French court sentences Islamic militants for New Year’s bomb plot News
French court sentences Islamic militants for New Year’s bomb plot

[JURIST] A French court Thursday sentenced 10 Islamic militants for up to ten years each in prison for their roles in a failed plot to detonate a bomb in a Strasbourg market on New Year's Eve 2000. All the men (including one said to be an associate of Osam bin Laden) were Algerian or Franco-Algerian; four others involved with planning the bombing were convicted and sentenced to jail time by a German court in March 2003. BBC News has more. From Paris, Le Monde provides local coverage in French.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Dreyfus convicted of treason

On December 22, 1894, Jewish French army officer Alfred Dreyfus was convicted of treason in a court-martial trial that prompted worldwide allegations of anti-Semitism. Dreyfus was later cleared. Learn more about the case of Alfred Dreyfus and read an English translation of the famous public letter J'Accuse...! by novelist and Dreyfus partisan Emile Zola.

US passed Embargo Act, banning foreign trade

On December 22, 1807, the Embargo Act was passed at the urging of US President Thomas Jefferson. The act barred trade with any foreign nations in an effort to avoid American entry into the Napoleonic Wars of Europe. However, the act proved unenforceable and was replaced with the Non-Intercourse Act, which barred trade with France and Great Britain. Learn more about the Embargo Act of 1807 from Monticello.org