Basescu has faced several similar political challenges throughout the course of his eight-year presidency. In 2009 the Constitutional Court declared then-incumbent Basescu the winner of a disputed presidential election [JURIST report], returning him to office after unanimously rejecting a complaint by Mircea Geoana, Basescu's opponent, alleging voter fraud and bribery. In 2007, he survived a similar referendum [JURIST report] with 74 percent of the vote and only 44 percent turnout. Babescu was first elected President of Romania in December 2004.

Pussy Riot's controversial trial ended [JURIST report] on August 17 with a guilty verdict and two-year prison sentences for each of the three women. Specifically, band members Natalia Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina, and Yekaterina Samutsevich were found guilty of "hooliganism" in the form of religious hatred, a charge based on the group's "guerrilla performance" of a protest song in February at the altar of Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral. Though the charge carries a maximum sentence of seven years, prosecutors originally requested sentences of three years [JURIST report]. The prosecution of Pussy Riot has been criticized as a politically motivated move by Russian President Vladimir Putin [official website; JURIST news archive] to discredit his opposition. Although defense lawyers for the band requested that the judge recuse herself [JURIST report] from the case due to politically motivated decisions, Judge Marina Syrova declined even hearing the motion for her recusal. The women were arrested in March, and their trial began [JURIST report] at the end of July.

Proposition 8 was struck down as a violation of the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses [Cornell LII backgrounders] of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Ninth Circuit initially heard arguments on Proposition 8's constitutionality in December 2010, but then asked the California Supreme Court [JURIST reports] to rule on whether defendants had standing to appeal. The state high court ruled in November that they did have standing [JURIST report]. Several jurisdictions in the US have legalized same-sex marriage, including the District of Columbia, Vermont, New Hampshire, Iowa, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York [JURIST reports] and the Suquamish [NYT report] and Coquille Indian Tribes [OregonLive report].

SPD and City officials have expressed their desire to continue the ongoing efforts to improve the Seattle Police Department through the Settlement Agreement. The Parties agree that the measures agreed upon in the Settlement Agreement will enhance SPD officers' ability to provide effective and constitutional policing, will promote transparency and accountability between SPD and the community, and will increase public confidence in SPD. ... Settling this dispute without protracted litigation thus allows the City, the United States, and SPD officers to achieve one of their shared primary goals: ensuring effective and constitutional policing for the City of Seattle.

Police practices are often controversial. Last week the US District Court for the District of Arizona [official website] heard arguments on whether to enjoin a controversial provision of Arizona's immigration law [SB 1070, PDF] that requires law enforcement officials to check the immigration status of persons they stop or arrest [JURIST report] if there is a reasonable suspicion that the person is in the US illegally. The two legal questions addressed were whether extending the detention of suspects to determine immigration status violates suspects' constitutional rights, and whether SB 1070 unconstitutionally discriminates against Latinos. Also last week the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit [official website] ruled that police did not violate Fourth Amendment [text] protection against illegal searches when they tracked a suspect's cell phone [JURIST report] using the phone's global positioning system (GPS) [JURIST news archive] signal.

[JURIST] The Supreme Court of Pakistan [official website] on Monday granted Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf three additional weeks to urge Switzerland to reopen an old corruption case against President Asif Ali Zardari [official website]. Ashraf appeared in court on Monday to explain why the court should not charge him with contempt [VOA report] for failure to initiate the corruption investigation. Ashraf was appearing in the Supreme Court after it issued a decision earlier this month ordering him to appear [JURIST report]. In June the Supreme Court ordered Ashraf to reopen the case [JURIST report] by writing a letter to Swiss authorities [DAWN report]. Switzerland said it will not be pursuing the case which was originally instituted in the 1990s. The next hearing on this case in Pakistan is now scheduled to take place on September 18.

These proceeding in Pakistan exemplify the mounting tension in the country between the judicial and executive branches of government. Some have argued that the judiciary in Pakistan is becoming too powerful. The former prime minister Yousef Raza Gilani [BBC profile] was disqualified from being a member of Parliament after an April contempt conviction [JURIST reports] and removed from office when he declined to follow the same court order that has been given to Ashraf. In early August the government announced that it will petition the high court to review its decision nullifying [JURIST reports] the Contempt of Court Bill 2012 which was passed to shield the country's new prime minister from contempt charges. The bill was passed by the upper [AFP report] and lower houses of the national parliament and signed [JURIST reports] by Zardari last month. The court had ordered [JURIST report] the new prime minister in late June to investigate the corruption allegations against the president. Ashraf, like his predecessor, has argued that the president is immune from prosecution under the country's constitution.

Earlier this month Myanmar President Thein Sein [BBC profile] announced the creation of a 27-member commission [JURIST report] tasked with investigating the cause of the sectarian violence between Rohingya Muslims and Rakhine Buddhists. The clashes, which began in May and carried on into June in the western Rakhine state, were responsible for at least 83 deaths and the displacement of thousands of nearby civilians. In July 10 UN staff and aid workers were arrested [JURIST report] in Rakhine. At that time, it was reported that three of those arrested [Reuters report] were Myanmar nationals working for the UNHCR while four of the 10 arrested were working for Doctors Without Borders. Earlier this month several other UN staff members and representatives from international NGOs were released after spending over two months in prison.