Opposition leaders and other groups have shown skepticism about the validity of Khodorkovsky's sentence. In December the Russia Presidential Council on Civil Society and Human Rights under President Dmitry Medvedev called for the prosecutor general to petition to annul the conviction [JURIST report]. Describing the verdict as fictitious, council member and former Constitutional Court judge, Tamara Morshchakova, noted the council found neither evidence nor substance to the charges brought against Khodorkovsky in the second trial. The council's decisions are non-binding and have seldom elicited action from Russian authorities. In July, the council urged amnesty for economic crimes in a meeting with Medvedev that would include amnesty for the crimes of Khodorkovsky. Last year former Russian prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov testified [JURIST report] that former president and current prime minister Vladimir Putin ordered Khodorkovsky's arrest for political reasons, indicating that Khodorkovsky had funded the Communist Party without first getting approval to do so from the president.

The evidence available to my Office was sufficient to commence those proceedings on the basis that Mr Hicks stood to benefit financially from the commercial exploitation of his notoriety resulting from the commission of a foreign indictable offense. ... Following commencement of the proceedings, Mr Hicks challenged the admissibility of the documents [recording his admissions to the US Military Commission], based upon the conditions and circumstances in which he made the relevant admissions. The challenge also relied upon the fact that Mr Hicks entered what is known in the [US] as an "Alford plea". This is a type of plea not recognised in Australia, whereby a defendant is able to acknowledge that the available evidence is sufficient to prove the case beyond reasonable doubt, without admitting commission of the offences charged.

In August 2011 the New South Wales Supreme Court [official website] froze all assets [Sydney Morning Herald report] arising out of the sale of Hicks's book. That same month Hicks filed an appeal [JURIST report] with the UN Human Rights Committee [official website] complaining of multiple violations of international law stemming from his five-year incarceration at Guantanamo from 2002 to 2007. In his petition Hicks asked the Australian government to "request the US authorities to formally overturn" his 2007 conviction on charges of aiding terrorism before a US military court and nullify the plea deal [JURIST reports] from which the conviction arose. Australian authorities removed the final restrictions against Hicks [JURIST report] in December 2008. Following his guilty plea Hicks was transferred to Australia in May 2007 to serve the remainder of his nine-month prison sentence at a maximum security prison near his hometown of Adelaide, South Australia, and was released [JURIST reports] in December 2007. The control order was relaxed [JURIST report] in February 2008, permitting Hicks to live anywhere in the country, and requiring him to check in with police only twice a week.

The decision by the appeals court came in the wake of coordinated attacks in 13 cities that killed at least 103 people while injuring around 200. The attacks are alleged to be initiated by the al-Qaeda [JURIST news archive] to send out a message that it is still strong. The attacks are considered [AP report] the deadliest in two years. In December al-Hashemi stated that he is not going to return to Baghdad [JURIST report] to stand trial on charges of inciting violence in the country. The statement came a week after an arrest warrant was issued [Reuters report] against him by Shiite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki [official website, in Arabic].

Romanian interim president Crin Antonescu [personal website, in Romanian] last week signed a law reinstating the 50 percent turnout threshold [JURIST report]. A week earlier European Commission (EC) President Jose Manuel Barroso [official website] summoned Ponta to Brussels to discuss concerns over some of the prime minister's policies, urging Ponta to respect the full independence of the Romanian judiciary and expressing the EC's desire that Romania maintain a democratic system of checks and balances. Earlier this month the Constitutional Court accused Ponta of overstepping his authority [JURIST report] by attempting to seize control over the judiciary system. Ponta also ignored a decision by the court finding Basescu should be the representative of the country at the European Council meeting in Brussels. In 2009 the Constitutional Court declared incumbent President Basescu winner of the country's disputed presidential election [JURIST report]. Basescu has been president of Romania since 2004.

The informed consent law was originally passed [JURIST report] in 2005 but has faced years of court challenges and appeals. The decision of the three-judge panel of the Eighth Circuit last year upheld most of the law, including a provision that requires doctors to tell patients prior to an abortion "that [she] has an existing relationship with that unborn human being and that the relationship enjoys protection under the United States Constitution and under the laws of South Dakota" and that "by having an abortion, her existing relationship and her existing constitutional rights with regards to that relationship will be terminated." A judge for the US District Court for the District of South Dakota last month upheld an injunction [JURIST report] against a different South Dakota abortion law, but allowed one section, requiring doctors to certify that a woman has not been "coerced" into making her decision, to go into effect. The most controversial parts of the law, including a provision requiring a 72-hour waiting period before obtaining the procedure, remain blocked. Last Year, the Planned Parenthood Federation of Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota and the American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota succeeded in obtaining a preliminary injunction against the law [JURIST report]. The law was passed [JURIST report] in March 2011.

The attack, which was clearly ethnically motivated, underscores the urgent need to combat impunity for past violations in Cote d'Ivoire. At the height of the post-electoral crisis in March last year, two massacres took place in the Duekoue-Guiglo area. One reportedly resulted in the deaths of around 100 members of the Dioula ethnic community and, in another, approximately 244 mostly male members of the Guere ethnic group were found to have been killed during the capture of Duekoue on 28 March 2011 by the Forces Republicaines de Cote d'Ivoire (FRCI). It appears that the attack on the IDP camp in Nahibly was targeted at members of the Guere community, which is being blamed by the Dioula community for an armed robbery earlier in the day on Friday during which five Malinke (a sub-group of the Dioula people) were killed. More than a year after the March 2011 Duekoue ethnic violence, little progress has been made in advancing justice and accountability. While more than 176 members of the pro-Gbabgo camp, aligned with former President Laurent Gbagbo, have been indicted for violations committed during the post-electoral crisis, we understand that no arrests have been made of supporters of current President Alassane Ouattara in relation to these crimes.

The continuing violence in the Ivory Coast has been the subject of criticism by international human rights groups. Earlier this month, the country's justice ministry announced [JURIST report] that two allies of former president Laurent Gbagbo [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] have been charged with genocide relating to the violence that followed Gbagbo's refusal to step down after his defeat in the November 2010 elections. Gbagbo was captured and forced to surrender [JURIST report] in April of last year after French tanks moved in on his residence while Outtara's forces surrounded it. The confirmation of charges hearing against him was postponed in mid-June by the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website] amid a request by his lawyers for more time. A week earlier, Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy website] reported [JURIST report] that since July 2011 at least 40 people including women and children have been killed during cross-border attacks on Ivory Coast villages by armed militants in Liberia [BBC backgrounder; JURIST news archive]. In February, HRW expressed concern [JURIST report] over the flawed investigation into the post-election violence and advocated six-month extension of the probe. Another concern was that all 17 members of the investigating commission were chosen by President Ouattara creating possibility of bias in the investigation. During the same month, ICC's former Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo [official profile] was granted permission [JURIST report] to expand his investigation of war crimes in the Ivory Coast to incidents dating back to 2002.

Somalia has been urged by the international community to ensure that the country's transition proceeds peacefully. Last month UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told officials at the Istanbul II Conference on Somalia that Somalia must make all efforts to smoothly transition to a permanent government [JURIST report] with a new constitution. Somalia's Transitional Federal Government (TFG) [CFR backgrounder] has been working toward establishment of a legitimate government since the 1991 end of the Muhammad Siad Barre [Britannica profile] dictatorship. In May UN representatives announced [JURIST report] that the Elders of Somalia were planning to select delegates for the NCA. Earlier that month a UN expert called on Somalia [JURIST report] to address issues with the judicial systems in Mogadishu and South Central Somalia after finding in Somalia's application of Sharia law and modern international and human rights law. In February Human Rights Watch criticized [JURIST report] the country's TFG for failing to prevent children recruitment into armed forces.

This week Terrica Ganzy [official profile], Staff Attorney for the Southern Center for Human Rights [advocacy website], argued that Warren Hill was improperly sentenced to death [JURIST comment] and that Georgia should adopt a "preponderance of evidence" standard for mentally disabled claims in capital offense cases. Last week after the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles denied Hill's petition for clemency [JURIST report] the DOC delayed his execution for several days in order to make the changes to its lethal injection protocol. Also last week UN Special Rapporteur on arbitrary executions Christof Heyns [official website] urged the US not to execute [JURIST report] Hill. The US Supreme Court [official website] ruled in Atkins v. Virginia [opinion; Cornell LII backgrounder] that the execution of mentally retarded individuals is cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Eighth Amendment [text]. However, in 29 states, including Texas, Tennessee and New Jersey [JURIST reports], the defendant still carries the burden of proving mental retardation in death-penalty [JURIST news archive] cases to receive a lesser sentence. Guest columnist Olga Vlasova argues [JURIST op-ed] that the Supreme Court should prohibit the death penalty for severely mentally ill offenders.

The US government has struggled to deal with the release of confidential files on Wikileaks. Army Col. Denise Lind last month ordered [JURIST report] the prosecution in the case against Pfc. Bradley Manning [advocacy website; JURIST news archive] to submit to her a number of files that were allegedly withheld from the defense during discovery. Manning is accused of transferring more than 700,000 confidential documents and video clips to Wikileaks, the largest intelligence leak is US history. Manning's defense has argued the leaks did not hurt US national security, but the US Army has responded that Manning's actions indirectly aided al Qaeda. Manning was formally charged [JURIST report] in February with 22 counts, including aiding the enemy, under the Espionage Act [text]. In April 2011 WikiLeaks began publishing the Guantanamo Files [JURIST report], a collection of more than 700 classified documents relating to the evidence and treatment of almost all detainees held at Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] between 2002 and 2008. In December 2010, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay criticized [JURIST report] actions by governments and corporations worldwide to cut off funding to WikiLeaks, saying it could violate the website's rights to free expression.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania [advocacy website] challenged the law [petition for review, PDF; JURIST report] in May, asking a court to block enforcement of the law in the upcoming November elections. The group claims that the new law violates the Pennsylvania Constitution [text] and will prevent eligible voters from casting their votes. Corbett signed the bill into law [JURIST report] in March. It was passed earlier that week in the House of Representatives by a vote of 104-88. Supporters of the proposed legislation said that it will combat voter fraud. Unlike the current trend of voter ID laws, Pennsylvania's allows voters to vote without an ID as long as they verify their identity within six days of voting. Absentee ballots will also only require identification by Social Security number. There are now 32 US states [NCSL backgrounder] that require voters to present some form of ID at the polls, but the issue remains controversial.

Apple and Samsung have been embroiled in continuous patent litigation around the world. On Monday, an Australian federal court began hearing [JURIST report] two patent infringement cases brought by Apple and Samsung Electronics that are anticipated to last for the next three months. Earlier this month, a UK court ruled [JURIST report] in favor of Samsung in a design infringement case brought by Apple alleging that three of Samsung's tablets infringed upon Apple's registered design patents while Samsung denied infringement. On the other hand, a judge for the US District Court for the Northern District of California [official website] issued an injunction [JURIST report] against Samsung to stop the sale of its Galaxy Nexus smartphone in the US. Judge Lucy Koh held that Apple is likely to succeed on the merits in the litigation and would likely suffer irreparable harm if Samsung's sale of its smartphone is not stopped immediately. A week earlier, Koh had granted [JURIST report] an injunction against Samsung blocking the sale of its Galaxy 10.1 tablet computer while the patent infringement case is reviewed. Apple filed suit [JURIST report] against Samsung in April of last year alleging that Samsung committed 10 patent infringements, two trademark violations and two trade dress violations by copying iPhone and iPad technology in making its "Galaxy" products. In June, the District Court of The Hague ruled [JURIST report] in favor of Samsung against Apple holding that Apple was liable for infringing upon one of the Korean company's four patents, a 3G patent. In March Samsung filed suit [JURIST report] against Apple in the Seoul Central District Court in South Korea alleging Apple had infringed three of its utility patents.

Earlier this month UN Chief Military Observer in Syria Major-General Robert Mood stated that he believed Syrian authorities were committed to implementing the peace agreement [JURIST report] that was reached earlier this month. Mood, who works with the UNSMIS, confirmed that the UN would continue to provide humanitarian support as the violence subsides. In June the UNSMIS concluded in a report that Syrian forces "may have been responsible" for the killing of more than 100 civilians [JURIST reports] in Al-Houla in May. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad [BBC backgrounder], however, said earlier that month that the government had nothing to do with the attacks [JURIST report]. In April, the UN Syria mission agreed to send up to 300 unarmed military observers and other humanitarian aid to supervise the implementation of a peace plan after Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report stating that Syrian security forces had killed more than 100 civilians [JURIST reports] and opposition fighters in recent attacks. In March, HRW also reported on and linked to videos of forces rounding up civilians for use as human shields [JURiST report], including women and children, forcing them to walk in front of soldiers and tanks during troops movements and attacks so that opposition fighters would not shoot at them.