Nigerian elections also have not proceeded without significant problems. Last month, Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] announced his intentions to propose a constitutional amendment [JURIST report] that would provide a single, extended tenure for the president of Nigeria and its 36 governors. In March, Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] and the Nigerian Bar Association [association website] called for Nigeria's National Assembly to pass legislation creating a special electoral offenses commission [statement; JURIST report] tasked with investigating and prosecuting election-related abuses, including violence. In 2006, Nigerian Vice-President Atiku Abubakar [official profile; official website] was charged with more than a dozen counts of corruption [JURIST report] in the Code of Conduct Tribunal, a special corruption court that has the power to strip elected officials of immunity. The charges were related to the alleged diversion of $125 million dollars of public money to private interests, as well as allegations of receiving more than $4.6 million dollars in bribes.

Italy is not the first EU country to enact legislation banning the wearing of full face veils in public. Last week, Belgium implemented a law banning women from wearing the burqa [JURIST report] in public, with violators facing the possibility of fines or up to seven days in jail. A French Muslim couple living in the UK filed a challenge [JURIST report] in June in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) [official website] over the French ban [materials, in French] on full face coverings. Also in June, a Spanish court upheld a city ban on veils in municipal buildings for identification and security purposes. In October, the French Constitutional Council ruled that the ban conforms with the Constitution [JURIST report]. Also in October, Dutch politician Geert Wilders [personal website, in Dutch] said that the Netherlands will ban the burqa [JURIST report] as part of the government's plan to form a minority coalition. In August 2010, Austria's conservative Freedom Party [official website, in German] called for a special vote [JURIST report] on whether to ban face veils and the construction of minarets, two of the most visible symbols of the Islamic faith. In July 2010, Spain's lower house of parliament rejected a proposal [JURIST report] to ban the burqa and other full face veils by a vote of 183 to 162 with two abstaining.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev [official profile; JURIST news archive] announced in June that Magnitsky's pre-trial death was the result of criminal acts [JURIST report] and not attributable to the denial of medical treatment from prison doctors. Medvedev was presented with a report [AFP report] on Magnitsky's death during a meeting [press release, in Russian] with the Presidential Council on Civil Society and Human Rights that said Magnitsky was beaten to death by prison guards before his death. Prior to his death, Magnitsky was held in prison for 358 days with little to no access to legal representation, his family or medical professionals. In February, the Council began investigating Magnitsky's death and the verdicts handed down against former Russian oil executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky [defense website; JURIST news archive] and his business partner Platon Lebedev [defense website]. The Council's goal is to submit to Medvedev, "expert legal analysis in connection with specific cases causing public outcry or defining trend of judicial practice." The Council began its work shortly after a group of independent UN human rights experts started its own investigation into the circumstances around Magnitsky's death. Last year, US lawmakers introduced a bill [JURIST report] that would prohibit the US State Department (DOS) [official website] from issuing visas to individuals, or their family members, who are connected to Magnitsky's death.

The Government of Sri Lanka made every effort to protect civilians in the conflict zone through the creation of Safe Corridors and No Fire Zones, and by adhering to a "Zero Civilian casualty" policy that had been conveyed to all troops through repeated training and operation orders. Sri Lanka also took a proactive and extensive role in delivering humanitarian assistance to these civilians before, during and after the fighting. Despite the clear intent of the Government of Sri Lanka and the precautions taken, it was impossible in a battle of this magnitude, against a ruthless opponent actively endangering civilians, for civilian casualties to be avoided.

There is a growing number of claims that Sri Lanka was responsible for war crimes during the war with the LTTE. In May, UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial killings Christof Heyns [official website] urged [JURIST report] the UN Human Rights Council [official website] to conduct further investigations into possible Sri Lankan war crimes after reconfirming the legitimacy of a video of LTTE members being executed by members of the Sri Lankan military. Heyns' conclusions were based on analysis by technical and forensic experts, including pathologists, video analysts and a firearms expert, and echo findings [JURIST report] that led his predecessor last year to call for an independent investigation into Sri Lankan war crimes. In April, a UN panel of experts said in a report that parties on both sides may have committed war crimes [JURIST report] during the final stages of the 26-year civil war. The Sri Lankan Ministry of External Affairs [official website] announced in December that the three-person panel would be allowed to visit [JURIST report] the island to investigate alleged war crimes. The decision represented a reversal after months of strong opposition [JURIST report] from the Sri Lankan government under President Mahinda Rajapaksa [official profile], who described the UN panel as an infringement on Sri Lanka's sovereignty.

Dr. Vu was jailed for political reasons in a trial that violated his rights. Vietnamese authorities should at least do the right thing now with a fair and independent appeals hearing. Rather than playing a revolving door game with peaceful government critics, this is an opportunity for the Appeals Court to correct the serious due process violations during Dr. Vu's trial in April and ensure that his appeal is in full accordance with fair trial standards.

Vu is among several dissidents in Vietnam who have been convicted for anti-government activity. In January, a Vietnamese court sentenced former communist official Vi Duc Hoi to eight years in prison [JURIST report] for advocating democracy and a multi-party system. In January 2010, a Vietnamese court sentenced [JURIST report] writer and democracy activist Pham Thanh Nghien to four years in prison on charges of spreading anti-state propaganda. That same month, a Vietnamese court convicted four democracy activists [JURIST report] of subversion. Following the one-day trial, human rights lawyer Le Cong Dinh [JURIST news archive] was sentenced to five years in prison. The four defendants were accused of activities aimed at ending communist rule in Vietnam. Dinh admitted to advocating multi-party democracy in Vietnam and joining the banned Democracy Party. Prior to Dinh's conviction, a Vietnamese court sentenced [JURIST report] pro-democracy dissident Tran Anh Kim in December 2009 to five-and-a-half years in prison for subversion.

There are sound policy reasons for requiring ... the petitioner signer to fill in his or her own information on the form, rather than allowing that information to be filled in by someone else. Anyone—including someone other than the voter—could have the website generate a "Pre-Filled Petition Form" with that voter's information pre-printed, both in the signing block and the circulators affidavit. The user (who is not the voter) could then print out the form, sign the voter's name in the signature space and in circulator's affidavit and mail the form to MDPetitions.com for submission to the Secretary of State and State Board.

The Maryland DREAM Act is currently suspended pending the public referendum. In order to be eligible for in-state tuition, undocumented residents would have to have attended at least three years of high school in Maryland and show their parents had filed tax returns to the state. The US Congress has considered a similar but more far-reaching bill [legislative materials; text], also entitled the DREAM Act, that would provide a path to permanent resident status for some high school graduates who enter the military or enroll in a college degree program. The Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act, or DREAM Act, would amend the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 [text, PDF] to allow certain children of illegal immigrants an opportunity to achieve legal residency. The bill was previously defeated in Congress in 2007, but reintroduced [JURIST reports] last October by US Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) [official profiles] as part of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2010 [legislative materials], which includes several bills that, if passed, would greatly change US immigration [JURIST news archive] law.

Though the Court's sanctioning of the CIA is a positive step for accountability, it falls short of the full accounting necessary before we can turn the page on the last decade. Far more disturbing than the CIA's destruction of the tapes is the CIA's authorization of the brutal mistreatment captured by the tapes. By destroying that evidence of criminal activity in direct violation of the judge's clear instructions, the agency's top officials aimed to deny the public and the courts the chance to hold them accountable.

In January, Hellerstein told the CIA that it must investigate the destruction of the interrogation tapes [JURIST report] related to individuals detained after 9/11 [JURIST news archive] and prevent similar incidents from happening in the future. Internal CIA documents [part 1, PDF; part 2, PDF; part 3, PDF] released last April reveal that the former head of the agency Porter Goss may have agreed to the destruction [JURIST report] of the interrogation videotapes [JURIST news archive]. According to redacted documents [text, PDF] filed in March 2009, 12 of 92 videotapes destroyed by the CIA [JURIST report] contained evidence of "enhanced interrogation techniques." The US Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website] had acknowledged [letter, PDF; JURIST report] in March 2009 that the CIA destroyed 92 videotapes of high value terrorism suspect interrogations, in response to an August 2008 judicial order [text, PDF] that the CIA turn over information regarding the tapes or provide specific justifications on why it could not release the information. The August 2008 order came in response to a December 2007 ACLU motion [text, PDF] that the CIA be held in contempt of court for not providing information on the tapes during a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) [text] lawsuit [ACLU materials] brought by the organization in an effort to access government materials on the interrogations.

When Congress enacted Medicaid, it did not create a top-down welfare model where the national government commandeers a State administrative apparatus and instructs it to provide particular benefits through prescribed channels. Rather, it created a cooperative-federalist program offering federal reimbursement to States that choose to establish Medicaid programs that comply with federal criteria. Under this model, States decide what services and segments of the population they want to cover and determine the qualifications and standards of practice for those who seek to provide the covered services. The federal government reimburses States whose Medicaid plans conform to the Medicaid Act and may refuse to issue grants to States with non-compliant plans. ... Accordingly, PPIN cannot have a right of action to "enforce" ... the "free-choice plan requirement." All concede that the Medicaid Act itself affords no right of action.

Indiana is already appealing an administrative decision in June by Donald Berwick, administrator of the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMMS) [official website] to deny approval of the law [JURIST report]. He sent a letter to the Indiana state agency saying states have the ability to assign the qualified provider status, but the law violates § 1902(a)(23) of the Social Security Act [text] because it prevents Medicaid beneficiaries from receiving services from certain providers for reasons unrelated to the providers qualifications to provide those services. The Obama administration has taken a stance against the Indiana law. In addition to the CMMS denial, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) [official website] filed a brief urging the court to grant an injunction [JURIST report] to stop the enforcement of the law. The ban includes disbursement of grant money, including federal Medicare funds, a provision PPIN claims is not legal under the federal Medicaid Act's "freedom of choice" provision, which allows states to disallow Medicare funding for medical providers based on deficiencies in quality of service. Before granting the preliminary injunction, the judge denied a request for a restraining order [JURIST report] to block implementation of the law.

DHS continues to enforce federal immigration laws in Alabama and around the country in smart, effective ways that focus our resources on criminal aliens and employers who knowingly hire illegal labor, as well as continue to secure our border. Legislation like this diverts critical law enforcement resources from the most serious threats to public safety and undermines the vital trust between local jurisdictions and the communities they serve. We continue to support comprehensive reform of our immigration system at the federal level because this challenge cannot be solved by a patchwork of inconsistent state laws.

The Alabama immigration legislation, which was signed into law [JURIST report] by Governor Robert Bentley [official website] in June, is one of the most rigid immigration reform laws passed recently. In addition to authorizing detention of individuals on reasonable suspicion they are illegal immigrants, the law provides harsh restrictions on employment for illegal immigrants. Businesses cited multiple times for hiring undocumented workers could lose their business licenses. Furthermore, undocumented immigrants are prohibited from applying for a job, and anyone transporting or harboring undocumented immigrants will be punished by a fine or jail time. A group of immigrants filed a lawsuit in an Alabama state court [JURIST report] just last week arguing that the Alabama immigration law conflicts with the Alabama Constitution [text], which expressly encourages immigration. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Hispanic Interest Coalition of Alabama (HICA) [advocacy websites] and several other civil rights groups jointly filed [JURIST report] a motion for preliminary injunction [text, PDF] earlier in July in an effort to prevent the Alabama immigration law from taking effect. Similar laws have been passed in Indiana, Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, Oklahoma and Utah [JURIST reports]. Federal courts have enjoined the laws in Arizona, Indiana, Georgia, Oklahoma and Utah [JURIST reports].

US troops and contractors have been tried in US courts for incidents occurring overseas. In June, four former Blackwater contractors allegedly involved in the 2007 shooting incident challenged a ruling reinstating the manslaughter case [JURIST reports] against them. The case had been dismissed [JURIST report] by the US District Court for the District of Columbia [official website] because it found the decision to prosecute the men was "tainted" by the use of immunized statements. Two ex-Blackwater contractors were convicted of manslaughter [JURIST report] in March for their role in the May 2009 shooting deaths of two Afghan nationals and the wounding of a third. Last April, a federal grand jury indicted five former Blackwater executives [JURIST report] on charges of weapons violations and lying to investigators. In February 2010, the Iraqi government ordered 250 former Blackwater employees to leave Iraq [JURIST report] in reaction to the dismissal of charges against the ex-Blackwater employees allegedly involved in the September 2007 shootings.