[JURIST] The Constitutional Court of Russia [official website, in Russian] on Thursday extended the moratorium [press release, in Russian] on the death penalty [JURIST news archive] until the Russian parliament ratifies an international treaty abolishing capital punishment. In 1997, Russia signed, but did not ratify, Protocol 6 of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms [texts], which was put forward by the Council of Europe (COE) [official website] in 1983 to limit the exercise of the death penalty to cases involving "acts committed in time of war or of imminent threat of war." The court noted that Russia was invited to join the COE in part because of its expressed intention to place a moratorium on the penalty and take steps towards its abolition. The court also stated that allowing capital punishment may violate Russia's obligations under Protocol 6, citing Article 18 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) [text, PDF], which requires signatories to "refrain from acts which would defeat the object and purpose of a treaty."

In December 2006, the Russian Duma [official website, in Russian] effectively extended [JURIST report] the national moratorium on the death penalty until 2010, when Chechnya [BBC backgrounder] is expected to become the last state to adopt a federal law establishing trials by jury. In February 1999, the Constitutional Court imposed a moratorium [Bloomberg report] on the death penalty until the federal law is implemented in all regions within the country. The Russian death penalty has drawn repeated criticism [JURIST report] from the COE, which has pressured Russia to abolish it completely.

[JURIST] The UK High Court ruled [judgment text] Thursday that the details of the detention of Binyam Mohamed [JURIST news archive] in Pakistan in 2002 must be released. This most recent decision is the latest in a series of back and forth rulings on whether redacted materials regarding Mohamed's detention should be disclosed. An October interim ruling [JURIST report] by Lord Justice Thomas and Justice Lloyd Jones resulted in a redacted release, which the High Court indicated it would revisit after receiving submissions from both the Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) [official website] and Mohamed. In handing down this most recent decision, Thomas and Jones said that in making public details of a detainee's treatment, "we were not in the judgment 'giving away the intelligence secrets of a foreign country' or making public 'American secrets.'" Both justices were critical of Foreign Secretary David Milliband's efforts to keep the information classified [BBC report], noting that the US had already released similar information on the treatment of Abu Zubayah. As part of the judgment, the justices indicated that the FCO had already sought an expedited appeal of the decision, though that matter would be handled by another court and it is not clear how quickly the hearing will occur.

This decision comes one day after a separate judge on the High Court ruled that, in Mohamed's separate suit for damages, information relating to his treatment at Guantanamo Bay may be withheld [JURIST report] under a "closed material procedure." Mohamed was returned to the UK in February, after charges against him were dismissed in October 2008 [JURIST reports]. Mohamed had been held at Guantanamo Bay for four years, on suspicion of conspiracy to commit terrorism [JURIST report].

[JURIST] The Supreme Court of Bangladesh [official website] on Thursday denied the appeals of five former military officers sentenced to death for the 1975 military coup assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman [Hindustan Times profile], the country's first leader. Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed [official website], Mujibur's daughter, praised [press release] the latest decision in the 16-year old murder trial [ALBD timeline]. The convicted officers, who are currently in prison, may appeal to the prime minister for clemency. Hasina had promised to make her father's murder trial a priority of her administration when she was elected in 2008 to a second term in office [JURIST report].

Mujibur and 16 family members were killed during a military coup that erupted only four years after Bangladesh won independence [TIME backgrounder] from Pakistan in 1971. In April, the government of Bangladesh announced [JURIST report] that it was working with the UN to establish prosecutions of alleged war crimes committed during the 1971 War of Independence [GlobalSecurity backgrounder]. The country ended 2 years of emergency rule in December 2008, with the government declaring [JURIST reports] its intent to restore [Daily Star report] the 1972 constitution [text, PDF].

[JURIST] The European Court of Justice (ECJ) [official website] ruled [case materials; press release] Thursday that airline passengers confronted with flight delays of two hours or more may receive compensation equal to that of passengers whose flights are cancelled. The flat-rate compensation ranges between 250 and 600 euros. The case arose under European Parliament and European Council Regulation (EC) No. 261/2004 [text, PDF], which sets forth rules for compensation and assistance of airline passengers. The court found:

Given that the damage sustained by air passengers in cases of cancellation or long delay is comparable, passengers whose flights are delayed and passengers whose flights are cancelled cannot be treated differently without the principle of equal treatment being infringed. That is a fortiori the case in view of the aim sought by Regulation No 261/2004, which is to increase protection for all air passengers.

In those circumstances, the Court finds that passengers whose flights are delayed may rely on the right to compensation laid down in Article 7 of Regulation No 261/2004 where they suffer, on account of such flights, a loss of time equal to or in excess of three hours, that is to say when they reach their final destination three hours or more after the arrival time originally scheduled by the air carrier.

[JURIST] Afghan President Hamid Karzai [official profile, JURIST news archive] pledged to fight corruption in his government during his inaugural address [text, PDF] on Thursday. To this end, Karzai announced that he would soon be organizing a conference to research the sources of the corruption and bribery that is widespread throughout Afghanistan and find ways to combat it. Additionally, he announced that his office, in cooperation with the National Assembly [official website], would draft a new law that would require senior government officials to declare their assets and an expansion of bodies charged with the oversight of the government:

The Government of Afghanistan is committed to end the culture of impunity and violation of law and bring to justice those involved in spreading corruption and abuse of public property. To do this, will require effective and strong measures. Therefore, alongside an intensified judicial reform, all government anti-corruption efforts and agencies have to be strengthened and supported. Particular attention will be given to building the capacity and upgrading the High Office of Oversight for the Implementation of the Anti-Corruption Strategy. Measures for supporting the anti-corruption agencies include: increasing the scope of their authority, improving their capacity and resources for detection and investigation, expanding their organizational structure, as well as reforming the relevant anti-corruption laws and regulations.

[JURIST] The Brazilian Supreme Court [official website, in Portuguese] on Wednesday voted 5-to-4 to extradite [press release, in Portuguese] former Italian guerrilla Cesare Battisti back to Italy, but left the final decision to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva [official profile, in Portuguese], who granted him asylum earlier this year. The high court has yet to decide if the order mandates Lula to extradite Battisti or merely authorizes him to do so. Early in the week, Battisti sent a letter [Reuters report] to Lula saying he would rather die in Brazil than be sent back to Italy. Lula granted Battisti political refugee status in January due to doubts about the fairness of his trial where he was convicted in absentia of four murders in the late 1970s. Battisti has firmly protested his extradition, going on a hunger strike [BBC report] last week in the Brazilian prison where he is being held. Italy considers Battisti a terrorist and has been pressuring the Brazilian government to extradite him.

Battisti was sentenced to life in prison in Italy for murders committed by the Armed Proletarians for Communism, an arm of a radical communist group known as the Red Brigades to which Battisti belonged. He escaped [BBC report] from an Italian prison in 1981 and fled to Brazil after spending ten years as a refugee in France. Battisti was arrested in Rio de Janeiro in March 2007. Other members of the Red Brigades group have been convicted for murders in Italy over the past few years. In 2005, three members, who were among five people sentenced to life in prison for the murder of government economic advisor Marco Biagi, were sentenced [JURIST reports] to another life term for the murder of Massimo D'Antona, a professor and legal consultant to the Minister of Labour. The murders occurred three years apart, but both victims were government advisers who were killed to deter reforms which would introduce greater flexibility to Italy's labor market. Four defendants were acquitted and nine other defendants received sentences ranging from four to 10 years in prison.

[JURIST] A judge in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana [official website] on Wednesday found [text, PDF] the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) [official website] negligent in its operation and maintenance of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet (MRGO) [USACE backgrounder]. Damages nearing $720,000 were awarded to five plaintiffs [case materials], who successfully demonstrated that known defects in the MRGO and the USACE's subsequent failure to take action contributed significantly to the devastation caused in the Lower Ninth Ward and St. Bernard Parish by Hurricane Katrina [JURIST news archive] in 2005. In his ruling, Judge Stanwood Duval wrote:

It is the Court's opinion that the negligence of the Corps, in this instance by failing to maintain the MRGO properly, was not policy, but insouciance, myopia and shortsightedness. ... The Corps had an opportunity to take a myriad of actions to alleviate this deterioration or rehabilitate this deterioration and failed to do so. Clearly the expression "talk is cheap" applies here.

[JURIST] A former senior Canadian diplomat alleged Wednesday that the Canadian military was complicit in the torture of Afghans by their own government, during testimony before the House of Commons Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan [official website]. Richard Colvin, who represented the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT) [official website] in Kandahar from 2006-2007 and is currently the deputy head of intelligence at the Canadian Embassy in Washington, said that captives transferred from a Canadian military base in Kandahar to Afghan authorities were subsequently tortured [Canwest News report]. Colvin accused both the government and military of ignoring and even suppressing reports of torture by Afghan authorities, citing upwards of twelve memos [Reuters report] that he sent to top officials beginning in early 2006. The minority Conservative Party [party website] government maintains that captives were not transferred if there was a threat of torture, and questions [CBC report] the validity of Colvin's information.

Amnesty International Canada and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association [advocacy websites] filed complaints [JURIST report] in 2007 against the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal [official website], alleging complicity in torture by Canadian personnel serving in Afghanistan. Amnesty accused Canada of violating the Charter of Rights and Freedoms [text] by turning Afghan detainees over to Afghan authorities without any protection against later cruel and unusual punishment. In March 2008, the Canadian Military Police Complaints Commission (MPCC) [official website] decided to hold public hearings to investigate the country's detainee transfer process in Afghanistan despite a move from the Canadian Department of Justice to block the inquiry [JURIST reports]. In September, the Canadian Federal Court ruled [JURIST report] that the MPCC's authority was limited to the investigation of military police, and it did not have the authority "to investigate government policy and to inquire as to the state of knowledge of the Government of Canada at large."

[JURIST] The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website] ordered [text, PDF] the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the Central District of California (FPD) [official website] on Wednesday to pay a monetary award to a man denied healthcare benefits for his same-sex spouse. Deputy federal public defender Brad Levenson brought the suit requesting the court to direct the FPD to obtain separate coverage for his spouse by contracting with private health insurance carriers or issue a monetary award in accordance with the Back Pay Act [backgrounder, PDF]. The court found that a back pay award would be the "necessary and appropriate" remedy "tailored as closely as possible" to address the specific violation within the scope of the Ninth Circuit's Employment Dispute Resolution Plan for Federal Public Defenders and Staff since the FPD does not have federal contracting authority. The case was remanded for the lower court to determine the appropriate monetary award. Judge Stephen Reinhardt was the Chair of the Standing Committee on Federal Public Defenders at the time of filing and continues to retain jurisdiction in the matter until Levenson's spouse receives his entitled benefits. Reinhardt reasoned:

[T]o the extent that the application of DOMA serves to preclude the provision of health insurance coverage to a same-sex spouse of a legally married federal employee because of the employee's and his or her spouse's sex or sexual orientation, DOMA as applied contravenes the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution and is therefor unconstitutional.

[JURIST] A federal judge on Wednesday ruled [opinion, PDF] that former Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] detainee Ahmed Ghailani [GlobalSecurity backgrounder; JURIST news archive] does not have a right to be represented by his military defense lawyers in a civilian court. Military lawyers Colonel Jeffrey Colwell and Major Richard Reiter were reassigned by the Department of Defense [official website] despite their willingness to continue representing Ghailani and Judge Lewis Kaplan's initial ruling [JURIST report] in June allowing them to do so. Ghailani's court-appointed lawyer argued that the reassignment orders violated his Fifth Amendment right to due process and his Sixth Amendment [texts] right to effective assistance of counsel. Kaplan rejected the due process claim because of its post-indictment nature and held that, despite a right to continued services of appointed counsel in military proceedings, the right did not extend to Ghailani in civil court. Kaplan reasoned that:

the more generous protection of the right to counsel afforded in the military justice system is grounded in the Uniform Code of Military Justice and military regulations, not the Sixth Amendment. Accordingly, the military analogy lends no support to Ghailani's argument. He is entitled to, and is receiving, representation of appointed counsel at public expense. He is not entitled to choose particular government-paid counsel – military or civilian – and he does not have a right to the continued services of previously appointed counsel.

[JURIST] The Cuban government of Raul Castro [BBC profile] has continued to repress dissidents and violate fundamental civil liberties of Cubans, maintaining the mechanisms put in place by Fidel Castro [BBC profile], according to a Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] report [text, PDF; press release] released on Wednesday. Specifically, HRW reported that 53 political dissidents imprisoned since 2003 under Fidel Castro remain imprisoned, as well as "scores of of individuals incarcerated for 'dangerousness' under Raul Castro." The HRW report claims that Raul Castro's government relies heavily on the Criminal Code offense of "dangerousness" [text], which provides for imprisonment of people suspected of behavior against socialist values. Among those imprisoned are individuals whose behavior included unemployment, voicing opinions contrary to the government, and staging peaceful protests. HRW maintains that Raul Castro's government has resorted to imposing short-term imprisonment measures to elude international critique, while mistreatment of prisoners may rise to the level of torture. The report does acknowledge that a limited amount of dissent outlets, like independent blogging, have been allowed to emerge in recent years. The Cuban Interests Section Washington DC has charged [text] in a statement published by the Miami Herald that the HRW report is an illegitimate and illegal evaluation that aims to manipulate public scrutiny away from the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs [official website] hearing [materials] on Thursday about ending the travel ban to Cuba.

The number of political prisoners in Cuba had declined from 234 in January 2008 to 205, while the number of brief detentions had increased, according to a Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN) [El Pais backgrounder, in Spanish] report [JURIST report] in February. The same report also charged that the decline in the number of political prisoners was due to the new practice of imposing shorter prison terms for those arrested employed since 2003. In January, HRW acknowledged some attempts in 2008 by the Cuban government to improve its position on human rights in its 2009 report [report text] on the country. HRW decried that overall the Cuban government continues to deny its citizens their fundamental rights. Last year, Cuba was ranked 170th in the eighth annual Worldwide Index of Press Freedom [JURIST report] issued by Reporters Without Borders (RWB) [advocacy website].