The Supreme Court of Sri Lanka on Tuesday overturned the president’s decision to dissolve parliament and called for a halt in preparations for a snap election on January 5. Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena dissolved parliament because he lacked the support to install the prime minister of his choice, Mahinda Rajapaksa, after firing the previous [...]
A federal judge on Tuesday ordered that mail-in absentee ballots in Gwinnett County, Georgia, should be counted after they were originally rejected for an omitted or incorrect birth year. Under Georgia law, an eligible voter can request an absentee ballot by completing an application 180 days before the election date. Once the application is received, [...]
North Carolina’s Democratic Party, voting rights group Common Cause and individual voters filed suit against the state government Tuesday claiming excessive partisan gerrymandering of legislative maps. In their complaint, filed in the Wake County Superior Court, plaintiffs that the 2017 state House and Senate redistricting maps were construed in favor of the Republican party. Common Clause claims [...]
The European Court of Justice ruled Tuesday against Dutch company Levola in its attempt to copyright the taste of a spreadable cheese product it produces, finding that the taste of a food product is not eligible for copyright protection. The case began over a decade ago when a Dutch food retailer created the spreadable dip Heksenkaas (commonly referred [...]
Two Egyptian police officers were sentenced by the South Cairo Criminal Court on Monday to three years and six months in prison for the wrongful death of a detainee, a popular painter known as “Afroto.” Egyptian news agency Mada Masr reports that Afroto was allegedly killed in prison on January 5, 2018, and eyewitnesses told [...]
The US Supreme Court added two cases to its docket Tuesday, including a Virginia gerrymandering case. Virginia House of Delegates v. Bethune-Hill is racial gerrymandering case in which 12 state legislative districts in Virginia are being challenged. The court wants briefs on whether the parties have standing to bring this appeal. The lower court ruled [...]
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet called on the government of Bangladesh on Tuesday to halt plans to repatriate more than 2,200 Rohingya refugees to Myanmar, warning that their lives would be at “serious risk” and that the returns would violate international law. “Forcibly expelling or returning refugees and asylum seekers to their [...]
CNN filed a lawsuit Tuesday against US President Donald Trump and others in his administration, requesting that chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta’s access be restored. The lawsuit makes claims under the First and Fifth Amendments along with the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). In the First Amendment claim, CNN points out that the president’s dislike [...]
Judge Amy Totenberg of the US District Court for the Northern District of Georgia ruled Monday that the state must delay certification of the election results pending consideration of provisional ballots cast due to flaws in Georgia’s registration system. The plaintiff, Common Cause Georgia, filed the action alleging that Georgia’s voter registration server that is used [...]
Voting rights groups League of Women Voters of Florida and Common Cause Florida filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking an injunction preventing Florida Governor Rick Scott from participating in the voting recount for the US Senate race, in which Scott is a candidate. The plaintiffs filed the suit in the US District Court for the Northern District of Florida. The governor has [...]
