Last month, International Criminal Court [official website] Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo [official profile] said that the ICC would allow Libya to conduct the trial [JURIST report] of Saif al-Islam. Despite concern from human rights groups, including HRW about whether he can receive a fair trial [HRW report] in Libya, Ocampo said he trusts the new Libyan government will be able to try him fairly [AP report] and maintained that the ICC will not intervene as long as it does not stray from ICC standards. The ICC issued a statement [text] clarifying that, "[s]hould the Libyan authorities wish to conduct national prosecutions against the suspect, they shall submit a challenge to the admissibility of the case before Pre-Trial Chamber I. ... Any decision on the admissibility of a case is under the sole competence of the Judges of the ICC." Ocampo's statement regarding the location of the trial came after his visit to Libya [JURIST report], during which he discussed the country's plans for the trial. Earlier in the month, Libyan Prime Minister Abdurrahim al-Keib pledged [JURIST report] that Saif al-Islam would receive a fair trial there.

The Member States, including the national courts, may not transfer an asylum seeker to the Member State indicated as responsible where they cannot be unaware that systemic deficiencies in the asylum procedure and in the reception conditions of asylum seekers amount to substantial grounds for believing that the asylum seeker would face a real risk of being subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment within the meaning of Article 4 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.

Greece is not the only country whose asylum policies have been questioned. In May, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay [official profile] rebuked [JURIST report] Australia for its political, rather than human rights based approach to indigenous people and asylum-seekers. Although she criticized some of the nation's practices, she had considerable praise for "a strong history of commitment to human rights at the international level, and also of course a robust system of democratic institutions." Nonetheless, she believes improvements are necessary in the realm of treatment of Aborigines and immigrants. On the topic of asylum-seekers, Pillay described situations where refugees wait in immigration centers for months or years. She recommended greater communication with both groups, a revamp of how the Aborigine Northern Territory is handled, and for political leaders to quit "demonizing" refugees and immigrants.

The council has spoken out about Khodorkovsky before. In July the council urged amnesty for economic crimes [JURIST report] in a meeting with Medvedev that would include amnesty for the crimes of Khodorkovsky. Khodorkovsky and his former business partner Platon Lebedev were convicted in December 2010 and sentenced [JURIST reports] on charges connected with embezzling more than $27 billion from Yukos oil. International human rights organizations and numerous governments criticized Russia's justice system [JURIST report] following the guilty verdict. Last year former Russian prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov [BBC profile] testified [JURIST report] that former president and current prime minister Vladimir Putin [official website; JURIST news archive] ordered Khodorkovsky's arrest for political reasons, indicating that Khodorkovsky had funded the Communist Party [party website, in Russian] without first getting approval to do so from the president. Some critics of the Russian government have argued that the charges against Khodorkovsky and Lebedev are politically motivated [JURIST op-ed] due to Khodorkovsky's opposition to Putin. In March 2010 Khodorkovsky criticized Russia's justice system [JURIST report] as an "assembly line" that inevitably finds the government's political enemies to be guilty. The statement echoed concerns Khodorkovsky had previously expressed about the fairness of Russian trials and the need for widespread reform of the Russian court system [JURIST reports].

The ICTR continues to try suspects for crimes occurring during the massacre in which approximately 800,000 people were killed. Last month the ICTR convicted former Rwandan mayor Gregoire Ndahimana [JURIST report] of genocide and crimes against humanity by virtue of his "command responsibility" and sentenced him to 15 years in prison in connection with the killings at Nyange parish between April 6 and April 20, 1994, In September, the court acquitted [JURIST report] two former Rwandan ministers, Casimir Bizimungu and Jerome Bicamumpaka, of genocide charges due to a lack of sufficient evidence. In June, the court convicted [JURIST report] former Rwandan army chief Augustin Bizimungu and three others. Bizimungu was sentenced to 30 years in prison while two others, Francois-Xavier Nzuwonemeye and Innocent Sagahutu, to 20 years in prison and Augustin Ndindiliyimana to time served since his arrest in 2000. Last December the ICTR sentenced [JURIST report] former Rwandan Armed Forces lieutenant Ildephonse Hategekimana to life imprisonment after convicting him on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity. The court found Hategekimana guilty of three counts of genocide stemming from his involvement in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, specifically in the massacre of civilian Tutsis in the Rwandan town of Butare.

Blagojevich was previously found guilty [JURIST report] last year of making false statements to the FBI, but the jury remained deadlocked on 23 additional charges. The prosecutors dropped some of the charges [JURIST report] to simplify the case for retrial, including charges for racketeering. In January 2009, the Illinois State Senate voted unanimously [JURIST report] to convict Blagojevich of abuse of power and remove him from office. Blagojevich and his former chief of staff John Harris were initially arrested [JURIST report] in December 2008 on corruption charges, including allegations that they conspired to sell the Senate seat left vacant by US President Barack Obama.

The EU insisted that it will enforce its new cap-and-trade law despite strong opposition from the US [JURIST report]. The new legislation will eventually require all airlines, including those of non-EU countries, to pay for their carbon dioxide emissions in an effort to encourage airlines to use cleaner fuels and to economize fuel use. Those who do not comply would face steep fines. In October, the US House of Representatives [official website] voted to shield [press release] US passenger and cargo planes from compliance with the EU law. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman John Mica [official profile] has criticized the law, calling it "an arbitrary and unjust violation of international law that disadvantages US air carriers, threatens US aviation jobs, and could close down direct travel from many central and western US airports to Europe" and a violation of international law and trade agreements. The change in the emissions law would greatly impact large US carriers, costing them an estimated $3 billion by 2020.