The Verkhovna Rada (Parliament) of Ukraine voted on Wednesday to ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, making Ukraine a state party. 281 deputies of the Rada voted for the bill while only one voted against it. The bill was introduced by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on August 17 alongside other legislation to bring [...]

The Arizona Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday that a 200-word description of a ballot initiative to enshrine a right to abortion in the state’s constitution was valid and determined voters would see the initiative on the statewide general election ballot. The plaintiff in this case is the Arizona Right to Life organization and the defendant [...]

Taliban figures have banned UN Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan Richard Bennett from entering the country. Representatives of the regime told Afghanistan’s TOLO News that: Mr. Bennett’s travel to Afghanistan has been prohibited because he was assigned to spread propaganda in Afghanistan. He is not someone we trust. He is not in Afghanistan, and he is [...]

The United States Treasury Department announced Tuesday that it has sanctioned Michel Joseph Martelly, the former president of Haiti, on drug trafficking charges. The US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control had imposed these sanctions under Executive Order 14059, which targets individuals involved in the global illicit drug trade. These sanctions freeze assets Martelly may [...]

The Supreme Court of India declined to entertain a petition seeking to declare the country’s traditional caste system unconstitutional on Tuesday. The petition, filed under Article 32 of the Constitution by Wazir Singh Poonia, contended that the caste system is unconstitutional and violates the fundamental rights enshrined in the Indian Constitution. The bench, led by [...]

Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, the Ukrainian parliament, approved the Law on Amendments to Certain Laws of Ukraine on the Activities of Religious Organizations in Ukraine (No. 8371), which bans religious organisations affiliated with Russia in Ukraine on Tuesday. Ruslan Stefanchuk, chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, announced the results of the plenary session. The [...]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Wednesday condemned Burkina Faso military authorities’ use of emergency law to unlawfully conscript magistrates who have opened legal proceedings against junta supporters. HRW has condemned the military’s actions as a blatant violation of the independence of the judiciary, saying “the authorities should immediately revoke these bogus conscription notices.” The organization [...]

A new law came into force in Hungary on Wednesday limiting which Ukrainian refugees can access subsidized housing. Only those from areas that are deemed to be most affected by the Russian invasion will be eligible for the long term. The new law excludes individuals arriving from, among other regions, Transcarpathia. This has been a [...]

Amnesty International (AI) released a briefing on Wednesday highlighting the ongoing repression against human rights under Evariste Ndayishimiye’s presidency in Burundi. The briefing released by AI, titled “Burundi: Rhetoric versus Reality; Repression of Civil Society Continues Under President Ndayishimiye’s Government,” details the ongoing suppression of Burundi’s civic space, particularly against journalists, activists for human rights, [...]

A German court rejected an appeal against the conviction of Irmgard Furchner, a 99-year-old former Nazi concentration camp secretary, on Tuesday. Furchner was employed as a stenographer in the commandant’s office of the Stutthof concentration camp located near the Polish city of Gdansk (formerly Nazi-occupied Danzig), where over 60,000 people were killed. Run by the [...]