Two days after US House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-WI) introduced a bill to make existing provisions of the Patriot Act permanent, Judiciary Committee members Wednesday debated a possible GOP compromise on term lengths for the new provisions. Dan Lungren (R-CA) has proposed renewing two provisions for 10 years instead of permanently: the [...]

Leading Wednesday's international brief, following a statement by military commander Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama , head of Fiji's military forces, that the army "will have no qualms about removing a government that will bring back chaos," Fiji Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase said that the Fiji government would reconsider provisions of the Reconciliation, Tolerance and Unity Bill [...]

Ali al-Timimi , an Islamic scholar from Fairfax, Virginia, was sentenced to life in prison Wednesday after he was convicted of soliciting others to levy war against the US, inducing others to aid the Taliban, and inducing others to use firearms in violation of federal law. He led a group of Virginia men that authorities [...]

European Union Interior and Justice ministers Wednesday voiced support for new security measures proposed at a meeting called in the wake of last Thursday's London bomings. The new rules would require telecommunications companies to retain and allow access to up to year-old communications data . The ministers' meeting is also expected to produce a joint [...]

Former WorldCom CEO Bernard Ebbers was sentenced Wednesday to 25 years in prison. US District Court Judge Barbara Jones handed down the sentence three years after WorldCom collapsed in an $11 billion accounting fraud, losing billions for investors. In March 2005 Ebbers was found guilty of fraud, conspiracy, and filing false documents with regulators. Reuters [...]

Iraq has accepted an offer from the Arab League to lend expertise and support to the committee established to draft the Iraqi constitution . Meanwhile the drafting and consultation process continues as the August 15 deadline for approval approaches. A document that is supposedly a draft of a proposed Bill of Rights has been leaked; [...]

US President George Bush said Wednesday that he will not comment on top aide Karl Rove's involvement in leaking the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame until a federal criminal investigation into the controversy is complete. Bush called it a "serious investigation" and said he would "not prejudge the investigation based on media reports." The [...]

Raed Juhi, a senior judge on the Iraqi Special Tribunal , said Wednesday that the Tribunal's investigations of the case against Saddam Hussein are "more than 80 percent complete". He said the court's investigating judges are not the ones to set a trial date, but according to a source a five-judge panel will set a [...]

Argentine newspaper La Nacion reported Wednesday that Argentina has taken formal responsibility for its failure to discover who was behind the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires that killed 86 people and that Argentine President Nestor Kirchner has admitted that previous administrations tried to downplay the failures in the investigation. Kirchner added [...]

Texas District Judge Robert Perkins Tuesday reaffirmed an indictment for violations of a state law regarding corporate campaign contributions against an ally of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX). John Colyandro, executive director of Texans for a Republican Majority , was indicted last September on charges of illegally collecting campaign money. The court rejected defense [...]