[JURIST] British music royalty collection society MCPS-PRS Alliance [corporate website] on Friday challenged a European Commission (EC) antitrust [backgrounder] decision limiting the control such organizations have over copyright use agreements. In July, the EC ruled [press release; FAQ] the current exclusivity deals the single-country societies had were effectively domestic monopolies in violation of Article 81 of the European Commission Treaty and Article 53 of the European Economic Area Agreement [text downloads, PDF]. The EC made the ruling after a challenge to the deals brought by radio broadcasting company RTL Group [corporate website], in which it sought the ability to make multinational use agreements with a single rights holder. The Financial Times has more.

In January, the EC dropped an antitrust case [press release; JURIST report] against Apple's iTunes [JURIST news archive] after Apple announced it would equalize music download prices across Europe [press release]. A UK consumer protection organization had filed a formal complaint with the Commission, which launched an investigation [press release; JURIST report] in April 2007 into whether sales restrictions based on the buyer's country of residence violated EU antitrust laws. Apple [corporate website] blamed the disparity on copyright holders charging more at the wholesale level in the UK than other countries.

[JURIST] A judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of Indiana [official website] ruled Friday that the US Army will be able to complete its shipment of chemical waste from a location in western Indiana to Port Arthur, Texas, where the material will be incinerated. The Sierra Club [advocacy website] and other citizen groups had filed the lawsuit in an attempt to block the Army from hauling the neutralized remains of the Cold-War era chemical weapon called VX. The groups had argued that the Army characterized the material, also called hydrolysate, as having less of an amount of VX and other toxic byproducts than it actually did. Chief Judge Larry McKinney held that the waste being shipped was not a munition or chemical agent, and rejected the argument that the Army had not fully considered the risk of shipping the material across the country. Most of the 1,513,994 gallons of the waste had already been shipped [Environmental News report] and the last portion had left the Newport Chemical Depot [globalsecurity backgrounder] in Indiana on September 4. A spokesman for the Chemical Weapons Working Group [official website] said the groups would not appeal the ruling since the shipment was essentially complete. AP has more.

The destruction of the VX nerve agent began in May 2005, in accordance with the requirements of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) [text, PDF; US CWC official website]. Over 180 nations [OPCW list] have signed on to the Convention since it entered into force in 1997. Under the Convention, banned weapons, including nerve and mustard gases, had to be destroyed by June 2007, though countries could apply for a five-year extension.

[JURIST] The head of India's Human Resources Development Ministry [official website], Arjun Singh [official website], said Friday that he advocates giving legal aid to two university students from the Jamia Millia Islamia [official website] who are suspects in the New Delhi serial bombings [AFP report] investigation. Singh's statement was in support of the university's Vice Chancellor, Professor Mushirul Hasan [official profile], who had said [press release] earlier this week that the students would receive legal aid. Hasan described legal aid as a constitutional right and in the interest of the nation. He was also supported by Union Minister and National President of the Lok Jan Shakti Party (LJP), Ram Vilas Paswan, who described Hasan as a person with the country's best interests in mind. PTI has more. IANS has additional coverage.

The two students, Mohammad Shakil and Zia-ur Rehman, were arrested last week and are among five suspects in the September 13 bombings which resulted in the deaths of 24 people. The police said the two were members of the Indian Mujahideen, the group which claimed responsibility [Rediff India Abroad report] for the bombings. The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) [official website] has criticized Hasan's decision and called for his removal.

[JURIST] Business research firm TM Group [corporate website] released a report [press release] on Friday saying that the majority of UK lawyers are using client identification methods which do not comply with the county's anti-money-laundering regulations. According to the report, 65% of those polled reported using only visual checks of identification, a method not endorsed by the country's 2007 Money Laundering Regulations [PDF text]. The majority of those polled also said they believed the regulations to be unnecessary, but had been trained in the methods they recommended.

As a sign of increasing concerns over money laundering, even some Swiss banks who are well known for strong privacy protections have recently released information on certain clients. In 2006, the Swiss Justice Ministry [official website] granted US investigators access to information [JURIST report] about bank accounts of terrorism suspects. Prosecutors in the US Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia [official website] requested the information in a four-year old investigation into money laundering to support terrorist activities. The same year, the Swiss Supreme Court denied a Russian request [JURIST report] for the transfer of bank documents to Russia [JURIST news archive] which were relevant to an ongoing investigation into Russian oil giant Yukos [corporate website; JURIST news archive].

[JURIST] Telecommunications executives told the US Senate Commerce Committee [official website] Thursday that their companies would refrain from using certain surveillance technology without users' permission but stopped short of endorsing legislation to outlaw the practice. The committee hearing [materials] to investigate the privacy practices of American Internet service providers (ISPs) focused on deep packet inspection (DPI) [Securityfocus.com backgrounder], a technique of compiling information about users' browsing and online behavior for security and advertising purposes, generally without consent. Among the witnesses testifying was Thomas J. Tauke, executive vice president for Verizon Communications [corporate website], who said in his prepared remarks [PDF text]:

We can commit – and believe that all companies should commit – to a set of best practices in the area of online behavioral advertising. The principles and best practices should apply to all online companies regardless of their technology or the platform used. ... Verizon believes that before a company captures certain Internet-usage data for targeted or customized advertising purposes, it should obtain meaningful, affirmative consent from consumers.

[JURIST] The Pre-Trial Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website] on Friday authorized the Office of the Prosecutor to proceed with the prosecution [press release; decision, PDF] of Congolese rebel militia leaders Germain Katanga and Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui [arrest warrants, PDF], confirming that there is sufficient evidence to establish that Katanga and Ngudjolo Chui jointly committed the crimes against humanity of murder, sexual slavery and rape, and other war crimes. AFP has more.

Katanga, a former commander in the Front for Patriotic Resistance of Ituri (FRPI), and Ngudjolo Chui, a former commander in the Nationalist and Integrationist Front (FNI) [backgrounders], allegedly planned and carried out an attack against the village of Bogoro in 2003, killing some 200 persons. The two defendants are currently detained in The Hague.