The Parisian Court of Appeals Monday commenced the trial of Kunti Kamara on charges of crimes against humanity, torture and acts of barbarity. Kamara allegedly committed these acts as a member of the United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO) in 1993 and 1994 during the First Liberian Civil War. He denies all allegations. [...]

The US Supreme Court Monday heard the case of Delaware v. Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, a consolidated case involving approximately $150 Million dollars in unclaimed money. The court is asked to interpret “money order” as used in 12 USC §§ 2501-03 and Disposition of Abandoned Money Orders and Travelers Checks Act of 1974. The case, consolidated with [...]

The International Criminal Court (ICC) Monday opened a trial against Mahamat Said Abdel Kani, alleged leader of the Séléka rebel group, for crimes humanity and war crimes in violation of the Rome Statute. Said allegedly committed these crimes in Bangui, Central African Republic (CAR) in 2013. Said pleaded not guilty to all charges. The ICC [...]

Amnesty International Wednesday reported that the Egypt presents a “deeply misleading picture” of the nation’s human rights crisis. Amnesty found patterns of violations including “unlawful killings, mass arbitrary detention and repression of freedom of expression.” The group asserts that Egypt wrongly justifies the violations on the grounds of public security. Egypt’s National Human Rights Strategy [...]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) Monday reported that authorities in Jordan use vague laws to criminalise key civil freedoms like the freedoms of speech, association and assembly in an effort to quash political dissent. HRW investigated a total of 30 cases and found evidence that authorities are use abusive legal frameworks to charge citizens who peacefully [...]

The French Republic on Wednesday invoked Article 63 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice. A press release from the Hague announced that the French Republic filed the declaration of intervention for the case ‘allegations of genocide under the convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide (Ukraine v. Russian Federation)’. [...]

North Korea passed a law Friday enshrining its right to use pre-emptive nuclear strikes. This legislation arose in response to Western countries’ efforts toward denuclearisation negotiations, and follows the UN treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). State-controlled Korea Central New Agency (KCNA) reports that, “by promulgating a law on a policy of the nuclear [...]

Leading Indonesian public figures Wednesday petitioned the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Indonesia to permit a case against the Myanmar junta. The application claims that the junta must be tried for crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide against Myanmar’s Muslim population. The Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia speaks of human rights abuses [...]

A special French terrorism court Monday opened the trial of eight defendants accused of assisting the driver who killed 86 people on in Nice, France, on Bastille Day 2016. The attacker, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, ploughed a heavy truck into civilians and was killed at the scene by security. However, eight people from his alleged network [...]

The Council of Europe Friday published a letter criticising the Netherlands’ asylum reception processes at the Ter Apel asylum centre. Commissioner Dunja Mijatovic addressed the issue in an August 26 letter to Eric van der Burg, the Dutch Minister for Migration. According to Mijatovic’s letter, more than 700 asylum seekers are forced to sleep outside [...]