[JURIST] The US Department of Defense [official website] will send an investigative team headed by Pentagon Inspector General Claude M. Kicklighter [official website] to Iraq to probe allegations of fraud and corruption related to military contracts, a DOD spokesman said Tuesday. The team will concentrate on incongruities concerning weapons and supplies bought by the US and intended for the use of Iraqi forces. As of last week, 73 criminal investigations were underway into contracts valued at more than $5 billion, Army spokesman Col. Dan Baggio said Monday; 20 military and civilian figures, including an officer who worked closely with Gen. David Petraeus [official profile], have already been indicted. The New York Times reported Tuesday that multiple federal agencies, including the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, are conducting their own investigations into the matter. AP has more.

These are not the first allegations of contract fraud connected with the Iraq reconstruction. In July, federal authorities arrested and charged [press release; JURIST report] a former school teacher for accepting kickbacks from contractors attempting to obtain military contracts in Iraq. Carolyn Blake was alleged to have been involved in a scheme with her brother, Major John L. Cockerham, and his wife, Melissa Cockerham, in which she received $3.1 million from contractors in 2004 and 2005. According to US Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction [official website] Stuart W. Bowen Jr., the Cockerham scheme was the largest case of bribery connected with the Iraq reconstruction effort at the time. The Cockerhams were arrested and charged with money laundering, bribery and conspiracy [DOJ press release] for receiving up to $9.6 million in kickbacks. In June, former US Army Reserve Lt. Col. Bruce D. Hopfengardner was sentenced to 21 months [JURIST report] in prison for taking bribes and defrauding the Coalition Provisional Authority [official website] in Iraq.

[JURIST] Russia has not yet received any evidence from Britain with which to prosecute Andrei Lugovoy [BBC profile; JURIST news archive], the primary suspect in the November 2006 murder of British citizen and former Russian intelligence officer Alexander Litvinenko [BBC profile; JURIST news archive], the chief of the investigating committee at the General Prosecutor's Office said Tuesday. In an interview scheduled to be published Wednesday, Alexander Bastrykin told government daily Rossiskaya Gazeta [media website, in Russian] that his office had only received documents riddled with contradictions and omissions. The UK Crown Prosecution Service declined to comment on Bastrykin's remarks. Russia has said it will not send Lugovoy back for trial to the UK, where he has been charged with Litvinenko's murder [JURIST report]. Russian officials say the Russian constitution prohibits the extradition of citizens for criminal trials in other countries, although they have offered to prosecute Lugovoi in Russia if presented with sufficient evidence.

Litvinenko and Lugovoy, both former employees of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) [official website], met in London on November 1, 2006, hours before Litvinenko fell ill to radioactive poisoning from polonium-210 [CDC backgrounder]. RIA Novosti has more.

[JURIST] The government of Pakistan [JURIST news archive] has reiterated its refusal to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) [PDF text] in the wake of its latest test of a nuclear-capable missile, saying that nuclear arms are vital to a stable balance of power, according to Tuesday reports. Pakistan Ministry of Foreign Affairs [official website] spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said that India - Pakistan's bitter adversary since partition of the subcontinent in 1949 - had rebuffed numerous appeals to sign the treaty, and that Pakistan was not obligated to become a party since India refused. She added that Pakistan's nuclear program was intended as deterrence against attack, and cited this as the primary reason that the country had begun conducting nuclear tests in 1998 after India tested its own nuclear bomb. She did, however, support a suggestion by the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency [official website] that the NPT should be adjusted to take into account "ground realities."

Pakistan test-fired its new air-launched Hatf-8 "Ra'ad" (in Arabic, "Thunder") cruise missile Saturday. The nuclear-capable missile has a range of some 350 miles. ANI has more.

[JURIST] Abdullah Gul [BBC profile] was sworn in as Turkey's new president Tuesday after winning a majority of votes in the Turkish parliament's third round of voting on his candidacy. Gul, supported by the Islamist-leaning Justice and Development Party (AKP) [party website, in Turkish] who had been serving as Turkey's foreign minster, pledged to uphold Turkey's secularist traditions. The Turkish army [official website], which has ousted four presidents in four decades and regards itself as the guardian of the secular Turkish constitution [text], warned Monday that "centers of evil" were trying to undermine the constitution. Earlier votes in parliament, which elects the president, failed to elect Gul by the required two-thirds majority. Gul only needed a simple majority in the third round of voting, and received backing from 339 of 550 parliamentarians. BBC News has more.

Gul's original candidacy in April caused controversy when he ran as the sole contender for the Turkish presidency [BBC Q&A]. The Turkish Constitutional Court voided [JURIST report] the April parliamentary vote in support of Gul because a quorum of legislators did not participate, prompting calls for constitutional reform [JURIST report]. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan [official website] accused the court of hurting democracy in its decision and said he would support dissolving parliament and holding an early parliamentary election to ensure that Turkey's leaders were chosen by the people rather than the courts. About one million protesters marched [JURIST report] in the streets of Istanbul to protest Gul and critics accused him of harboring secret plans for Islamist reforms to Turkey's strongly secular state. The army also warned against instituting any Islamist reforms.

After the Constitutional Court voided the April presidential vote, members of parliament pushed through a constitutional amendment [JURIST report] to allow voters to directly elect the president. The bill was vetoed [JURIST report] by current Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer [BBC profile], and then passed by parliament a second time [JURIST report], but that vote was marred by complaints of balloting violations. The AKP then sought to hold a national referendum on the issue; Sezer later blocked the referendum [JURIST reports] from taking place at the same time as parliamentary elections [BBC Q&A] in July. The Constitutional Court has ruled that the referendum may proceed [JURIST report], but since winning re-election, the AKP has not yet scheduled a vote.

[JURIST] US Army Lt. Col. Steven Jordan [CBS profile; JURIST news archive] was acquitted by a military jury Tuesday of failing to control soldiers under his command who abused detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison [JURIST news archive]. He was convicted, however, of disobeying an order not to discuss the investigation into abuse allegations. Jordan was the second highest intelligence officer at the prison when the abuses took place and is the only commissioned officer to be tried in connection with the prisoner abuse scandal. He faces up to five years in prison.

Prosecutors initially charged [JURIST report] Jordan with seven violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice [text] including disobeying a superior commissioned officer, dereliction of duty, failure to obey a regulation, false swearing, cruelty and maltreatment, and interfering with an investigation. Two charges were dropped [JURIST report] before his court-martial began last week after after new evidence came to light that Jordan provided statements to an official investigating the Iraqi prison abuse allegations without being properly read his rights, making his statements inadmissible. In his 2004 report [PDF text; JURIST report], Maj. Gen. George R. Fay recommended that Jordan and Col. Thomas Pappas [official profile], Jordan's superior, be punished for their roles in the abuse scandal. Pappas was granted immunity in exchange for his testimony against Jordan. Pappas testified during Jordan's Article 32 hearing [JURIST report] that Jordan was concerned that he did not have the proper training or experience to assume his role running the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center [backgrounder] at Abu Ghraib. AP has more.

[JURIST] Russian authorities have charged at least four of the 10 suspects arrested [JURIST report] Monday in connection with last October's killing [JURIST report] of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya [BBC obituary; JURIST news archive], a defense lawyer told reporters Tuesday. A spokesman from the office of Russian Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika [official website, in Russian] has thus far declined to issue an official statement or identify those arrested. Reuters has more.

Politkovskaya, who had covered the crisis in Chechnya [BBC Q&A] for Novaya Gazeta [media website, in Russian] since 1999, was shot in the head and in the chest after returning to her Moscow apartment building last year. Politkovskaya was a well known critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and authored two books on Chechnya. Immediately following Politkovskaya's death, Putin suggested that the murder was an outside plot to damage Putin's reputation.

[JURIST] The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit Tuesday ordered [order, PDF] former Wal-Mart [corporate website; JURIST news archive] vice chairman Tom Coughlin to face a new sentencing hearing, holding that his sentence was too lenient and improperly departed from the punishment prescribed by the Federal Sentencing Guidelines [USSC materials]. Coughlin was sentenced to five years probation [JURIST report], including 27 months of house arrest, in August 2006 after pleading guilty to six felony fraud and tax charges [JURIST report] in January 2006 for stealing money, merchandise and gift cards from the store and filing a false tax report. Coughlin was also ordered to pay a $50,000 fine and more than $400,000 in restitution.

Wal-Mart lawyers referred Coughlin to federal prosecutors [JURIST report] after they uncovered $500,000 in losses due to store vouchers that Coughlin used to purchase items and funds he embezzled to pay for the care of his hunting dogs, an upgrade to his truck, and the lease for a private hunting area. AP has more.

[JURIST] A Manhattan federal judge Monday overturned a federal bankruptcy court's highly-controversial decision in the Enron [JURIST news archive] case, ruling that holders of claims against a bankrupt company should have their claims extinguished if they purchased them from a seller who used "inequitable conduct." US District Judge Shira Scheindlin found that federal bankruptcy rules were only intended to extinguish the claims of holders who knew of the seller's bad conduct when they made their purchase and should not be used to punish "good faith" claim-holders.

Numerous financial organizations and associations, including Merrill Lynch and Co. [corporate website], the Bond Market Association [trade website], the International Swaps and Derivatives Association [trade website], had filed papers criticizing the bankruptcy court ruling, fearing that it could destroy the $500 billion distressed-debt market and also injure the stock market as a whole. AP has more.

[JURIST] A US magistrate judge for the Southern District of Florida [official website] issued a ruling Tuesday recommending that the US Department of State [official website] extradite former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega [BBC backgrounder] to France when he is released from federal prison [JURIST report; Federal Bureau of Prisons materials] on September 9, 2007. Noriega is charged in France with laundering money through French banks. In a related ruling last Friday, another US judge refused to reject the French extradition request [JURIST report] and denied [order, PDF] Noriega's petition for writs of habeas corpus, mandamus, and prohibition filed in July [JURIST report]. The court specifically rejected Noriega's claims that France's extradition request was superseded by his status as a US prisoner of war and that under the Geneva Conventions the US must return him home to Panama upon his release.

Noriega and his wife were sentenced in absentia [Reuters report] to 10 years in jail in 1999, but France has reportedly agreed to hold a new trial if he is extradited. AP has more.

[JURIST] Senior judges on the UK Council of HM Circuit Judges [official website] have warned UK lawmakers that the judiciary may balk at a plan to add new control orders [BBC backgrounder; JURIST news archive] to a draft criminal justice and immigration bill [PDF text], the Guardian reported Tuesday. Lawmakers have proposed adding a violent offender order, which would impose tough restrictions on the activities of released offenders for at least two years, with no statutory endpoint. While no specific restrictions have been set, the judges said that the proposed orders, which could mandate compulsory mental health treatment or ban contact with the offender's family, unduly restrict former offenders' civil liberties. The judges argued that professional full-time judges rather than magistrates should determine when to impose the violent offender order, and complained that the proposal does not guarantee legal representation for offenders.

Control orders were first introduced [JURIST report] by the Tony Blair government in 2005, and apart from being politically controversial have already run into repeated problems in the courts [JURIST report]. The Guardian has more.

[JURIST] The Bangladesh Supreme Court [official backgrounder] has overturned a court order granting bail to former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed [party profile], ruling Monday that she should remain in prison as she awaits trial on extortion charges [JURIST report]. Earlier this month, the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court ruled Hasina could be detained and prosecuted under emergency laws declared by the interim emergency government, overturning the High Court Division's ruling that suspended Hasina's extortion trial [JURIST report]. Hasina's lawyers had argued that she cannot be charged under the new laws because her alleged offenses originate from circumstances dating over eight years ago, before the government came to power in January.

The interim emergency government [JURIST report], which has the backing of the military, has used its anti-corruption campaign [BBC Q&A; JURIST news archive] to justify the emergency laws, and has also filed tax evasion charges against Hasina's rival, former Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia [UN profile]. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] The European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) [official website; JURIST report] released its first major report [PDF text; press release] on racism and inequality in the European Union [official website] Tuesday, finding ethnic discrimination in employment, housing and education, as well as an increase in racist violence in many member states. Of the 11 reporting member states, racist crimes increased in Denmark, Germany, France, Ireland, Poland, Slovakia, Finland and the United Kingdom in 2005 and 2006. Figures decreased in Austria, the Czech Republic and Sweden. The FRA suggested that member states must do more to fight racism, noting that EU anti-discrimination legislation [EC backgrounder] has helped promote racial equality. The report also indicated that many of the victims of discrimination are unaware of their rights under the law.

While politicians are increasingly aware of inequality, the FRA found that several member states had failed to fully implement EU anti-discrimination legislation by the end of 2006, and that half of EU member states had failed to apply sanctions to violators. The FRA presented its report to the European Parliament Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs [official website] on Monday. EUobserver.com has more.

[JURIST] Yahoo! [corporate website] filed a motion in federal court in California Monday seeking the dismissal of a lawsuit [complaint, PDF; JURIST report] alleging that the Internet giant aided and abetted human rights violations committed by the Chinese government by providing Chinese officials with information, including e-mail records and user ID numbers, that helped them to identify pro-democracy activists. Yahoo! admitted that it turned over users' personal information, but argued that it could not be held liable for complying with a lawful request by the Chinese government. The World Organization for Human Rights USA [advocacy website] filed the lawsuit on behalf of imprisoned Internet activist Wang Xiaoning, under the Torture Victim Protection Act [text] and the Alien Tort Statute [text].

A 2006 Amnesty International report criticized [JURIST report] Yahoo! and other Internet companies for so-called "Internet oppression", alleging that Yahoo!, Microsoft, and Google have been complicit in efforts by the Chinese government to silence government critics in violation of stated corporate policies. Amnesty urged the companies to petition the Chinese government for the release of "cyber-dissidents." The Washington Post has more. MarketWatch has additional coverage.

[JURIST] Canadian-born financier and former media mogul Conrad Black [JURIST news archive] filed a motion Monday requesting either a new trial or acquittal after his conviction [JURIST report] on mail fraud and obstruction of justice charges in July. In the motion, Black's lawyers questioned the credibility of some trial witnesses, including Black's long-time business partner F. David Radler [JURIST report]. Radler pleaded guilty in 2005 to mail fraud and agreed to testify against Black. Black's attorneys also argued that a decision by US District Judge Amy St. Eve [official profile] of the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois [official website] to deny a defense request to recall Radler on cross-examination was unfair, and that St. Eve's instructions to the jury that Black could be convicted for purposely avoiding knowledge of illegal activity were improper.

Black was accused [indictment, PDF] by the US government of diverting more than $80 million from Hollinger International and its shareholders [JURIST report] during the company's $2.1 billion sale of several hundred Canadian newspapers. He was found not guilty on separate charges of racketeering, wire fraud, and tax evasion. His conviction on the three mail fraud and obstruction of justice counts could lead to a maximum sentence of 35 years in prison and fines of up to $1 million. Former Hollinger executives John Boultbee, Peter Atkinson and Mark Kipnis, also convicted of fraud, filed concurrent motions for new trials or acquittals. AP has more.