[JURIST] The US Department of Justice announced [press release] Friday that it has settled a lawsuit [settlement text, PDF] brought by former US Army germ-warfare researcher Dr. Steven Hatfill [WP profile], a development that may moot a landmark contempt case against former USA Today reporter Toni Locy [JURIST news archive] now awaiting a ruling by the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. Under the settlement, Hatfill would drop all damages claims against the government in return for a lump sum payment of $2.825 million and a 20-year annuity of $150,000 amounting to $3 million. Hatfill had initially sued [complaint, PDF; JURIST report] the Department alleging that it violated the US Privacy Act [text] by providing personal information and information about him to journalists - including Locy - during its investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks [GWU backgrounder] in which he was at one point named a "person of interest". Locy had refused to disclose her sources in discovery, arguing that the information Hatfill was seeking was not central to his lawsuit. In a letter [PDF text] to the Court of Appeals Friday informing it of the settlement, Hatfill lawyer Christopher Wright said that Locy's evidence was no longer needed by his client. Bloomberg has more

In March, US District Judge Reggie Walton found Locy in contempt of court [order, PDF; JURIST report] for not disclosing her sources and ordered her to pay a fine of $500 a day, increasing to $1000 a day after one week and then up to $5000 a day after two weeks, the costs of which could not be covered by her former employer. Locy obtained an emergency stay of that order from the Court of Appeals and oral arguments [JURIST reports] on the merits of the sanctions were heard last month. The appeals court has yet to make a formal ruling on the status of the contempt case in light of the Hatfill settlement, but Locy said late Friday that she and her lawyers are hopeful that the deal would end the matter. Locy will be a professor at Washington & Lee University's journalism school this fall.

Editor's Note: Toni Locy served as a JURIST student staff member while pursuing her MSL at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law in 2006-07.

[JURIST] A South African magistrate Thursday set April 14, 2009 as the start of the corruption and fraud trial of suspended police commissioner Jackie Selebi [BBC profile, JURIST news archive]. The South African National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) [official website] charged Selebi, the former president of INTERPOL [organization website], with corruption [charge sheet, PDF; JURIST report] in connection with his alleged relationship with Glenn Agliotti [Mail and Guardian report], a convicted drug smuggler suspected of involvement in the murder of South African mining head Brett Keeble. AP has more. Reuters has additional coverage.

Selebi is a close political ally of South African President Thabo Mbeki [official profile] and on Thursday the South African government extended Selebi's contract [BBC report] for an additional year. Selebi was suspended from his police post and forced to resign as INTERPOL president [JURIST report] after the NPA announced the allegations last month. Selebi is accused of receiving $170,000 in bribes from Agliotti. The NPA has alleged that Selebi ignored Agliotti's drug trafficking and warned Agliotti that he had been identified in the Keeble murder investigation.

[JURIST] An HIV-positive soldier has challenged his upcoming dismissal from the Indian Army, the Supreme Court [official website] announced Friday. A Human Rights Law Network [advocacy website] lawyer who is representing the soldier argued that the policy barring HIV-positive personnel from military service was "retrograde," pointing to a March 2008 ruling by the South African High Court that struck down a similar South African policy [PlusNews report]. He also noted that other nations, including the United States [US military policy text, PDF], already allow HIV-positive people to serve in their armed forces. IANS has more.

Other countries have also rejected policies banning all HIV-positive individuals from serving in the military. Last year, the Supreme Court of Mexico [official website] ruled [JURIST report] such a policy was an unconstitutional infringement on principles of equality. The Mexican military may now only expel soldiers if a doctor certifies that their condition prevents them from performing their duties.

[JURIST] The Canadian Federal Court [official website] ruled in two separate opinions Thursday that media comments by Quebec Justice John Gomery [CBC profile], who led the inquiry into the sponsorship scandal [CBC backgrounder] involving the Liberal Party [party website] and the administration of former prime minister Jean Chrétien [official profile], indicated bias against Chrétien [opinion, PDF] and his chief of staff Jean Pelletier [opinion, PDF]. The court also set aside a portion of the inquiry's findings, including a conclusion by Gomery that Chrétien and Pelletier had erred in their oversight of a sponsorship program, in which millions of dollars were given to advertising agencies friendly with the then-ruling Liberal Party, in return for little or no advertising work. In rebuking Gomery and setting aside a substantial portion of his report on the scandal, Judge Max Teitelbaum [official profile] wrote:

I am convinced that an informed person, viewing the matter realistically and practically and having thought the matter through would find that the Commissioner’s statements to the media during the Phase I hearings, after the release of the Report and upon his retirement, viewed cumulatively, indicate that the Commissioner prejudged issues under investigation and that he was not impartial toward the Applicant. The nature of the comments made to the media are such that no reasonable person, looking realistically and practically at the issue, and thinking the matter through, could possibly conclude that the Commissioner would decide the issues fairly.

[JURIST] Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer [official website] promised in an open letter [text, in German; SPÖ statement, in German] Thursday that he would push for Austria to hold national referenda in deciding whether to accept future modifications of the EU reform treaty [JURIST news archive], properly known as the Treaty of Lisbon [PDF text; website]. The announcement came two weeks after Irish voters rejected [JURIST report] the reform treaty in a referendum. A June European Commission Eurobarometer report [PDF text] found that Austrian citizens are among those least satisfied with EU membership. Bloomberg has more.

In April, the upper house of the Austrian parliament [official website, in German] voted 151-27 [press materials, in German; JURIST report] to approve the treaty. The treaty must be ratified by all 27 EU member states before it can take effect, though each country may choose the method of ratification. Leaders from the 27 countries signed the reform treaty [JURIST report] last December, and 14 countries have ratified the document [JURIST news archive]. In 2005, an earlier draft for a European constitution [JURIST news archive] failed when voters in France and the Netherlands [JURIST reports] rejected the proposal in national referenda.

[JURIST] A German court [Bavarian justice system website, in German] Friday ruled that a sports utility vehicle manufactured in China bore an unacceptable resemblance to a model manufactured by German automaker BMW [corporate website], ordering the SUV's importers to stop sales of the infringing SUV, destroy all remaining cars, and pay compensatory damages to BMW. China Automobile said it would appeal the ruling to the European Court of Justice [official website], arguing that Germany could not ban a vehicle that was legal throughout the rest of Europe. AP has more.

This is not the first time Chinese automakers has been accused of imitating foreign car design. Last year, DaimlerChrysler threatened to sue Shuanghuan Automobile [Forbes report] over a car it alleged infringed on its designs. Counterfeit luxury goods have been an increasing problem [AutoChannel report] for many countries in recent years and many have taken steps to crack down on Chinese "copycat cars."

[JURIST] Unidentified assailants Thursday shot and killed a top Iraqi judge while he was traveling on a Baghdad highway. Kamel al-Shewaili was the president of the al-Rasafah Court of Appeal, one of two appeals courts in Baghdad, and presided over criminal cases for the city's eastern district. Reuters has more. Voices of Iraq has local coverage.

In January, Iraqi federal court of appeal judge and Supreme Judicial Council member Amir Jawdat al-Naeib was also assassinated [JURIST report] by gunmen in the capital. The Judicial Council said in August 2007 that 31 Iraqi judges have been assassinated since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime. The Iraqi Lawyers Association reported in April last year that at least 210 lawyers and judges have been killed [IRIN report] since the US-led invasion, with dozens more injured in attacks which have prompted hundreds to leave the country. Many key Iraqi judges and their families now live in the fortified Green Zone in Baghdad or in the so-called Rule of Law complex [NYT report], a secure compound in the northern Baghdad neighborhood of Rusafa where they are supposedly safe from outside threats.

[JURIST] Hearings to confirm war crimes charges [press release] against two former Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) militia leaders began at the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website] Friday. Germain Katanga [BBC report; ICC materials] is accused [JURIST report] of using child soldiers and orchestrating violence against women; former Nationalist and Integrationist Front leader Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui [ICC materials; JURIST report] is accused of planning and carrying out an attack against the village of Bogoro in 2003, allegedly killing some 200 persons. Prosecutors argued that the trial would help victims to "move forward" with their lives in the DRC's violence-plagued Ituri district [HRW backgrounder], where many of the alleged war crimes took place.

A scheduled May hearing to confirm the charges against Chui and Katanga was delayed [decision, PDF; press release] in April to allow the defense more time to prepare. Another accused war criminal, Thomas Lubanga [ICC materials; BBC profile], was taken into ICC custody in March 2006, becoming the first DRC war crimes defendant to appear before the ICC [JURIST reports]. Lubanga is charged [JURIST report] with enlisting child soldiers in the Ituri district.

[JURIST] Banu Altunbasof, the Sudan head of international aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF) [advocacy website], was ejected from the country's Darfur region [JURIST news archive] Thursday, after authorities said that she blocked state investigations into alleged MSF transgressions. The Sudanese government has long alleged that aid agencies have falsely accused the government of human rights abuses in Darfur for political purposes [JURIST report], while aid groups accuse the government of being hostile toward their work [HRW backgrounder] in the region. In 2005, two MSF workers were detained [JURIST report] over a report [PDF text] alleging mass rape in the Darfur region. Reuters has more.

A report [materials] released by the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI) [official website] last week named Sudan as one of the worst violators of refugee rights. The report graded [grade report, PDF; report grading policy, PDF] countries based on their adherence to the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees [text], specifically evaluating refugee policies on physical protection, detention and access to courts, labor, and freedom of movement. According to a report [text] by Human Rights Watch (HRW) [official website], as of April 2008 2.5 million people have been displaced by the government's war against rebel forces and another 2 million are considered to be otherwise affected by the conflict.

[JURIST] UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour [official profile; JURIST news archive] Thursday sharply criticized [press release] Zimbabwean political groups for violence surrounding the country's ongoing presidential elections and said that mediation efforts should be based on the need for accountability and justice. Members of both the ruling ZANU PF party and occasionally the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) [party websites] commit serious human rights violations, she said, and must be held accountable. Arbour added that current conditions make meaningful elections impossible and she called on both the Zimbabwean government and international groups to restore order. Also Thursday, the UN Special Procedures mandate holders [UN materials] reiterated concerns about rights violations in Zimbabwe and urged the government to postpone the elections until the rule of law had been restored. In a statement [text], the group wrote:

We strongly urge the Government of Zimbabwe to ensure respect for human rights and to abide by democratic principles and practices, in accordance with Zimbabwe's own domestic law and international human rights standards.

[JURIST] Controversial US interrogation policies outlined in two 2002 and 2003 memoranda [PDF texts; JURIST report] were reviewed by top Department of Justice (DOJ) officials, including former Attorney General John Ashcroft [official profile], according to two former Bush administration officials testifying before the House Judiciary Committee [official website] Thursday. The documents advised the Department of Defense (DOD) that the military could use a wide range of interrogation methods to question foreign detainees outside the US without fear of criminal liability or constitutional limitations. Vice Presidential chief of staff David Addington and former DOJ lawyer John Yoo [profiles] denied that the memos were written without Ashcroft's knowledge or input. Addington did not prepare formal testimony [background documents, PDF], but told the panel that he would not be responsible for US interrogation policy if a court later found it to be illegal. Yoo, who wrote the 2002 memorandum, told the Committee [PDF text]:

In facing the questions that were posed to us, we appropriately kept in mind that the homeland of the United States had been attacked by a dangerous, unconventional enemy. But we did not make policy, and we called the legal questions as we saw them.

[JURIST] East Timorese President Jose Ramos-Horta [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] Friday declined what he described as an offer to become the next UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, despite having told parliament last week [AP report] that he had accepted the position. Ramos-Horta said he changed his mind because resigning from the presidency would force new elections to be held within 90 days, something he feared could destabilize the newly-formed country. The UN has made no official statement on the matter. Ramos-Horta, who won the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize [Nobel Prize website], had been considered a leading candidate for the position since surviving an assassination attempt [JURIST report] in February. Current UNHCHR Louise Arbour [official profile; JURIST news archive] will be formally stepping down next week. AP has more. BBC News has additional coverage.

Ramos-Horta is only the second president of East Timor and previously served as the country's first foreign minister. He was wounded in a February assassination attempt by anti-government rebels. Rebel leader Alfredo Reinado was killed during the attacks, while Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao [BBC profile] escaped unharmed. The National Parliament of East Timor [official website] subsequently declared a national state of emergency [AP report], prohibiting public gatherings and establishing a curfew. The parliament initially established the state of emergency for one month at the end of February, but extended it [JURIST reports] in late March, saying some parts of the country remained unstable following the assassination attempts.

[JURIST] A judge in the US District Court for the Northern District of California [official website] Wednesday granted a motion [order, PDF] to enforce a previous settlement agreement between two social networking websites, Facebook [corporate backgrounder] and ConnectU [corporate website]. The ruling effectively ends the two companies' ongoing legal battle [case materials] concerning ownership of source code forming the basis of Facebook. The two sides had agreed on a settlement in February, but ConnectU had sought to annul that agreement [Bloomberg report], arguing that Facebook had committed fraud in the procurement, material terms were missing, and the agreement did not reflect the parties' intentions. Judge James Ware rejected ConnectU's arguments asserting unclear terms and fraud:

In sum, the Court finds that the Agreement reached by the parties does not display on its face a failure to agree or any uncertainty regarding its material terms. Accordingly, the Court finds that the Agreement is enforceable...[T]he Court finds that Defendants have failed to tender sufficient evidence of fraud in the circumstances proffered to the Court to create a genuine dispute as to whether the Agreement was fraudulently induced.