[JURIST] The US will have a hard time convincing other countries to adopt emissions-cutting legislation so long as an American bill [text, PDF] capping carbon emissions remains unpassed, US climate change chief negotiator Jonathan Pershing said in an interview with AP published Sunday. The Waxman-Markey Climate Bill [HR 2454 materials] passed [JURIST report report] the House of Representatives in June by a vote of 219 to 212, with three members not present or abstaining, but has not yet been put up for a vote in the Senate, although it has been placed on the docket. There is some concern that Senate passage will be delayed into December or even beyond. The legislation is designed to create clean energy jobs, reduce US dependence on pollution-causing sources of energy and reduce global warming.

Some 1500 climate change negotiators from around the world will begin meeting under UN auspices in Bangkok [official website] Monday in a run-up to a major climate change meeting slated for Copenhagen in December. Thusfar Western countries have been unable to convince developing nations to commit to reductions in emissions when the Western world has not done so either. The Copenhagen meeting [official website] is supposed to establish a replacement for the controversial Kyoto Protocol [JURIST news archive], which the US did not sign.

[JURIST] US Army First Lt. Ehren Watada [JURIST news archive] has won discharge from military service after a three year battle to avoid redeployment in Iraq, according to media reports Friday. Watada sought to leave the army [Honolulu Star Bulletin report] in 2006 in objection to the war in Iraq, arguing that by participating in it, he would be committing war crimes for which he could later be tried. Discharged "under other than honorable circumstances," Watada had at one point faced the prospect of a second court-martial after an initial military mistrial, but the case against him was dropped [JURIST reports] in May. Charges laid against him included conduct unbecoming an officer [NYT report] for Watada's comments about the war, and failure to show up for deployment. Watada will be formally discharged on October 2.

Watada, a Honolulu native who was the first commissioned officer in the US military to publicly refuse deployment to Iraq, refused to be classified as a conscientious objector because he did not object to war in general, just to the "illegal" war in Iraq. He offered to serve in Afghanistan, but the Army refused. His vocal protests and participation in rallies by Veterans for Peace and Courage to Resist [advocacy websites] led to the charges of conduct unbecoming an officer and the original charge of contempt toward officials.

[JURIST] The US Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website] Saturday announced [DOJ press release] that three more detainees have been released from the Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] prison. Two Uzbek detainees were transferred to Ireland and one Yemeni national was transferred to Yemen. According to the DOJ's release:

As directed by the President's Jan. 22, 2009 Executive Order, the interagency Guantanamo Review Task Force conducted a comprehensive review of each of these cases. As a result of that review, these detainees were approved for transfer from Guantanamo Bay. In accordance with Congressionally-mandated reporting requirements, the Administration informed Congress of its intent to transfer each of these detainees at least 15 days before their transfer.