[JURIST] The spokesman for China's Supreme People's Court [English website; official website, in Mandarin], Sun Jungong, announced Wednesday that he had started writing his own blog [Sun weblog, in Mandarin] in order to directly communicate with the public. Sun said he will operate the blog in a semi-official capacity and that he would honestly answer questions posed there in an effort to make the judiciary more accessible to the public. Zhou Ze, a law professor quoted by a state-sponsored Xinhua report [text], said the creation of the blog signaled an increase in transparency and fairness in the country's courts.

China has taken a less favorable stance on blogs that criticize the government and in January, Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD) [advocacy website] reported that Chinese activist and blogger Chen Qitang had been sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison [press release; JURIST report] for disparaging remarks about the Chinese government he made on his blog [text, in Mandarin]. Chen made the comments while he was helping villagers in Sanshan Village, Nanhai District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province draft legal documents appealing the confiscation of their land by the local government.

[JURIST] A Sudanese court on Wednesday sentenced 11 members of the Darfur [JURIST news archive] rebel group the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) [advocacy website; BBC backgrounder] to death by hanging for their involvement in a 2008 attack on Khartoum [BBC report]. Out of seven other defendants [Al Jazeera report] tried in the proceedings, five were acquitted and two had their cases transferred to a different court due to mental issues and age. On Tuesday, the rebel group rejected efforts to negotiate with the Sudanese government by citing a failure to cooperate [AFP report] in a recent deal and the recent death sentences [Reuters report] handed down to ten other members of the group. In August, a Sudanese court sentenced [JURIST report] eight other rebels to death in connection with the same attack.

Part of JEM's refusal to cooperate with the Sudanese government is the ousting of humanitarian groups within the country. In March, Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] called on [JURIST report] the League of Arab States [official website, in Arabic] to urge Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] to allow foreign aid agencies back into the country. In November, the Chief Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court [official website] (ICC) sought arrest warrants [JURIST report] for Darfur rebel group leaders for attacks unrelated to the 2008 Khartoum attacks. JEM agreed to cooperate [AFP report] but denied that any of their leaders were the subjects of the warrants.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] on Wednesday heard oral arguments [day call, PDF; briefs] in Ricci v. DeStefano [oral arguments transcript, PDF; JURIST report], where the Court will consider whether a government employer may refuse to certify results of a civil service exam that would make disproportionately more white applicants than minority applicants eligible for promotion, because of fears of charges of racial discrimination. Petitioners were applicants who qualified for promotions based on their test scores but were denied promotions because the municipality said it would violate the Equal Rights Act of 1964 [text]. The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit found [opinion, PDF] that the government employer's actions were protected. Lawyers for the employees argued that the lower court erred by not requiring the municipality to show that its actions prevented any actual discrimination:

Neither equal protection nor Title VII justified New Haven's race-based scuttling of the promotions Petitioners earned through the civil service process mandated by Connecticut law. The lower court required no strong evidentiary basis that the City was acting to remedy or avoid any actual discrimination, but strong safeguards are needed to smoke out illegitimate uses of race and to extinguish the racial favoritism that civil service laws... are intended to prevent.

Governmental employment actions grounded in race must be strictly scrutinized because they engender divisiveness and cause race-grounded harm that the Constitution seeks to avert.

[JURIST] A top Norwegian prosecutor said Wednesday that she will look into a compliant filed by Norwegian lawyers accusing Israeli government figures of war crimes during the recent offensive in the Gaza Strip [BBC backgrounder]. The chief prosecutor at Norway's National Authority for Prosecution of Organised and Other Serious Crimes Siri Frigaard [ICTJ profile] will investigate the complaint, which alleges [AP report] that 10 Israelis, including former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert [JURIST news archive], Defense Minister Ehud Barak [official profile, in Hebrew] and former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni [official profile], committed terror attacks against civilians. The lawyers' compliant was centered on the Norwegian interpretation of universal jurisdiction [AI backgrounder], which allows individuals to be charged Norway for committing war crimes, genocide or crimes against humanity despite the acts occurring internationally. Israel conducted its own internal investigation into the allegations, concluding that there was no wrongdoing [JURIST report]. Israel reiterated [AFP report] this position Wednesday, and human rights groups immediately responded by calling for an independent investigation [AP report] into war crimes allegations.

Last week, Israel announced [JURIST report] that it would not comply with a UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) [official website] investigation into the war crimes. The probe was a result of the report [text, PDF] authored by UN Special Rapporteur Richard Falk [appointment release] that criticized Israel for failing to take adequate precautions to distinguish between civilians and combatants in their offensives in the region. Both Israel and the US condemned [JURIST report] the report as biased.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] on Wednesday ruled [opinion, PDF] 7-2 in Nken v. Holder [Cornell LII backgrounder; JURIST report], retitled from Nken v. Mukasey, that an alien's stay of deportation request pending consideration of his petition for review is governed by the traditional test for stays, not by congressional revisions to the Immigration and Nationality Act reflected in 8 USC § 1252(f)(2) [text]. Jean Marc Nken is a native of Cameroon who fears persecution upon return to his home country. He was denied a stay of a deportation order while he pursued court review of the denial of his asylum claim. His lawyers originally asked the Court for a stay of deportation [application, PDF], but the Court granted full review to resolve the conflict over the proper standard of review. In vacating the decision below, which denied Nken's stay of deportation request, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote:

This case involves a statutory provision that sharply restricts the circumstances under which a court may issue an injunction blocking the removal of an alien from this country. The Court of Appeals concluded, and the Government contends, that this provision applies to the granting of a stay by a court of appeals while it considers the legality of a removal order. Petitioner disagrees, and maintains that the authority of a court of appeals to stay an order of removal under the traditional criteria governing stays remains fully intact, and is not affected by the statutory provision governing injunctions. We agree with petitioner, and vacate and remand for application of the traditional criteria.

[JURIST] The US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York [official website] on Tuesday announced charges [press release, PDF] against an Afghan of conspiring to finance terrorist activity. Haji Juma Khan, who was already detained on charges of narco-terrorism, is accused of providing the Taliban [JURIST news archive] with proceeds from his drug operation with knowledge that the money would be used in terrorist activities in Afghanistan [JURIST news archive]. The prosecution alleges that Khan was closely aligned with the Taliban in the course of his drug activities and that his organization sold enough morphine base fill the US heroin market for two years. Khan faces up to a life sentence and a minimum sentence of 20 years in prison if convicted.

In May, a jury in the US District Court for the District of Columbia [official website] convicted [JURIST report] Afghan national Khan Mohammed, who was originally held as an enemy combatant, on charges of drug distribution and narco-terrorism. That was one of the first prosecutions of the US anti-narco-terrorism effort [DEA program site], aimed at crippling terrorist organizations by stopping the sale of the drugs said to finance them. In September, Afghan tribal chief Haji Bashir Noorzai was convicted [NYT report] following his April 2008 indictment [text, PDF; JURIST report] for violation of US drug laws.

[JURIST] The US Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) [official website] on Tuesday declassified [statement] a November 2008 report [text, PDF; JURIST report] detailing the extent of top Bush administration officials' involvement in implementing severe interrogation techniques employed by US military forces against terrorism suspects. According to the report, the interrogation techniques originated from a February 2002 memo signed by former US President George W. Bush declaring the Third Geneva Convention [text] inapplicable to the al Qaeda conflict and denying prisoner of war status to Taliban [JURIST news archives] detainees. The report claims that senior administration officials, including former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and former Attorney General John Ashcroft [JURIST news archives] were directly involved in implementing the policies allowing harsh interrogation techniques at both Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archives]. The report concludes:

The abuse of detainees in US custody cannot simply be attributed to the actions of "a few bad apples" acting on their own. The fact is that senior officials in the United States government solicited information on how to use aggressive techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance of their legality, and authorized their use against detainees. Those efforts damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority.

[JURIST] The US Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website; JURIST news archive] might drop charges [case materials] of disclosing national defense secrets against former pro-Israel lobbyists Steven Rosen [Washington Post profile] and Keith Weissman, a senior official said Tuesday. Government sources told the AP that there is still some support for going to trial [AP report] with the case, which has been delayed repeatedly since the former employees of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) [advocacy website] were indicted [JURIST report] under the 1917 Espionage Act [18 USC § 792 text] in August 2005. Rosen faces up to 20 years and Weissman up to 10, with the trial currently scheduled to begin in June. In a related story, Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) defended herself [press release] Tuesday against reports [NYT report] that wiretapped [JURIST news archive] conversations revealed her agreeing to seek leniency in the case in exchange for political favors.

In February, the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit [official website] ruled [opinion, PDF] that the former lobbyists could use classified documents [JURIST report] in their defense. In November 2007, a federal judge ruled [JURIST report] that then-US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other senior administration officials must testify about whether they shared classified national defense information with lobbyists. In August 2006, Rosen and Weissman's constitutional challenge of the Espionage Act failed [JURIST report]. In January 2006, former Pentagon analyst Lawrence Franklin was sentenced [JURIST report] to 12 years, seven months in federal prison after pleading guilty to giving classified information to the lobbyists.

[JURIST] A Chilean judge has charged [press release, in Spanish] three former Pinochet-era military officers as accomplices for their role in the October 1973 killings of 14 leftist political opponents as part of the so-called "Caravan of Death" [BBC backgrounder]. Judge Victor Montiglio of the Santiago Court of Appeals indicted and ordered the arrests of General Gonzalo Santelices [La Nacion backgrounder, in Spanish], Lieutenant Pablo Martinez, and Major Patricio Ferrer on Monday. Santelices and Martinez were granted bail [La Nacion report, in Spanish] Tuesday, and bail is under consideration for Ferrer. The Court of Appeals has 48 hours to approve or deny the orders, during which time the men will continue to be held at a military police battalion. A lawyer for the Ministry of Interior's Human Rights Program [official website, in Spanish] said that the prosecution intends to appeal Montiglio's resolution to raise the charges of all three men to the level of principal actors rather than accomplices. Santelices's lawyer has alleged that the former general was only a student following orders [Radio Cooperativa report, in Spanish] to deliver the 14 members of the Socialist Party to the Caravan. Eight others have been charged with murder in the incident, including former General Sergio Arellano Stark, who is currently serving time for a separate conviction under house arrest due to dementia.

The Chilean Supreme Court sentenced five former military officers to prison [JURIST report] for their role in the Caravan of Death in October and found Stark responsible for leading the caravan under orders from General Augusto Pinochet [BBC backgrounder; JURIST news archive] to dispose of potential political opponents. In November 2006, Montiglio indicted Pinochet [JURIST report] and placed him under house arrest in connection with the firing-squad deaths of two of Allende's bodyguards. Pinochet died in December 2006 before being brought to trial [JURIST report]. More than 75 Chilean dissidents, many of whom had turned themselves in to authorities, are thought to have been killed by the "Caravan of Death."

[JURIST] A lawyer for the relatives of 17 sailors killed in the 2000 al Qaeda attack [US DOD inquiry report] on the USS Cole [official website; JURIST news archive] said Tuesday that the families will receive compensation from the Sudan government after a judge for the US District Court of the Southern District of New York [official website] ordered last week that banks release $13.4 million in previously blocked funds. The Terrorism Recovery Insurance Act of 2002 [text, PDF] allows judges to unblock funds where judgments have been rendered against terrorist states. Sudan denies any involvement in the bombing. Family members will receive pecuniary damages under the Death on the High Seas Act [46 USC § 30302 text], but the act does not allow them to recover punitive damages. The lawyer for the families said each family will receive between $200,000 and $1.2 million [AP report]. The families also plan to seek punitive damages [JURIST report] of up to $50 million under the Justice for State Sponsored Terrorism Act [text] passed last year according to their lawyer.

In 2007, the government of Sudan announced plans to appeal the original judgment [JURIST reports] of nearly $8 million, arguing that as a sovereign nation it was not subject to US Courts and denying any role in the bombing. A judge for the US Circuit Court for the Eastern District of Virginia [official website] found Sudan liable in 2007 for the bombing after previously rejecting a motion by Sudan to dismiss the suit [JURIST reports]. The court originally allowed the suit [JURIST report] in 2005.

[JURIST] A Russian court Tuesday ordered the release on parole [RIA Novosti report] of Svetlana Bakhmina, the former lawyer for Russian oil firm OAS Yukos Oil Co. [TIME backgrounder]. Bakhmina was convicted [JURIST report] of embezzlement and tax evasion in 2006 for her part in a scheme to strip assets worth over $300 million from a Yukos subsidiary. As a lawyer for Yukos, Bakhmina worked closely with the company's former chief executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky [defense website; JURIST news archive] and his former business partner, Platon Lebedev [defense website], who were convicted and jailed in 2005 on similar fraud and tax evasion charges stemming from an alleged attempt to embezzle and strip Yukos of valuable assets. Earlier Tuesday, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev both pleaded not guilty [JURIST report] to additional charges of money laundering and embezzlement. The two men are already facing trial on further embezzlement and money laundering charges, which they have challenged, alleging that the evidence against them is insufficient [RIA Novosti report].

Last month, a Russian court refused a request [JURIST report] by Khodorkovsky and Lebedev to have the charges against them dropped, one day after Judge Viktor Danilkin refused to recuse himself [St. Petersburg Times report] from the case amid accusations of bias. Critics have claimed that the charges against Khodorkovsky and Lebedev are politically motivated due to Khodorkovsky's opposition against former Russian president and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin [JURIST news archive]. The transfer of the two from prison to Moscow to stand trial on the new charges was ordered [JURIST report] last month by a judge for the District Court in Moscow. Khodorkovsky still maintains that his 2005 conviction [JURIST report] on the fraud and tax evasion was unjust, and maintains his innocence. He requested early release from that sentence last July, but his application was rejected [JURIST reports] in August because he disobeyed guards at the Krasnokamensk penal colony [Guardian backgrounder], refused to participate in a training program, and faced the possibility of additional charges. Khodorkovsky has appealed [JURIST report] that decision.

[JURIST] Alleged Somali pirate Abduwali Abdukhadir Muse, captured by US forces following an attempted attack on the container ship Maersk Alabama [corporate backgrounder], was charged [compliant, PDF] Tuesday and will be tried as an adult following a ruling by federal magistrate judge Andrew Peck of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York [official website]. Muse, whose exact age is unknown [Washington Post report], has been charged with five counts relating to the pirate attack on the Alabama, including committing an act of piracy as defined by the law of nations, conspiracy to seize a ship by force, conspiracy to take hostages, and two counts relating to the use of a firearm during commission of a crime. Muse's father testified via telephone [NYT report] in an attempt to establish his son's age for the court, but Peck discredited the testimony after the elder Muse was unable to give precise dates of birth for any of Muse's siblings. The government complaint alleges that Muse coordinated the attack, and presented himself to the ship's crew as the leader of the attacking gang. If the case proceeds to trial, it will be the first major piracy trial in the US since 1885 [AP report].

Earlier this month, the Commandant of the US Coast Guard called for greater enforcement [JURIST report] of international piracy laws. In March, the European Union (EU) [official website] announced an agreement with Kenya [JURIST report] to transfer suspected pirates captured by EU counter-pirate operations into Kenyan custody for prosecution. In December, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) [official website] called for greater judicial cooperation [JURIST report] to combat piracy off the coast of Somalia. In October, the UN Security Council unanimously approved Resolution 1838 [text, PDF; press release], condemning all acts of piracy and armed robbery off the coast of Somalia, and calling on states to "deploy naval vessels and military aircraft to actively fight piracy on the high seas off the coast of Somalia." Although maritime piracy is increasingly widespread, Somalia's coast has been ranked as the most dangerous in the world [BBC report] due to a surge in attacks on ships carrying traded goods or humanitarian aid [NPR report].