[JURIST] The UK shadow Home Secretary resigned [statement text; video] his parliamentary seat Thursday in protest at House of Commons passage Wednesday of an anti-terror bill [materials; BBC Q/A] that would allow authorities to detain terror suspects without charge for up to 42 days [JURIST news archive]. Conservative Party frontbencher David Davis [party profile] called the Labour Party government's bill an "insidious, surreptitious and relentless erosion of fundamental British freedoms," and said that by resigning and forcing a by-election in which he will run, he could take the issue to his constituents for public debate. The House of Lords must still pass the Counter-Terrorism Bill 2007-2008 for it to become law, but Davis suggested that politically motivated government officials might invoke the Parliament Act [backgrounder, PDF] to allow the bill to pass without House of Lords consent.

Current British law authorizes detention without charge for 28 days [JURIST report], but proponents of the 42-day detention limit have argued that the 28-day limitation endangers national security. Critics of the bill, including Davis, say that it would be an unacceptable abridgment of basic rights, and Davis said Thursday that if he is re-elected, he will continue to fight against it. The Guardian has more.

[JURIST] Ethiopian human rights practices in the eastern Ogaden region have come under attack in a new report [text, PDF; press release] from Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website], made public Thursday. The report details atrocities committed by both the Ethiopian military and the ethnic Somali group the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) [official website], who are seeking independence for the Ogaden region. It outlines the failures of the Ethiopian judiciary to provide protection for those subject to government detention or mistreatment due to corruption, insufficient capacity, and the supremacy of federal security forces over the judiciary. HRW also criticized the regional parliament's collectivization of punishment against people and communities suspected of involvement with the ONLF. HRW alleges that the atrocities committed by the Ethiopian military amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, and called on the UN Security Council to urge Ethiopia to conduct a "thorough, transparent, and independent investigation" into the alleged abuses. AFP has more.

Thursday's HRW report adds to recent criticism of Ethiopia's human rights record. In October 2007, the US House of Representatives passed the Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007 (H.R. 2003) [text; JURIST commentary], aimed in part at encouraging the human rights situation in Ethiopia. The bill is currently before the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. In July 2007, HRW accused Ethiopian troops of violating international humanitarian law [JURIST report] by burning homes and forcibly relocating civilians in Ogaden. In March 2007, HRW also accused Ethiopia of complicity with the US and Kenya in secretly detaining Somalis [JURIST report] accused of being Islamic militants. Ethiopia had admitted [JURIST report] in April 2007 that it detained terror suspects but denied that the detentions were secret.

[JURIST] The Arizona State Legislature [official website] passed legislation [HB 2677, PDF] Wednesday barring the state from implementing the REAL ID Act of 2005 [PDF text; JURIST news archive]. The Arizona House voted 51-1 for the bill Wednesday; the Arizona Senate had approved the bill 21-7 on May 6. The bill prohibits the state from participating in or implementing the REAL ID Act, and requires the Arizona Department of Transportation [official website] to report to the legislature any attempts by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) [official website] to secure the enforcement of the Act. The Arizona legislation comes after similar laws barring compliance with the federal statute were passed [ACLU backgrounder] in a number of states, including Alaska, Washington, Georgia, Minnesota and Idaho. The Arizona Daily Star has more.

Initially drafted after the Sept.11, 2001 attacks and designed to discourage illegal immigration, the REAL ID Act attempts to make it more difficult for terrorists to fraudulently obtain US driver's licenses and other government IDs by mandating that states require birth certificates or similar documentation and also consult national immigration databases before issuing IDs. After controversy and strenuous opposition from civil libertarians [FindLaw commentary], it finally passed in 2005 [JURIST report] as part of an emergency supplemental appropriations defense spending bill. State lawmakers have previously expressed concern [JURIST report] about possible problems expected to accompany the implementation of the REAL ID Act, fearing that they would not be able to comply with the law's requirements before the May 2008 deadline. In March 2007, Homeland Security responded to these concerns by extending the deadline for compliance by 18 months; all states have since been granted compliance extensions [JURIST reports].

[JURIST] Zimbabwean police arrested opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) [party website] Secretary General Tendai Biti [profile] Thursday on suspicion of treason. Biti left Zimbabwe after the disputed March 29 elections [JURIST news archive] in which MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai [BBC profile] challenged current Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe [BBC profile; JURIST news archive]; police arrested him as soon as he arrived back in the country Thursday. Police suspect that he wrote a document explaining a plan to fix the elections and that he published false and prejudicial information against the state by announcing an MDC election victory before the official results were released. The charges constitute treason [Section 20 text, PDF] under Zimbabwean criminal law. If convicted, Biti could face the death penalty [sentencing code section 337(b) text, PDF]. AFP has more.

Tsvangirai himself was also detained [BBC report] Thursday while campaigning. Last week he was stopped at a roadblock and then held for nine hours [Reuters report] for drawing and addressing a crowd of people.

[JURIST] Convicted rapist and murderer Karl Eugene Chamberlain [State of Texas profile] was executed by lethal injection at a Texas prison Wednesday evening. His death marked the state's first execution since the US Supreme Court's April ruling in Baze v. Rees [opinion, PDF], in which the Court held that execution by lethal injection did not violate the Eight Amendment prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. Texas has the highest execution rate [AP report] of all US states. Since the Supreme Court lifted a ban on capital punishment in 1976, 406 inmates have been executed in the state. AP has more. The Huntsville Item has local coverage.

Earlier this month, a Texas appeals judge announced the creation of an oversight committee to evaluate and improve the state's criminal justice system, including its execution procedures. According to the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) [advocacy website], there were 42 executions in the US last year, 26 of which took place in Texas. Texas was also at the center of an international controversy over the death penalty when a court in the state set August 5 [JURIST report] as the execution date for a Mexican national incarcerated in Texas. The US Supreme Court ruled [JURIST report] that President Bush did not have the authority to direct state courts to comply with an International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling that attempted to grant review of such cases. Mexico has since asked the ICJ to enjoin execution of its citizens [JURIST report] in the US until it can determine obligations under the ruling.

[JURIST] Singapore Second Foreign Minister Raymond Lim said in a speech Wednesday that the new human rights body of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) [official website] should not set initial standards too high [AFP report] for the organization's member states. The terms and powers of the new human rights body will be determined in Singapore next month at the 41st ASEAN Ministerial Meeting. Lim added that promulgating the rules and terms of the new body would be difficult, and that strict deadlines should not be set for its creation. From China, Xinhua has more.

In November 2007, member states adopted the ASEAN Charter [text, PDF; JURIST report], which is designed to unite the nations into an economic block similar to the European Union. Article 14 of the Charter provides for the establishment of an ASEAN human rights body in order to promote and protect human rights and other fundamental freedoms in member states. In July 2007, ASEAN members agreed in principle [JURIST report] to the creation of the human rights body. Myanmar [JURIST news archive] had opposed the establishment of the human rights group, and Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam [JURIST news archives] had also sought to delay its creation.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] ruled Thursday in the consolidated cases of Munaf v. Geren and Geren v. Omar [Duke Law backgrounder; JURIST report] that federal courts have jurisdiction over habeas corpus petitions filed by American citizens detained abroad by US military personnel, even if the military is operating under a multinational force. Although the Court found such a right exists, it rejected the appeals of two Americans held in US custody in Iraq who had sought to use US courts to challenge their foreign convictions, holding that:

Munaf and Omar are alleged to have committed hostile and warlike acts within the sovereign territory of Iraq during ongoing hostilities there. Pending their criminal prosecution for those offenses, Munaf and Omar are being held in Iraq by American forces operating pursuant to a UN Mandate and at the request of the Iraqi Government. Petitioners concede that Iraq has a sovereign right to prosecute them for alleged violations of its law. Yet they went to federal court seeking an order that would allow them to defeat precisely that sovereign authority. Habeas corpus does not require the United States to shelter such fugitives from the criminal justice system of the sovereign with authority to prosecute them.

For all the reasons given above, petitioners state no claim in their habeas petitions for which relief can be granted, and those petitions should have been promptly dismissed.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] held in the consolidated cases of Boumediene v. Bush and Al-Odah v. United States [Duke Law backgrounder; JURIST report] Thursday that federal courts have jurisdiction to review habeas corpus petitions filed by Guantanamo detainees who have been classified as "enemy combatants." Overturning a decision [PDF text; JURIST report] by the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, the Court held that the Military Commissions Act of 2006 [PDF text; JURIST news archive] did not deprive detainees of the right to challenge their detentions in federal court. Writing for the majority, Justice Kennedy said:

It bears repeating that our opinion does not address the content of the law that governs petitioners’ detention. That is a matter yet to be determined. We hold that petitioners may invoke the fundamental procedural protections of habeas corpus. The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times. Liberty and security can be reconciled; and in our system they are reconciled within the framework of the law. The Framers decided that habeas corpus, a right of first importance, must be a part of that framework, a part of that law.

[JURIST] Sudanese UN ambassador Abdel-Mahmood Mohamed told Reuters [report] Wednesday that International Criminal Court (ICC) [official backgrounder] Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo [official profile] is a terrorist. He said that the ICC's plan [Reuters report] to divert the plane of Minister for Humanitarian Affairs Ahmed Harun [TrialWatch profile] in order to arrest him constitutes terrorism and piracy, for which Moreno-Ocampo should be removed from office. Sudanese President Omer al-Bashir [BBC profile] agreed, telling an Egyptian news service that the ICC is a terrorist organization. An ICC spokeswoman said last week that the court attempted the plan in December, when Harun was scheduled to make a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia, but Harun learned of the plan and called off his trip. Mohamed also criticized the unspecified other countries that had cooperated with the plan, and said that officials in Sudan are considering what actions to take against Moreno-Ocampo. The Sudan Tribune has additional coverage.

Last week Sudan accused the Chief Prosecutor of hindering the peace process for Darfur [Reuters report] by preparing a "fictitious and vicious" case against its government officials after Moreno-Ocampo alleged that top Sudanese officials had been directly involved [JURIST report] in the planning, execution, and cover-up of atrocities committed against Darfur residents. In December 2007, Sudan rejected [JURIST report] Moreno-Ocampo's previous report to the UN Security Council, in which he condemned Sudan for failing to hand over Harun. In February 2007, Moreno-Ocampo asked the ICC to issue a summons [JURIST report] for Harun for "crimes against the civilian population in Darfur," and in May 2007, the ICC issued an arrest warrant [text, PDF; JURIST report] for him. Al-Bashir has since refused to cooperate [JURIST report] with the ICC.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] handed down five decisions Thursday, including Republic of the Philippines v. Pimentel [Duke Law backgrounder; JURIST report], where the Court ruled that an interpleader action to determine ownership of assets held by former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos [official profile] cannot continue because an indispensable party is protected by sovereign immunity. The Republic of the Philippines and the Philippine Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) [official website] claim ownership of funds improperly moved out of the Philippines by Marcos and invested with US investment bank Merrill Lynch, as does Mariano Pimentel, the representative of a class of 9,539 people holding an unsatisfied human rights judgment [opinion] against Marcos' estate. Merrill Lynch initiated the interpleader action to settle ownership of the funds, listing the Philippines, PCGG, and Pimentel, among others, as claimants. The Philippines and PCGG asserted their sovereign immunity from the suit and moved to dismiss the entire action, arguing that they are indispensable parties under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 19(b) [text]. The Court ruled that the Philippine government was an indispensable party, overturning a decision [PDF text] by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and remanding the case to the district court with instructions to dismiss the interpleader action:

The Court of Appeals' failure to give sufficient weight to the likely prejudice to the Republic and the Commission should the interpleader proceed in their absence would, in the usual course, warrant reversal and remand for further proceedings. In this case, however, that error and our further analysis under the additional provisions of Rule 19(b) lead us to conclude the action must be dismissed.

We have never defined the showing required to establish that a nonparty to a prior adjudication has become a litigating agent for a party to the earlier case. Because the issue has not been briefed in any detail, we do not discuss the matter elaboratively here. We note, however, that courts should be cautious about finding preclusion on this basis. A mere whiff of "tactical maneuvering" will not suffice; instead, principles of agency law are suggestive. They indicate that preclusion is appropriate only if the putative agent’s conduct of the suit is subject to the control of the party who is bound by the prior adjudication.

[JURIST] Myanmar law allows the continued detention of pro-democracy party leader Aung San Suu Kyi [BBC profile; JURIST news archive], the government-run New Light of Myanmar [media website] insisted in an editorial Wednesday. The editorial cited Myanmar's 1975 "Law Safeguarding the State from Dangers of Subversive Elements," which it said permitted detentions for up to six years. It noted [AFP report] that other countries have laws allowing the detention of individuals determined to be security threats and likened Suu Kyi to a "naughty child" because she poses a danger to the state. AP has more.

The military junta extended [JURIST report] Suu Kyi's house arrest into a sixth year in May, sparking an international outcry and a demonstration by members of her National League of Democracy. Suu Kyi has spent 11 of the past 17 years in prison or under house arrest for alleged violations of an anti-subversion law [text].

[JURIST] The Supreme Court of Israel [official website] Wednesday upheld [decision] a controversial law allowing the government to detain unlawful combatants suspected of belonging to terrorist groups. The Incarceration of Unlawful Combatants Law [text, PDF] allows the Chief of the General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) [official website] to issue an order to detain any person who is reasonably suspected of direct or indirect participation in "hostile acts against the State of Israel, or [who] is a member of a force perpetrating hostile acts against the State of Israel." The law applies to any person not qualifying as a prisoner of war under the Third Geneva Convention of 1949 [text]. Under the law, unlawful combatants suspected of involvement in terrorism can be held indefinitely, although judicial review of detentions under the law are required every six months. In upholding the law, the Supreme Court of Israel ruled [Ynetnews.com report] that the law's infringement upon personal rights was justified by its goal of limiting acts of terrorism against Israel. Ha'aretz has more.

The Incarceration of Unlawful Combatants Law has been the subject of much criticism [academic backgrounder; JURIST commentary] since it entered into effect in 2002. In June 2006, the Israeli Attorney General refused to apply [JURIST report] provisions of the law to a group of Hamas MPs and ministers detained by Israel.

[JURIST] Malaysian Law Minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim [firm profile] Wednesday said legal reforms are needed to safeguard the independence of the country's judiciary. His remarks came in response to recent allegations that during his term of office, former PM Tun Dr. Mahathir bin Mohamad threatened to remove judges unless they rendered satisfactory verdicts. Ibrahim indicated that the reform would come as an amendment to the Federal Constitution of Malaysia [text, PDF]. The amendment will be designed to endure greater judicial independence and increase the separation of powers between the executive and judiciary branches. Ibrahim added that since the new amendment would address the issue of political interference with the judiciary, there is no need to begin an official probe into the allegations against the former PM. AP has more. The Star has local coverage.

Allegations concerning the interference of the executive branch in the judiciary have been common in Malaysia. An official government inquiry panel announced [JURIST report] in May that a prominent Malaysian lawyer had conspired with allies in the government, judiciary, and business to arrange favorable judicial appointments. Also in May, opposition politicians called for the prosecution of those involved [JURIST report] in the judicial fixing scandal. Public confidence in the judiciary began to diminish after the 1998 constitutional crisis, when three Supreme Court judges were dismissed by the government. Several constitutional amendments after the crisis led to uncertainty surrounding the proper role of the judiciary in the Malaysian government.

[JURIST] Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper [profile] officially apologized [transcript; video] Wednesday for Canada's former Indian residential schools policy [CBC backgrounder], which was designed to aggressively assimilate aboriginal children. The school policy, which was in place from the 1870s to the 1970s, required aboriginal children to attend federally funded Christian boarding schools, communicate in only English or French, adopt the Canadian culture, and to sometimes endure neglect and abuse [advocacy backgrounder]. "The government of Canada sincerely apologizes and asks the forgiveness of the aboriginal peoples of this country for failing them so profoundly," Harper said. This was the first official apology, but the government began reconciliation efforts in 2001 when it established the Indian and Northern Affairs Canada Resolution Sector [official website] to address former students' claims. In 2006 the government settled a class-action suit [Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement text, PDF], giving class members $10,000 CAD for the first school year plus $3,000 CAD for each additional school year. The Toronto Star has more.

The Settlement Agreement also includes funding for commemoration activities, measures to support healing, an independent assessment process for those who allege they suffered abuse, and the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission [official website] to educate the public about the residential schools policy and to promote understanding. In 2007 Harper announced the Specific Claims Action Plan [backgrounder; JURIST report] to establish a new independent tribunal to permanently resolve aboriginal tribes' existing disputes over land seized by the Canadian government. The plan is designed to make financial compensation more transparent, and would set aside approximately $250 million for 10 years to fund claim settlements.