[JURIST] About 14,000 people are currently being detained by the US in overseas prisons in uncertain legal circumstances, the Associated Press reported Sunday. Some 13,000 are being held in Iraq. US officials have told the Red Cross that 70 to 90 percent of the tens of thousands of Iraqis detained in recent years have been "mistakes." As of September 9, fewer than 1,500 of the Iraq prisoners have been tried by the Central Criminal Court of Iraq [Wikipedia backgrounder]. The US recently closed its prison at Abu Ghraib [JURIST news archive], but shifted the 3000 prisoners there to another detention facility at Camp Cropper. A total of 770 detainees have been sent to a prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba [JURIST news archive; JURIST report] where 455 still remain. Only ten of these prisoners have been charged with crimes.

Detainee mistreatment [CBC backgrounder; JURIST report] in Iraq has led to more than 800 investigations [JURIST report] of the actions of more than 250 US service personnel. In 14 of 34 cases, someone has been punished for the killings of detainees; the harshest sentence in these cases, however, has been five months in prison. A cause of death has been determined for only half of the 98 detainees [JURIST report] who have reportedly died so far in US custody, not including three suicides at Guantanamo in June of this year. AP has more.

[JURIST] Women's rights activists in Pakistan [JURIST news archive] urged the government Sunday to suspend controversial religious laws that make it extremely difficult to prosecute rapists in the country. The Pakistan parliament [official website] delayed [JURIST report] the introduction of a revised 2006 Protection of Women Bill [BBC report] as planned on Friday because Islamic leaders do not want to change the laws, called the Hudood Ordinances [Pakistan government backgrounder], and would not make a compromise deal to parallel them with secular criminal laws.

The bill, which would classify rape under the penal code and make it easier for women in Pakistan [CBC backgrounder] to prove rape allegations, is at the center of a debate between liberals and conservatives in the country. Liberals who support changing the laws say the laws are old-fashioned and discriminatory against women. Conservatives, on the other hand, accuse bill supporters of trying to "westernize" the country. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] UK Attorney General Lord Goldsmith [official profile] called on the US Saturday to close down Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] at an International Bar Association event [event information] in Chicago. While acknowledging that the September 11 attacks [JURIST news archive] required a response to terrorism, he stressed that key principles of democracy and the rule of law had to be upheld in the process:

I am not embarrassed to repeat here my views on Guantanamo Bay which are well known; that it is unacceptable and that it is time that it should be closed; that it has become a symbol of injustice, a recruiting agent for terrorists. It is a symbol which the long American tradition of justice and liberty deserves to see removed at the earliest moment.

[JURIST] Losing leftist presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador [campaign website, in Spanish; BBC profile] established a parallel government [press release, in Spanish] for Mexico Saturday representing what he called a "true, authentic republic" in the wake of a late-August electoral court rule certifying his defeat. Supporters of Lopez Obrador turned out for a symbolic vote [Reuters report] at a rally in Mexico City and with a show of hands "elected" him. Complete with its own cabinet, the parallel government plans to set up committees throughout the nation in support of Lopez Obrador's message and boycott major national and international companies that supported the campaign of presidential victor Felipe Calderon [campaign website, in Spanish; BBC profile].

Leftist supporters object to the official results of Mexico's July 2 presidential election [JURIST news archive] which gave Calderon victory by a margin of 0.6 percent. Lopez Obrador argued before the Federal Electoral Tribunal [official website, in Spanish] in late July that the election was marred by fraud [JURIST report], but the court rejected most of his challenges [JURIST report] last month on the grounds that there was no evidence of systematic fraud. AP has more.

[JURIST] Thousands of protestors took to the streets across South Africa Saturday demonstrating against same-sex marriage [JURIST news archive] as South Africa's parliament prepares to hold hearings on a bill that would place same-sex partnerships on equal footing with traditional marriage. The parliament is set to debate [JURIST report] the Civil Unions Bill [draft text, DOC; background legal memo, DOC], drafted in response [JURIST report] to a December 2005 ruling [judgment,PDF; summary] of the South African Constitutional Court [official website] holding that the 1961 Marriage Act [1997 extension text, PDF] prohibition against same-sex marriages violates the South African Constitution [text]. The opposition African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) [party website] has called for a constitutional amendment [text, DOC; press release] to define marriage as between a man and a woman.

Passage of the legislation is not assured, as it has incurred opposition not only from South African marriage advocates [advocacy website], but also from members and supporters of the South African gay and lesbian community who argue that it simply endorses an apartheid-like "separate but equal" status for same-sex unions falling short of the remedy mandated by the Constitutional Court's finding. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] President Bush used his weekly radio address [recorded audio; transcript] Saturday to reiterate his call [JURIST report] to members of Congress to pass his proposed legislation [PDF text; White House fact sheet] on military commissions [JURIST news archive] for terror detainees. Bush focused his remarks on provisions that would provide what the White House has described as "clear rules" [JURIST report] for US interrogators, disputing [State Department report] allegations that it is proposing to "reinterpret" or "redefine" Common Article 3 [text] of the Geneva Conventions that gives potentially broad scope to war crimes liability. Bush said:

The information the Central Intelligence Agency has obtained by questioning men like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has helped disrupt terrorist plots, including planned strikes inside the United States and on a U.S. Marine base in East Africa, an American consulate in Pakistan, and Britain's Heathrow Airport. This CIA program has saved American lives, and the lives of people in other countries.

Unfortunately, the recent Supreme Court decision [in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, ruling that Common Article 3 applied to US detainee interrogations] put the future of this program in question, and we need this legislation to save it. There is debate about the specific proposals in this bill, and my Administration will work with Congress to find common ground. I have one test for this legislation: The intelligence community must be able to tell me that the bill Congress sends to my desk will allow this vital program to continue.