Doctors from 16 countries have chided the US military for its medical care of detainees at the US detention center in Guantanamo Bay , Cuba in a letter Friday to the UK medical journal The Lancet . Referring to the US policy of force-feeding detainees on hunger strike, the more than 260 signatories to the [...]

Zimbabwe police charged opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai with disorderly conduct Thursday for allegedly causing a disturbance in early August by touring markets, according to a spokesperson for Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change . The charges, which the party said amounted to political intimidation, were brought only days after Tsvangirai returned from an overseas tour in [...]

A Pakistani lawyers group Thursday pressed its campaign to defeat an expected re-election bid by President Pervez Musharraf , holding planned protest rallies and boycotting courts nationwide. Speaking on behalf of the lawyers, Pakistani Supreme Court Bar Association president Munir Malik said that the group's goal is to secure the resignation of Musharraf and to [...]

UN special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers Leandro Despouy has issued a new report criticizing the government of Iraq for its ongoing use of the death penalty . In the report, Despouy specifically condemned the government for executing Iraqi prisoner Awraz Abdel Aziz Mahmoud Sa'eed despite a UN request to spare him [...]

The ruling party of Zimbabwe Thursday announced that it has proposed changes to a bill currently before parliament to amend the Zimbabwean constitution . The Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) said that Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa presented a report to the politburo on the proposed changes, but it did not elaborate on [...]

The New Jersey Supreme Court dismissed a class action lawsuit filed against pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. Thursday, reversing a lower court's decision to grant nationwide class certification in the case. The lawsuit, filed by the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 68 Welfare Fund on behalf of various insurers and health-maintenance organizations, was one [...]

Issuing National Security Letters (NSLs) demanding private information and imposing gag orders on recipients under the reauthorized and revised USA Patriot Act is unconstitutional without judicial review, US District Judge Victor Marrero of the Southern District of New York ruled Thursday. In September 2004, a federal judge struck down as unreasonable search and seizure the [...]

"Indiscriminate airstrikes" by Israel were responsible for the majority of civilian casualties during the summer 2006 Lebanon conflict , according to a 249-page report issued Thursday by Human Rights Watch (HRW) . HRW investigated about 500 of the reported 900 civilian deaths. Its report specifically refutes Israeli assertions that civilian casualties were due to Hezbollah [...]

Fiji's military commander and self-declared interim Prime Minister Voreqe "Frank" Bainimarama announced in a radio broadcast Thursday that a state of emergency will be imposed in Fiji for the next month. Bainimarama said the emergency measures will not have a major effect on citizens and were enacted in response to the return of exiled former [...]

The US Department of Defense said Thursday that 16 Guantanamo Bay detainees have been transferred to their home country of Saudi Arabia . Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul-Aziz welcomed the release of detainees, and said he was hopeful that all Saudi detainees currently in custody at Guantanamo Bay would be returned to the [...]