[JURIST] New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (D) [official website] on Tuesday unexpectedly vetoed a bill [legislative materials] that would have required girls to be vaccinated against a sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer. AP reported that Richardson, who last month announced his intention to sign the bill [PJEPHL report], said the legislation's June 15 enactment date would not have given parents, school officials and health care providers enough time to learn about the vaccine for human papillomavirus (HPV) [JURIST news archive; US CDC fact sheet]. The bill would have allowed parents or guardians to opt out of the mandate after reviewing information about the vaccine.

The governor did, however, sign a bill requiring that insurers pay for the HPV vaccine [legislative materials], whose cost approaches $400. Similar measures are pending in other states [PJEPHL report]. AP and the Santa Fe New Mexican have more.

Richardson is the second governor in the past week to change position on a bill requiring HPV vaccination. Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine (D) [official website], who pledged to sign such a bill, last Tuesday proposed amending the legislation [JURIST reports] to allow parents to opt out more easily.

This report was prepared in partnership with the Pittsburgh Journal of Environmental and Public Health Law.

[JURIST] Dhiren Barot [BBC profile], a British man who pleaded guilty [JURIST report] in October to planning a series of bombs on US and British targets, filed an appeal in London’s Court of Appeal Criminal Division [official website] Tuesday. Barot was sentenced to life in prison [JURIST report] in November after pleading guilty to conspiracy to murder for his role in the "Gas Limos Project" [Times report] bombing scheme to blow up three limousines filled with explosives in underground parking garages in Britain, as well as a separate plan to explode radioactive "dirty bombs." Lawyers for Barot argued Tuesday that he should not face life imprisonment for a charge that typically merits a fixed 20 to 30 year sentence. Lord Phillips, sitting with Lord Justice Latham and Mr Justice Treacy, did not issue an immediate ruling on the appeal.

In April 2005 Barot and two other men were indicted [text; JURIST report] in New York for US-related bomb plans in April 2005. In addition to attacks planned throughout the UK, prosecutors alleged that Barot planned to attack the International Monetary Fund and World Bank [official websites] buildings in Washington DC, the New York Stock Exchange and Citigroup buildings in New York City, and the Prudential [corporate websites] building in Newark, New Jersey. London's Daily Telegraph has more.

[JURIST] The anti-Syrian majority in the Lebanon [JURIST news archive] parliament on Tuesday approved a petition asking UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon [official website] to create a tribunal [JURIST news archive] to investigate the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri [JURIST news archive]. Members of the parliamentary majority say that Syria was responsible for the assassination and that its allies in the Lebanese government are stalling the investigation. Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a Syrian ally and opposition leader, has refused to allow a vote on the tribunal until the idea is approved by President Emile Lahoud [official website], another pro-Syria politician. The President and the opposition say they agree to the tribunal in principle, but worry that some might use the investigation for political ends.

Lebanon's current tribunal proposal was approved [JURIST report] last November by a divided cabinet, but Lahoud has refused [JURIST report] to sign off on the proposal. For his part, Ki-moon said last week that it is too soon to construct a tribunal by UN Security Council mandate. Instead, he hopes to build a consensus within the Lebanese government. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] President Bush urged Congress on Tuesday to adopt his proposed targets for alternative fuel use [White House energy policy materials] as a way of combating greenhouse gas emissions [JURIST news archive; EPA backgrounder] a day after the US Supreme Court ruled in Massachusetts v. EPA [opinion text; JURIST report] that the Clean Air Act [text; EPA materials] gives the Environmental Protection Agency [official website] authority to regulate automobile emissions. Speaking at a Rose Garden press conference, Bush said [official transcript]:

First of all, the decision of the Supreme Court we take very seriously. It's the new law of the land. And secondly, we're taking some time to fully understand the details of the decision. ... My attitude is, is that we have laid out a plan that will affect greenhouse gases that come from automobiles by having a mandatory fuel standard that insists upon using 35 billion gallons of alternative fuels by 2017, which will reduce our gasoline usage by 20 percent and halt the growth in greenhouse gases that emanate from automobiles. In other words, there is a remedy available for Congress. And I strongly hope that they pass this remedy quickly.

[JURIST] US District Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California [official website] approved the release Tuesday of jailed video journalist and blogger Josh Wolf [advocacy website; SourceWatch backgrounder], who was imprisoned for 226 days, longer than any other journalist, for refusing to testify before a grand jury. The judge agreed to Wolf's release after he complied with a subpoena and turned over footage [video] he took in 2005 of a San Francisco demonstration protesting the 2005 G8 Summit [official website]. Wolf also published the previously-unreleased video footage on his website Tuesday. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) [advocacy website] has repeatedly called for Wolf's release [press release] and issued a statement [press release, text] Tuesday welcoming news that Wolf was to be freed. AP has more. Bloomberg has additional coverage.

Reporters Without Borders (RWB) [advocacy website] ranked the United States in 53rd place [JURIST report] last October in its fifth annual Worldwide Index of Freedom [press release]. RWB mentioned [press release] Wolf's imprisonment among other factors contributing to the United States' slip of nine places in the rankings since the previous year.

[JURIST] United States intelligence agents from the FBI [JURIST news archive; official website] and the CIA [JURIST news archive; official website] have been using secret prisons in Ethiopia [JURIST news archive] to conduct interrogations, according to AP Tuesday. The report alleges that men, women, and children from the neighboring African nations of Somalia and Kenya [JURIST news archives] have been secretly transferred to Ethiopia for questioning by US officials, hunting Muslim extremists. Though officials in the Ethiopian government were quick to deny these allegations, western security officials stated they had prisoners with links to al-Qaeda in custody. Based on reports from human rights groups [HRW report], AP reported that Kenyan authorities seized Somali refugees fleeing the recent violence in their country and then secretly flew them to Ethiopia for interrogation by US agents. The first abductee to speak out about her experiences, Kamilya Mohammedi Tuweni, said she was abducted and beaten in Kenya before being shipped to Ethiopia, where she was questioned by an American agent.

Human Rights Watch [advocacy website] first claimed [JURIST report] Saturday that the US, Kenya and Ethopia were cooperating with the transitional government of Somalia to detain refugees [press release]. "US security agents have routinely interrogated people held incommunicado," said Georgette Gagnon, Deputy Director of Human Rights Watch in Africa. Though the prisoners were primarily from the Horn of Africa, citizens of western nations such as Sweden, Canada, and even the United States are also said to be incarcerated in Ethiopia. If substantiated, secret jails and interrogations in Africa could prove an embarrassing counterpart to the US's European extraordinary rendition [JURIST news archive] program. AP has more.

[JURIST] A meeting to sort out remaining differences over the rules governing the Khmer Rouge [JURIST news archive] genocide tribunal in Cambodia [JURIST news archive] has been delayed after the Cambodian Bar Association (BAKC) refused to compromise on fees for foreign lawyers. The Bar Association has demanded that foreign defense counsel pay $4,900 to participate in the first year of hearings, despite protests from NGOs [JURIST report] and judges of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) [official website]. These groups fear that the fees will discourage volunteer attorneys from offering their services and will prompt complaints that defendants have not been given a free choice of counsel. The ECCC has given the Bar Association until the end of the month to reconsider its position, at which point they may proceed without the association's input.

Cambodia's 1975-79 Khmer Rouge [MIPT backgrounder] regime was responsible for the deaths of over 1.7 million people from genocide, disease and malnutrition. The ECCC was created to investigate and prosecute instances of human rights violations by a 2001 agreement between Cambodia and the UN. Prosecutors are expected to indict about 10 defendants; however, trials which were scheduled to begin in mid-2007 have been delayed for several months [JURIST report] due to disagreements over procedural rules. The Bar Association has blamed delays on the ECCC [JURIST report]. AFP has more.

[JURIST] A court of appeals in Thailand [JURIST news archive] Tuesday refused to extradite dissident Ly Tong [Wikipedia profile] to Vietnam [JURIST news archive] for using a hijacked plane to drop anti-communist leaflets over Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) in 2000. The court overturned a September ruling that ordered Tong's extradition to face criminal charges of slandering the Vietnamese government and violating its airspace. Judge Wisarut Sirisingh held on that Tong's offense was political rather than criminal, so there was no basis for extradition.

As a pilot for the South Vietnamese air force during the Vietnam War, Tong spent five years in a North Vietnamese prison camp. He gained US citizenship in 1984 and has dropped leaflets over Ho Chi Minh City in 1992 and over Havana, Cuba in 1998. Vietnamese authorities recently arrested a Catholic priest for distributing anti-government documents and two lawyers [JURIST reports] for holding a public human rights discussion. Tong has been detained in Thailand since November 2000, although California state lawmaker Van Thai Tran [personal website] has pressed the Thai government to transfer him to the United States since 2005. AP has more.

[JURIST] US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) [official website] Tuesday announced the arrests of three former South American military officials suspected of war atrocities in their home countries. Ernesto Guillermo Barreiro [Desaparecidos profile] is a former Argentine military officer accused of having served as the chief interrogator at La Perla [IPS report], a clandestine prison during Argentina's 1976-83 Dirty War [Global Security backgrounder; JURIST news archive]. Telmo Ricardo Hurtado and Juan Manuel Rivera-Rondon are former members of the Peruvian military accused of participating in the 1985 Accomarca massacre [AP file report]. Sixty-nine civilians died during the incident when Peruvian state forces raided a village in search of Shining Path guerrillas [FAS backgrounder].

The three men were arrested in Virginia, Maryland and Miami for violating US immigration laws. Hurtado was arrested in Miami for making false statements on his visa application; he had failed to report his 1993 convictions in Peru for two crimes in connection with the Accomarca massacre. Hurtado was pardoned by Peru, as was Barreiro, who was arrested in Argentina in 1987. Peru has had an extradition request for Hurtado since 2005. ICE stated its plans to deport all three to their countries of origin. Reuters has more. AP has additional coverage.

[JURIST] The Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website] Tuesday slightly reduced the 32-year sentence [opinion, PDF; ICTY press release] of former Bosnian Serb leader Radislav Brdjanin [ICTY case backgrounder], but upheld the majority of his 2004 convictions [JURIST report] for crimes against Croats and Muslims during the Bosnian War [Wikipedia backgrounder]. Brdjanin's sentence was reduced by two years because the tribunal reversed certain convictions against him for aiding and abetting torture and for destroying the city of Bosanska Krupa. The court nonetheless said its reduction of sentence is "quite limited" because hundreds of other charges against Brdjanin remain, including approving murders, torture and deportations during the war.

Brdjanin was a member of the Serbian Democratic Party of Bosnia and Herzegovina (SDS) [Wikipedia backgrounder], created by Radovan Karadzic [BBC profile; ICTY case backgrounder], who remains a fugitive [JURIST report] wanted by the Hague-based court on war crimes charges. Brdjanin led the autonomous Serbian region of Krajina during the 1992-95 war which claimed the lives of more than 1,600 Muslims and Croats and deported thousands more from the region. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) [official website] adopted new privacy rules [FCC press release, PDF; order, PDF] for telephone and wireless companies on Tuesday aimed at strengthening safeguards against pretexting [JURIST news archive], the disclosure of personal telephone records to unauthorized individuals. The new rules include carrier authentication requirements, additional notice requirements, and annual certification requirements. Commenting on the new rules, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin [official profile] said in a prepared statement [text, PDF] that the regulations significantly strengthen existing safeguards by requiring express consent before a carrier can give a customer’s phone records to other parties for marketing purposes.

In January, President Bush signed into law [JURIST report] new federal legislation to protect telephone consumers from pretexting. The Telephone Records and Privacy Protection Act of 2006 [text, PDF] was approved [JURIST report] by the US Senate in December in response to the Hewlett-Packard corporate spying scandal [JURIST news archive] that broke last summer. CNET News has more.

[JURIST] The Nigerian Court of Appeal ruled Tuesday that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) [official website] has the right to disqualify presidential candidates for fraud, thus barring Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar [official website; JURIST news archive] from running in the April 21 election. INEC removed Abubakar's name from the ballot because he was indicted on corruption charges [JURIST report], along with his political rival Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo [BBC profile], for diverting money to private interests. Tuesday's unanimous ruling overturned a lower court decision that the INEC did not have the authority to remove candidate names from the election list after Abubakar filed a lawsuit [JURIST report] against the commission for doing so.

Lawyers for Abubakar said they plan to immediately appeal the verdict to the Nigerian Supreme Court [official website]. Abubakar alleges that his indictment was politically motivated by Obasanjo in an effort to quash the democratic process before this month's elections. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] Australian Attorney General Philip Ruddock [official profile] said Tuesday that the gag order placed on Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] as part of his plea agreement [text] cannot be enforced once he returns to Australia, and that Hicks could not be extradited if he were to violate the order. Lawyers for Hicks said that Hicks may have to serve the entirety of his sentence if he violates the gag order; however, Ruddock said Australia would not have the power to enforce the gag.

Hicks submitted an application Monday to be transferred to a prison near his home in South Australia to serve the remainder of his nine-month sentence after pleading guilty to a charge of supporting terrorism [JURIST reports] last week. The Australian government is awaiting formal documentation from US authorities to move Hicks from the US prison camp at Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive]. Once this information is received, the Australian federal government can approach the state government in South Australia to move the process forward, including assessing security requirements and a potential control order [JURIST report]. Australia's ABC News has more.

[JURIST] Taiwanese Nationalist Party (KMT) [party website, in Chinese] leader Ma Ying-jeou [official website, in Chinese; Wikipedia profile] pleaded not guilty Tuesday to corruption charges [JURIST report] and said he plans to run in the 2008 presidential elections no matter what the court's verdict. The charges against Ma stem from $333,000 that he transferred from a city expense fund to his own private account during his term as mayor of Taipei [government website, English version]. Ma has defended his actions as completely legitimate based on a 20-year-old practice that allows government officials to take discretionary funds without keeping specific accounting records if used to pay bonuses to city workers or fund municipal events.

If convicted by the Taipei District Court, the Harvard-trained lawyer could be sentenced to up to seven years in jail. The KMT and current ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) [party website] are scheduled to reveal their presidential candidates in May. Fellow Nationalist Wang Jin-pyng [Wikipedia profile] said Monday that he will not contest the presidential primary, but some believe Wang may split the party by running as an independent presidential candidate against Ma. AP has more.

[JURIST] Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych [BBC profile] and leaders of the Ukrainian Parliament filed a lawsuit Tuesday seeking to block a decree from Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko [official website; BBC profile] to dissolve parliament and hold elections in May. Yushchenko issued the decree [statement] Monday, saying that his "actions are dictated by the crucial necessity to save the country's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and to ensure the adherence to the constitution and the observance of civil rights and freedoms." Yushchenko accused the country's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada [official website], of "deliberately escalating" the latest political crisis [BBC Q&A] in the country, saying there are three "dangerous tendencies" in the parliament:

The first one is the unconstitutional process to form and expand the parliamentary coalition. Under the constitution, the coalition can be formed by deputy factions and not by individual or group members. Any other way is a revision of the will of the nation and the most cynical challenge for each of us.

The second tendency is the practice to pass illegitimate and unconstitutional laws. The most recent example is the Law on the Cabinet of Ministers, which systemically violates the constitution of Ukraine and is an attack on Ukraine's constitutional order.

The third tendency is their inability to fulfill obligations and fraudulent policy of intrigues and betrayals disguised as national unity slogans....

Violations of the Constitution of Ukraine, the biggest of them being the unconstitutional way of coalition formation, created obvious legal and political reasons to dissolve parliament.

[JURIST] Thousands of protesters rallied outside the Pakistan Supreme Court [official website] Tuesday wearing signs and shouting chants against Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf [official profile; BBC profile] for suspending [JURIST report] the country's chief justice last month as a hearing regarding the suspension took place inside the court. Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry [official profile] was removed from his post by Musharraf for accusations that he abused his position by pushing police officials into giving his son a job [JURIST report] and taking advantage of unwarranted privileges. Lawyers and political opponents, however, view Musharraf's decision as a means to control the judiciary in an attempt to continue his eight-year rule in an election year.

Since Chaudhry was suspended, many lawyers and senior judges have resigned [JURIST report] and boycotted courts [JURIST report] across Pakistan in an effort to prompt Chaudhry's reinstatement. Chaudhry denies any wrongdoing and has called for the hearings to be made public [JURIST report]. The chief justice has been active in cases involving people allegedly abducted by state security personnel and the privatization of state assets and has handed down decisions which many say Musharraf views as a threat to his continued rule. AP has more. BBC has additional coverage.

10:50 AM ET - Chaudhry's hearing has been adjourned until April 13. Chaudhry's lawyers argued Tuesday that the proceedings should be open, but the prosecution opposed that idea. The judges hearing the case refused to make an immediate decision. PTI has more.

ALSO ON JURIST  Op-ed: Safeguarding Judicial Independence in Pakistan | Op-ed: Justice Derailed in Pakistan: The Sacking of the CJ

[JURIST] Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick [official website] has directed the Massachusetts Department of Public Health [official website] to register the same-sex marriages [JURIST news archive] of 26 couples from outside the state whose licenses were not previously allowed to be included in state records by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney [Wikipedia profile]. The couples were married in 2004 in four Massachusetts towns and cities which refused to follow an order by Romney not to marry out-of-state same-sex couples. Patrick said Monday that he would support the repeal of a 1913 state statute [text], upheld [JURIST report] by the Massachusetts Supreme Court last year, which prohibits couples from marrying in Massachusetts if their marriage would not be legal in their own state.

Earlier this year, Massachusetts lawmakers lobbied for a proposed constitutional ban [JURIST report] on same-sex marriage which would strictly define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, though it would leave existing Massachusetts same-sex marriages intact. While the recognition of the 26 marriage certificates does not actually change the legal status of the marriages, Patrick's decision has been heralded by the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD) [advocacy website] as a move toward treating same-sex couples equally to heterosexual couples. Patrick's order was criticized, however, by the Massachusetts Family Institute [advocacy website] which said Patrick was "placing his personal preference above the law." Monday's New York Times has more.

Massachusetts is currently the only US state to recognize same-sex marriage, after a November 2003 state high court ruling [JURIST report; background materials], and more than 8,000 same-sex couples have since been wed there.

[JURIST] The European Commission [official website] is investigating Apple's iTunes [JURIST news archive] to determine if sales restrictions based on the buyer's country of residence violate EU antitrust laws, according to a commission statement confirming the probe [press release] Tuesday. Music buyers in Europe are currently only able to download songs or albums from the iTunes store in their own country, which the commission says restricts buyers in terms of what music is available and the cost of each purchase. Depending on where in Europe the buyer lives, music prices can vary by as much as $0.24 for a single song. A spokesman for Apple [corporate website] said Monday that the company would like to make the costs and availability to Europeans uniform across the 27-nation EU, but music labels and publishers have limited Apple's rights in Europe.

Apple could face significant fines if found in violation of EU antitrust [JURIST news archive] laws. The company has two months to respond to a letter from the European Commission containing questions about its iTunes sales practice in Europe. Last year, France passed legislation [JURIST report] allowing French regulators to force Apple to make its iPod player compatible with songs downloaded from other Internet music stores, and downloads from its iTunes service compatible with other players. Similar legislation has been proposed in Britain, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Poland. AP has more.