eastern descent. New South Wales Police Commissioner Ken Moroney described the outbreak as "the worst violence that I have ever seen in my policing service of 40 years"; Australian Prime Minister John Howard immediately condemned the violence as unacceptable and un-Australian [press conference transcript], and denied suggestions that his government's strict new anti-terror laws and warnings about potential home-grown terrorists had bred an atmosphere of fear and racial tension contributing to the riots: "everything that this Government has said about home-grown terrorism has been totally justified, totally justified and it is a potential threat". A number of academic observers blamed the outbreak on talk radio and "white Australia" policies associated with Pauline Hanson's One Nation [political party website] party. In the wake of the rioting Sunday incendiary text messages circulated from both sides in the violence, prompting law enforcement authorities to fear another outbreak; local media reports [ABC Australia report] Monday night Australian time indicated "another night of violence and protests", with maurauding groups travelling around neighborhoods in cars and police confiscating potential weapons. The Australian has local coverage.

[JURIST] The trial of Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye [BBC profile] on charges of treason and rape [JURIST report] is set to begin on December 19. Besigye has been denied bail as he faces separate charges of terrorism and illegal possession of firearms [JURIST report] before a military court. His lawyers have argued that the military has no jurisdiction over civilians and that court martial proceedings against him as a former member of the Uganda military are illegal. Supporters of Besigye have said the trial is a ploy to prevent him from winning the Presidential bid in the February 2006 elections. Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] Monday urged Uganda's [JURIST news archive] electoral commission to uphold Besigye's presumption of innocence, concerned that the charges against him could be politically motivated. HRW argues that there is no legal or constitutional basis on which to deny someone the right to be nominated as a political candidate. IRIN has more.

Previously in JURIST's Paper Chase...

• Uganda court orders halt in military trial of opposition leader
• Uganda government rejects call to release jailed opposition leader
• Uganda lawyers strike over military involvement in opposition leader trial
• Uganda opposition leader brought before military court on terror charges
• Ugandan rebels appear in military court; US urges fair trial
• Uganda opposition leader charged with treason, rape

[JURIST] The Iraqi Human Rights Ministry said late Sunday that 13 prisoners in an overcrowded facility run by the Iraqi Interior Ministry were abuse victims who required medical treatment. The detainees have been transferred to a hospital and are under guard. The Ministry also said that an investigating judge has ordered the immediate release of 56 people held seemingly without reason at the facility, inspected on December 8. Last month Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] ordered an investigation after US troops found 173 malnourished Iraqi detainees [JURIST report], some showing signs of torture, in another Interior Ministry building in Jadriyah. Observers believe disclosure of the more abuses could affect parliamentary elections scheduled for Thursday, since opposition parties and Sunni Arab groups have accused the government and Shiite-dominated security forces of gross human rights violations [JURIST report]. AP has more.

11:49 AM ET - Aljazeera TV has aired video purporting to show scars and wounds inflicted upon some of the prisoners, mostly Sunni Arabs, held at the Baghdad Interior Ministry facilty. Aljazeera has more.

3:16 PM ET - Some 625 detainees were found in the Interior Ministry facility; may were malnourished and showed signs or torture. Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari said he has ordered an investigation into the latest abuses. BBC News has more.

[JURIST] Slobodan Milosevic [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] Monday asked judges at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia [official website] to let him visit a Moscow clinic for medical examinations during the court's winter recess. Milosevic suffers from high blood pressure and a heart condition and earlier this month was granted a limited adjournment [JURIST report] after for health reasons. The former Yugoslav president is charged [ICTY case backgrounder] with genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Balkans in the 1990s. Milosevic is defending himself and the proceedings have been limited to three days a week to ease pressure on him, despite prosecutorial opposition [JURIST report] to extensions of his trial. The tribunal has asked Milosevic to submit his request in writing with a medical report on the condition to be treated in Russia. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw [official website] said Monday in a BBC radio interview [recorded audio] that the UK has found no evidence that the US transported terror detainees [JURIST report] via UK airports, despite a UK newspaper report [JURIST report; Guardian report] last week alleging that CIA-owned or operated planes made 210 "ghost flights" to transport terror suspects through nearly 20 different UK facilities. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) [official website] has been accused of running secret prisons [JURIST report] in Eastern Europe and covertly transporting detainees in a practice referred to as extraordinary rendition [JURIST news archive]. Straw said there are no governmental records that show any requests for rendition through UK territories since 9/11, highlighting that it is general procedure for the US to request permission for rendition flights. Straw noted, however, that military flights from other countries are not subject to checking by local authorities. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] In a 6-0 vote, the California Supreme Court late Sunday refused to halt the execution of co-founder Crips gang [Wikipedia backgrounder] co-founder and convicted killer Stanley Tookie Williams [advocacy website]. Williams was convicted of killing four people during two 1979 robberies and is due to be executed early on December 13. The Court refused an earlier clemency request [JURIST report] by Williams in late November. Last week, Bruce Gordon [NAACP profile], president and chief executive of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) [advocacy website] urged [JURIST report; press release; NAACP petition] that Williams be granted clemency, calling him a secret weapon [NAACP recorded video; NAACP recorded audio ] for helping young African-American men stay out of gangs. Williams has spent his two decades on death row at San Quentin Prison as an anti-gang activist writing children's books on the dangers of gang life. Williams has denied committing the murders and has expressed remorse for founding the Crips. Barring intervention by the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, his plea for clemency is now in the hands of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger [official profile]. No clemency request has been granted by a California governor since 1967, when Ronald Reagan spared a mentally ill killer. AP has more.

3:11 PM ET - AP is reporting that the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to order a stay of execution for Williams, leaving him scheduled to die just after midnight Monday barring a grant of clemency from Governor Schwarzenegger.

[JURIST] Leading Monday's international brief, Human Rights Watch [advocacy website] has called on the UN Security Council [official website] to sanction Sudanese President Omar El Bashir [Wikipedia profile] and other senior Sudanese government officials for complicity in crimes against humanity. In a new report on the situation in the Darfur region [JURIST news archive] of Sudan, the New York-based monitoring group alleges that the Sudanese government [official website] was fully aware of the actions taken by Islamic militias in Darfur that led to hundreds of thousands of deaths and nearly two million internally displaced persons in Sudan. The report recommends that leading Sudanese officials be placed on the list of individuals [JURIST report] submitted to the International Criminal Court [official website] for suspected involvement in crimes against humanity. JURIST's Paper Chase has continuing coverage of Sudan [JURIST news archive]. Read the HRW report [official text]. The Sudan Tribune has local coverage.

In other international legal news ...

• Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe [BBC profile] admitted over the weekend that his efforts at land reform [JURIST report] were partially at fault for Zimbabwe's current agriultural crisis. Zimbabwe, once a leading food producer for all of southern Africa, has been dependent on international food aid since Mugabe implemented his land reform scheme in 2000. Mugabe told a meeting of his ruling political party that "lack of proper planning in the land reform exercise, corruption, lawlessness on farms and vandalisation of irrigation equipment and infrastructure, coupled with shortages of fertilizer and seed had exacerbated the effects of poor weather." Mugabe denied that he would back off from futher land seizures however, claiming that they were necessary to restore a historical imbalance between white and black land owners in Zimbabwe. The admission comes just days after Mugabe called UN Humanitarian Envoy Jan Egeland a "liar and hypocrite" who was actually a British agent intent on seeing Mugabe's government discredited [Zim Online report] before the international community. Mugabe said that Zimbabwe would reject all representatives from UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan as biased and anti-Mugabe from now on and complained that recent criticism of Zimbabwe's human rights record was part of a plot to see him removed from power. JURIST's Paper Chase has continuing coverage of Zimbabwe [JURIST news archive]. Zim Online has local coverage.
  
  
• The Association of South East Asian Nations [regional website] (ASEAN) announced Monday that senior officials from all ten ASEAN member nations have agreed to the creation of a Charter for the regional organization. The charter will act as a constitution for the regional organization and will likely include procedures on possible expulsion of members who fail to abide by its provisions. NGOs and human rights groups have hailed the decision as a step forward, but have called on ASEAN leaders to explicitly include pro-democracy and human rights standards in the document to "embody universal values" throughout the Southeast Asia region. ASEAN leaders will be advised on the content of the charter by an 'Emminent Persons Group' [ASEAN report]. Read the official ASEAN statement on the proposed charter. The Jakarta Post has local coverage.
  
  
• WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy [official profile] spoke to a gathering of representatives of the Hong Kong Session of the Parliamentary Conference on the WTO [IPU backgrounder] on Sunday concerning the role that the Inter-Parliamentary Union and European Parliament [official websites] can play on implementing the WTO Doha Declaration. Lamy emphasized the need for parliaments on both the regional and national levels to take seriously the responsibility of seeing the Doha provisions agreed to in 2001 implemented by the deadline established in 2006. Lamy emphasized the need for working with developing countries and praised the recent decision by the WTO Hong Kong ministerial team to extend the deadline for developing countries to comply with international intellectual property law. The Sixth WTO Ministerial Conference [official website] in Hong Kong begins Tuesday. Read the official transcript of Lamy's speech.