Also Wednesday, the US State Department (DOS) [official website] announced that it has declared the TTP a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) [press release] under Section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) [materials]. "Today's actions put the TTP and its sympathizers on notice that the United States will not tolerate support of this organization," said DOS Coordinator for Counterterrorism Daniel Benjamin. "TTP's destabilizing effect in Pakistan's tribal areas has resulted in innumerable civilian deaths and considerable property losses." The DOS also announced a $5 million bounty for information leading to the capture of Mehsud.

The DOJ says Hakimullah Mehsud is currently "a fugitive believed to be residing in the [Federally Administered Tribal Area] (FATA)" in the southern region of Pakistan. However, reports emerged in January suggesting that he had died [NYT report] from wounds sustained during a January 14 drone attack in the tribal region. Hakimullah Mehsud reportedly assumed leadership [BBC report] of the TTP after Baitullah's death. TTP has been implicated in or claimed responsibility for a number of terrorist acts, including multiple assaults on NATO supply lines in the FATA, a 2009 attack on a police station in the Bannu province and the 2007 assassination of former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto [JURIST report], for which Baitullah Mehsud was charged [JURIST report] in a Pakistani anti-terrorism court. According to the DOJ, the TTP is believed to have coordinated most of their efforts with other terrorist organizations, including al Qaeda.

Former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich [JURIST news archive] also tried to cite Skilling in his defense against corruption charges. However, in June, the presiding judge in the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois denied a request [JURIST report] to delay the Blagojevich trial, holding that the Supreme Court's decision was unlikely to affect Blagojevich's case. In 2008, Ryan issued his first public apology [JURIST report] for the crimes that resulted in his imprisonment. Ryan was sentenced in 2007 and jailed [JURIST reports] on corruption charges. Ryan's trial began in 2005, and, in 2006, a jury found him guilty [JURIST reports] on multiple counts of corruption and fraud [indictment, PDF] in connection with a bribes-for-licenses scandal that occurred during Ryan's term as Illinois Secretary of State. Ryan made national headlines and won praise in some quarters in January 2003 when, just before leaving office, he commuted the executions [BBC report] of all Illinois inmates then on death row.

The persons singled out and favored by Texas's marriage laws, namely opposite-sex couples, have such a distinguishing and relevant characteristic: the natural ability to procreate. The state's interest in "fostering relationships that will serve children best" is a legitimate interest within the state's authority to regulate. Thus, although a person's sexual orientation does not affect his or her ability to contribute to society in general, it does bear on whether he or she will enter a relationship that is naturally open to procreation and thus trigger the state's legitimate interest in child-rearing. Accordingly, [precedent] does not support appellee's contention that homosexuals are a suspect class.We conclude that homosexuals are not a suspect class, that persons who choose to marry persons of the same sex are not a suspect class, and that the Texas law at issue in this case does not discriminate against a suspect class.

The Texas ruling stands in contrast to the decision handed down last month by a judge for the US District Court for the Northern District of California [official website], finding that California's ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional [JURIST report]. In the ruling, the court found that even though homosexuals should be treated as a suspect class, it was unnecessary because the ban failed to satisfy even rational basis review. Citing the Supreme Court case of Romer v. Evans [text], the court held that "moral disapproval of homosexuality, animus towards gays and lesbians or simply a belief that a relationship between a man and a women is inherently better than a relationship between two men or two women, ... is not a proper basis on which to legislate." The case is currently being appealed [JURIST report] to the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Several jurisdictions in the US have legalized same-sex marriage, including the District of Columbia, Vermont, New Hampshire, Iowa, Connecticut, Massachusetts [JURIST reports] and the Coquille Indian Tribe [OregonLive report].

The settlement agreement came less than a month after New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo [JURIST news archive] filed civil charges [complaint; JURIST report] against BOA, former CEO Ken Lewis and former CFO Joseph Price, alleging that the bank misled investors in order to acquire Merrill Lynch. The complaint alleges that Merrill Lynch had significant losses in the months leading up to a shareholder vote on the merger and that Lewis and Price violated the New York Martin Act [WLF backgrounder, PDF] because they knew of the losses but failed to disclose them to shareholders before the vote. In June, BOA subsidiary Countrywide Home Loans, Inc. reached a $108 million settlement agreement [JURIST report] with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) [official website] to resolve charges that the subsidiary collected excessive fees from homeowners facing foreclosure. The agreement allows the FTC to create a fund to provide refunds to borrowers affected by Countrywide's improper fees.

Also last week, Brewer filed the state's opening brief [JURIST report] in the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website], asking the court to lift the preliminary injunction blocking Arizona's immigration law from taking full effect. In the brief, Arizona argued that the preliminary injunction should be vacated because Bolton applied the wrong legal standard in issuing the preliminary injunction. Last month, the Ninth Circuit denied Arizona's request for expedited appeal [JURIST reports]. The preliminary injunction [JURIST report] came at the request of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website], which filed suit challenging the constitutionality of the law [JURIST report] in July. Bolton issued the injunction against provisions of the law requiring the verification of the immigration status of people reasonably suspected of being illegal immigrants, authorizing the warrantless arrest of those police have probable cause to believe have committed an offense that could lead to deportation and requiring noncitizens to carry their registration papers with them at all times. The law has been widely criticized as unconstitutional for allegedly legalizing racial profiling. The American Bar Association (ABA) [official website] filed an amicus curiae brief [JURIST report] in support of the DOJ lawsuit, following the submission of another amicus curiae brief [JURIST report] filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website].

So long as rapists remain at large, they hold the whole reputation of the Congo hostage...The time when sexual violence is tolerated and sidelined as a product of war is over...[Y]ou cannot have a policy of zero tolerance backed by zero consequences.

Last week, members of the Security Council expressed "outrage" [JURIST report] over the recent mass rape in the DRC calling for justice for the victims. Human rights have long been a major concern in the DRC. In June, national police chief John Numbi was suspended [JURIST report] as part of the ongoing investigation into the murder of human rights activist Floribert Chebeya. In December, HRW urged the UN Organization Mission in DR Congo (MUNOC) [official website] to stop funding military groups [JURIST report] in the country that are committing human rights abuses. In December 2008, AI reported that rape and sexual warfare have been employed [JURIST report] by both the DRC military and by rebel forces. In November 2008, MUNOC head Alan Doss [appointment release] condemned [JURIST report] the killing of civilians by militias in the country as war crimes. MONUC has been operating in DRC since 1999. The conflict in the DRC has claimed more than four million lives and has been ongoing since 1983. MONUC has overseen elections and continues to provide armed protection for civilians in certain areas, particularly the North and South Kivus provinces.

Lamberth granted the injunction on the basis that the federal funding violated the Dickey-Wicker amendment, a provision at Division F, Section 509 of the annual Omnibus Appropriations Act [2009 edition materials], which prohibits appropriated funds from financing research that involves the creation or destruction of human embryos. The case was originally dismissed for lack of standing last October but was reinstated [JURIST reports] in June with only plaintiffs who claimed their their ability to obtain funding for adult stem cell research was harmed by increased competition for federal funds after they were permitted to also be used for embryonic stem cell research. Those new guidelines reversed previous rules that limited government funding of embryonic stem cells to only cell lines that were in existence as of August 2001. Despite pressure from the scientific community, the previous administration refused similar changes to funding guidelines. In 2007, then-president George W. Bush vetoed [JURIST report] the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007 [S 5 materials], which was intended to relax funding restrictions on embryonic stem cell research. The administration rejected the bill, saying it would compel taxpayers to support the destruction of human embryos. In 2006, Bush vetoed a previous version [JURIST report] of the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act, which was passed by the Senate to remove restrictions on embryonic stem cell research, saying he would not provide federal funding for stem cell research because many consider the destruction of embryos to be murder.

The US State Department (DOS) [official website] criticized Russia [JURIST report] in its 2009 report on Human Rights Practices [text], writing that "[t]he government limited freedom of assembly, and police sometimes used violence to prevent groups from engaging in peaceful protest." In a January 31 protest, more than 100 protesters were arrested [JURIST report]. According to statistics [chart; PDF] from the ECHR, Russia has more complaints than any other country pending before the court. The ECHR has recently issued several high-profile decisions related to Russia, including a ruling [JURIST report] in March that Russia was responsible for disappearances in Chechnya.

January's ruling was the DC Circuit's first Guantanamo habeas corpus ruling since the US Supreme Court decided Boumedine v. Bush [opinion text; JURIST report] in 2008. While all three members of the panel concurred in the result, one member wrote separately to question the conclusion that international laws of war have no bearing on the president's detention authority. In July, the DC Circuit ruled in Bensaya v. Obama [opinion, PDF] that the government must show by a preponderance of evidence that an enemy combatant is "part of" a terrorist group [JURIST report]. The circuit court held that the government's authority under the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) [text, PDF] only extends to the detention of individuals who are "functionally part of" a terrorist organization. Bensayah was the only one of the six petitioners from Boumediene who was not granted habeas relief after the Supreme Court remanded the case for further review of evidence.