[JURIST] Some 30,000 Serbs gathered in front of the US embassy in Belgrade on Saturday insisting that the United States and the United Nations are trying to kill ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party (SRS) [party website, in Serbian] leader and war crimes defendant Vojislav Seselj [BBC profile; ICTY case backgrounder]. Seselj is currently on the twenty-second day of his hunger strike; he had been refusing medical attention [JURIST report] but on Friday agreed to a medical exam [JURIST report] by an "independent" team of doctors. The SRS, which denied the protest is a pre-election stunt, accused the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website] of acting on American instructions and "jeopardizing Seselj's life". SRS Deputy Leader Tomislav Nikolic described the hunger strike as a "fight against injustice and humiliation."

Seselj [JURIST news archive] was transferred to a Dutch prison hospital [JURIST report] adjoining the tribunal's detention center [ICTY backgrounder] at Scheveningen near The Hague Wednesday so that his medical condition could be more closely monitored. When Seselj went on hunger strike in early November, he demanded [statement, DOC] that the ICTY dismiss his court-appointed lawyers, who he calls "actors" and "spies," and allow him to conduct his defense to nine war crimes charges [indictment, PDF]. The court later stripped Seselj of his right to defend himself [JURIST report] after he failed to appear in court. Seselj is accused of establishing rogue paramilitary units affiliated with the SRS, which are believed to have massacred and otherwise persecuted Croats and other non-Serbs in the Balkan Wars of the 1990s. Seselj has pleaded not guilty to the charges. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] The New York Times has asked US District Judge Claude M. Hilton to dismiss a libel lawsuit brought by Dr. Stephen J. Hatfill, a former Army germ-warfare researcher who was named a "person of interest" by the FBI [JURIST news archive] in its investigations of anthrax mailings shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks [JURIST news archive]. Hatfill sued the Times for libel and intentional infliction of emotional distress after the newspaper published a story stating that the government's decision not to further pursue Hatfill as a suspect was the result of "poor investigation." The newspaper moved to dismiss the lawsuit on the grounds that as a public speaker on bioterror, Hatfill is a public figure and therefore must prove a higher standard of defamation. The "public figure" must prove that the defamatory actions were taken with "actual malice", a standard which the Times motion contends Hatfill has failed to meet.

Hatfill's suit against the Times and columnist Nichols Kristoff was initially dismissed by a trial court, who ruled the columns were an ongoing report about a government investigation, not libel. The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit reversed [opinion text, PDF], ruling that a jury should decide that issue. In March, the Supreme Court refused to grant certiorari [JURIST report] in the case. Hatfill has also sued [complaint, PDF; JURIST report] the government for related claims. The New York Times has more.

[JURIST] Software-dependent electronic voting machines, "are not viable for future voting systems" and "in practical terms cannot be made secure," according to a draft report [PDF text; press release] prepared by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) [official website] and the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) [official website]. The NIST report instead strongly favored what they called software-independent systems. Those systems do not rely on software alone for vote-tallying and often have a paper back-up system. The most common version of this independent system is use of a paper ballot that is electronically scanned and tallied. Such a system permits an accurate audit.

Errors with these touch-screen-only systems are the basis for several lawsuits filed in Florida regarding vote-tallying irregularities [JURIST report] after the November elections. A coalition of advocacy groups filed a lawsuit [complaint, PDF] on November 21 claiming that officials in Sarasota County failed to investigate or report various alleged malfunctions with the touch-screen voting machines and are calling for a re-vote in Florida's hotly-contested 13th Congressional District. This was only one of many instances of voting machine malfunction on election day [JURIST report]. AP has more.

[JURIST] A UN Human Rights Council [official website] commission of inquiry has recommended [report, PDF] that Israel be made to compensate Lebanon for damages the Israeli military inflicted during the 33-day conflict in the Middle East [JURIST news archive]. Specifically, the panel recommended that the Council create "a commission competent to examine individual claims" of citizens and "examine issues of reparations." The Commission of Inquiry made its recommendation to the Council based on its findings that Israel's actions during the conflict were "disproportionate and indiscriminatory" and that they also used prohibited munitions [JURIST report], especially during the last few days of the conflict.

Both Israel and the United States objected strongly to the panel's report [statements summary], with Israel referring to it as "rife with imbalances and misrepresentation." Both countries claimed the report diminished the severity of the attacks on Israel staged by Hezbollah from villages in southern Lebanon. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] Federal Communications Commission (FCC) [official website] Chairman Kevin Martin has asked the FCC general counsel to consider whether one commissioner with a potential conflict of interest may be allowed to consider a proposed $82.2 billion merger of BellSouth and AT&T [corporate websites]. The merger has been delayed three times [JURIST report] as the proposal has failed to gain approval from a majority of the five FCC commissioners. Republicans hold a 3-2 advantage, but voting has been deadlocked at 2-2 as Republican Commissioner Robert McDowell, a former lobbyist, recused himself from voting due a conflict of interest. Martin took steps to break the stalemate Friday, notifying Congress of his petition to the FCC general counsel. Title 18, Section 208 (b) of the US Code [text] would allow the general counsel to reinstate McDowell if "the interest of the Government in the employee's participation outweighs the concern that a reasonable person may question the integrity of the agency's programs and operations." AP has more.

The merger has already been approved [text] without reservation by the US Department of Justice Antitrust Division [official website] following an eight-month investigation that concluded that AT&T's proposed acquisition of BellSouth was not likely to "substantially reduce competition" in the US telecom market. In an October letter [PDF], the Democratic FCC commissioners said that serious questions remained about whether the merger would serve the public interest, especially against the backdrop of other forms of consolidation and concentration in the telecommunications industry.

[JURIST] The lawsuit brought against the New Hampshire Republican State Committee [official website] for the jamming of Democratic phone lines in the 2002 Senate race has been settled, according to a statement Friday from GOP state Committee Chairman Wayne Semprini. The New Hampshire Democratic Party [official website] filed civil suit [JURIST report] for compensation for the 800 hang-up phone calls that were placed to interfere with Democratic get-out-the-vote campaigns. The settlement comes just as trial was set to start Monday in Hillsborough County Superior Court on issues of phone system interference and compensation, after the trial judge dismissed 5 of the initial 8 counts [JURIST report] in the complaint. Democrats sought $4 million compensation for the cost of the seven-month voter turnout campaign, while Republicans wanted damages to be limited to the $4,974 spent on phone rentals and use. A judge ruled Wednesday that damages above phone rentals could be sought, though not the full $4 million, and that the Democrats had the right to allege that the phone jamming thwarted their efforts to increase voter turnout. The settlement amount has not been disclosed. In a statement [text] Saturday, the New Hampshire Democratic Party said that although the settlement "closes one chapter of the litigation stemming from the shameful and criminal Republican campaign to rob people of their fundamental right to vote, the federal criminal investigation will continue." AP has more.

Several key figures in the scheme to jam the phone lines received prison time for criminal charges related to the case. James Tobin [SourceWatch profile], President Bush's 2004 campaign chairman for New England, was sentenced to 10 months in prison [JURIST report] in May after being convicted in December 2005 for his role in the scheme. Allen Raymond, former president of Republican consulting group GOP Marketplace, received a five month sentence, and Chuck McGee, the former executive director of the New Hampshire Republican Party was sentenced to seven months in prison and $2,000 in fines [JURIST reports]. McGee admitted that he had paid a Virginia telemarketing company more than $15,000 in a scheme to jam Democratic Party phone lines with computer-generated calls. In November, Shaun Hansen, former owner of the telemarketing firm Mylo Enterprises Inc., pleaded guilty [JURIST report] to two federal counts of conspiracy to commit interstate telephone harassment. The election concerned was a off-term Senate race between Democrat Jeanne Shaheen and Republican John Sununu [official website], who won with 51 percent of the vote.

[JURIST] Republicans in the US House of Representatives agreed Friday to vote on a compromise offshore drilling bill [S 3711 text; CRS summary] on Tuesday under special rules that limit amendments and generally speed up proceedings, but require a two-thirds majority for approval. If passed, the bill would allow oil and gas drilling in about 8.3 million acres of federal waters in the eastern-central Gulf and boost federal royalty shares from two percent to 37.5 percent in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. Environmental leaders, however, oppose the measure, especially in light of the GOP's pending loss of majority rule.

The Senate passed the compromise bill [JURIST report], 71-25, in August, limiting offshore expansion to the Gulf of Mexico. The bill passed by the House [JURIST report] in June, the Deep Ocean Energy Resources Act [HR 4761 text, PDF], would have ended the offshore drilling moratorium on 85 percent of the coastal waters surrounding the US. AP has more.

[JURIST] Argentinean judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral declared former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani [official website, in Persian; BBC profile] and eight other Iranian officials fugitives from justice on Friday. The nine failed to respond to arrest warrants [JURIST report] issued in Argentina in November for their alleged roles the AMIA Jewish cultural center bombing [Wikipedia backgrounder, BBC report] that killed 85 people and wounded over 200 more in Buenos Aries in 1994. Chief prosecutor Alberto Nisman has said that Iranian officials authorized the bombing [JURIST report] while members of Hezbollah [BBC backgrounder] actually carried out the attack. Canicoba Corral has assigned the state public defender's office to represent the accused.

Iran has repeatedly denied playing a role [BBC report] in the bombing's planning and execution, and responded to Argentina's issuance of arrest warrants by requesting the issuance of its own arrest warrants [JURIST report] for those investigating the bombing. Iranian prosecutor Dorri-Najafabadi said he wants those involved in the case arrested because "making propaganda against Iran is a crime" and he plans to seek "spiritual and financial compensation" [Reuters report] for their "conspiracy against the Iranian nation." Argentina, home to more Jewish people than any other Latin American nation, has yet to convict anyone in connection to the 1994 attack or the attack two years prior that destroyed the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires and killed 29 people. Rafsanjani was president of Iran from 1989 to 1997, and he is now the head of the Expediency Council [Global Security backgrounder], which serves as a mediator between Iran's parliament and clerics, who can block legislation. AP has more.

[JURIST] An Italian appeals court Friday denied the request of former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi [BBC profile; JURIST archive] to remove the judge presiding over his tax fraud trial. Berlusconi and co-defendant David Mills [Guardian profile] had asked that Judge Edoardo d'Avossa be removed [JURIST report] from the current trial, citing d'Avossa's involvement with other Berlusconi trials. The Milan appeals court rejected the request because the present case involves "facts and behaviors completely different from the activities examined in the previous proceedings." Berlusconi's defense team said it plans to appeal the decision with the nation's highest criminal court.

The charges stem from allegations [JURIST report] that, in deals struck between 1994 to 1999, Berlusconi's media empire, Mediaset [corporate website], falsely reported the broadcast royalties paid for US films, thus avoiding taxes totaling 125 billion old lire. Berlusconi has faced numerous criminal trials, but has never been found guilty. In September 2005 he was cleared of false accounting charges and in June 2005 he was acquitted on bribery charges [JURIST reports]. AP has more.