UK Home Secretary Charles Clarke has rejected criticisms by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour that Britain's proposed anti-terrorism bill violates basic rights and sets a "worrying precedent." Arbour sent a letter to the British government in November saying that several of the bill's clauses may violate the country's obligations under international human [...]

Peru's National Election Council formally announced Tuesday that former president Alberto Fujimori is banned from participating in the April 9 presidential election. The council's decision came after Fujimori registered as a presidential candidate , despite a Peruvian Constitutional Court decision last October to bar Fujimori from running for office until 2010. Fujimori fled to Japan [...]

The lower chamber of Russia's parliament, the Russian State Duma , approved a bill Tuesday mandating stricter controls on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that could dissolve many of the present NGOs that openly criticize the government. The measure passed by a margin of 357-20 in the third of three required readings and is expected to be [...]

US Supreme Court nominee Judge Samuel Alito on Tuesday told the Senate Judiciary Committee that he would keep an open mind on the issue of abortion and that the president was not above the law in times of war during the first day of questioning in his confirmation hearings. As expected, senators questioned Alito on [...]

South Korean prosecutors said Tuesday that they will open a criminal investigation into South Korean scientist Hwang Woo-Suk , a day after an investigation concluded that Hwang's acclaimed research on stem cells was fake. Reports suggest that prosecutors could pursue charges of fraud and embezzlement after Hwang won more than $60 million in government funding [...]

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that states have no immunity from private lawsuits under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) if the state has violated the Fourteenth Amendment. In United States v. Georgia , 04-1203, the Court unanimously ruled that where lawsuits for monetary damages were permitted under the ADA, states were not [...]

Two British officials charged with leaking a UK government memo in which President Bush reportedly suggested bombing the offices of Arab satellite news channel Aljazeera will stand trial by the end of the month, the judge in the trial ordered at a hearing Tuesday. Judge Timothy Workman of the UK Central Criminal Court ordered a [...]

The European Court of Justice on Tuesday upheld a law that requires airlines to pay compensation to passengers who experience long flight delays, overbooking and cancellation on flights to and from the European Union. The International Air Transport Association and the European Low Fares Airline Association had challenged the EU regulation, arguing the law was [...]

US District Judge Sim Lake on Monday refused to dismiss the criminal case against former Enron founder Kenneth Lay and former CEO Jeffrey Skilling Chronicle profile], saying that the defense had failed to prove that there was "deliberate, systematic prosecutorial misconduct" that has interfered with the defendants' efforts to prepare for trial. Lay and Skilling [...]

Judges who serve on the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) met with officials from the Department of Justice Monday for a closed-door briefing on the president's decision to allow warrantless domestic eavesdropping . While members of the court declined to comment on the meeting, the judges were expected to voice strong concerns about the [...]