Corruption charges against ex-Malawi president dropped News
Corruption charges against ex-Malawi president dropped

[JURIST] Corruption charges filed [JURIST report] last week against former Malawi President Bakili Muluzi [BBC profile] have been dropped after the head of the country's Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) [official website] was suspended, Malawi's director of public prosecutions said Monday. President Bingu wa Mutharika [BBC profile; BBC profile], Muluzi's hand-picked successor, suspended ACB director Gustave Kaliwo on Thursday [Nation report], leaving no one to oversee the case against Muluzi.

Muluzi, who ruled Malawi [CIA backgrounder] from 1994 to 2004, had been charged with 42 counts of corruption, fraud and theft arising from allegations that he directed campaign contributions into his personal accounts. Reuters has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Ku Klux Klan founded

The US hate group known as the Ku Klux Klan was founded on December 24, 1865 in Pulaski, Tennessee as a reaction to reconstruction efforts following the Union victory in the American Civil War. The group would later become notorious for its attacks on Black Americans, being targeted by the Enforcement Act of 1871, which imposed civil and criminal liability for deprivation of constitutional rights. Read the Enforcement Act of 1871.  

Hamid Karzai born

On December 24, 1957, Hamid Karzai was born in Karz, Afghanistan. He would go on to become in 2004 his country's first elected president after the end of Taliban rule in 2001.