British MPs voted Tuesday by an overwhelming margin to ban smoking in all public enclosed spaces beginning in the summer of 2007. Prime Minister Tony Blair , Chancellor Gordon Brown , and Home Secretary Charles Clark were the among the Labor MPs who voted for a full ban instead of the limited version of the [...]

US senators late Tuesday failed to overcome an objection effectively killing a bill designed to avoid costly asbestos litigation by creating a special fund to compensate asbestos victims . The objection, raised by Senator John Ensign (R-NV) and supported by fiscal conservatives , invoked a budgetary rule barring legislation that would up US government spending [...]

US Rep. Christopher Shays (R-CT) , chairman of the national security subcommittee of the House Government Reform Committee, said Tuesday that changes in whistleblower laws are needed to provide better protection for whistleblowers in the national security area. The remarks made during a subcommittee hearing in which whistleblowers Spc. Samuel Provance , Russ Tice, Lt. [...]

Human Rights Watch has accused Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni of "playing dirty tricks" to intimidate voters in the upcoming elections on Feb. 23. Principal opposition leader Kizza Besigye is facing criminal charges in civil and military courts for treason, rape and terrorism. In a new report , HRW claims that military personnel in Northern Uganda [...]

Leading Tuesday's environmental law news, the US Fish and Wildlife Service has reopened the public comment period on its original 1999 proposal to remove the bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) from the federal list of threatened and endangered species . The bald eagle is often cited as an example of the success of the Endangered Species [...]

The Massachusetts Board of Pharmacy on Tuesday ordered the state's 44 Wal-Marts and 4 Sam's Club stores to carry emergency contraception pills at their pharmacies. Previously Wal-Mart only carried the "morning after" pill in Illinois, a requirement of state law. Wal-Mart was sued earlier this month by three women alleging the retail giant was in [...]

South Dakota governor Mike Rounds has signed into law a bill limiting protests during funerals. SB 156 was passed in response to recent picketing at the funerals of US soldiers who died in Iraq, and will ban protests within 1,000 feet of a funeral from one hour before until four hours after the ceremony. The [...]

Former Nepal prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba was released from prison Tuesday in the wake of Monday's ruling by the Nepal Supreme Court declaring the Royal Commission for Corruption Control (RCCC) set up by Nepal's King Gyanendra unconstitutional . The former Prime Minister was arrested last July, found guilty of corruption and given a two [...]

A UK parliamentary report released Tuesday concludes that British control orders confining and/or regulating the conduct of suspected terrorists who cannot be prosecuted in courts may violate the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) . Eighteen control orders have so far been issued by UK Home Secretary Charles Clarke since the Prevention of Terrorism Act [...]

US Vice President Dick Cheney has received a citation for breaking a Texas hunting law by not having the proper stamp giving him permission to shoot quail. The warning was issued by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department after hearing news that the Vice President shot fellow hunter and Republican lawyer Harry Whittington over the [...]