The truth commission established by Indonesia and East Timor to investigate the 1999 violence in East Timor that left 1,400 dead met for the first time on Thursday. The commission was set up earlier this year as part of an attempt by Indonesia to avoid an international tribunal that might prosecute the pro-Jakarta militias and [...]

Supreme Court nominee Judge John Roberts helped gay rights activists win a key Supreme Court battle in the 1996 Romer v. Evans case while doing pro bono work at Hogan and Hartson . While Roberts didn't write a brief or argue before the Supreme Court, several lawyers involved with the case said he was "instrumental" [...]

The last four files of the Alabama Legislative Commission to Preserve the Peace were released to the public this week by Alabama state archivists . The segregation-era state agency secretly monitored the activities of a range of groups from civil rights workers to interracial couples to suspected communists. Sam Webb, a history professor at University [...]

After originally allowing a two-day delay for inspections , Iran has now announced that it will push back its plans to resume uranium enrichment until "early next week" to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to install surveillence equipment. The UN had requested that Iran not resume uranium conversion until a UN agency could set [...]

Italian anti-terror magistrate Pietro Saviotti said Thursday that an extradition hearing has been scheduled for August 17 for Hamdi Issac, a suspect in the failed July 21 London bombing attacks , who was apprehended in Rome last week . Issac, an Ethiopian, was living in the UK under the name Osman Hussain and initially claimed [...]

A panel of judges in Argentina on Wednesday removed a judge from office for bribing a witness to a car bomb attack. The 1994 bombing leveled the seven-story Argentine Israeli Mutual Aid Association , killing 85 and wounding over 200. Five police officers charged with supplying vehicles to the bombers were acquitted last September, and [...]

Martha Stewart agreed on Wednesday to a three-week extension of her home confinement as part of her sentence for lying about a stock sale . Neither Stewart's lawyers or government officials gave a reason for the extension. The New York Post reported Sunday that she had been seen riding in an off-road vehicle on her [...]

Leading Wednesday's corporations and securities law news, Christopher Cox was sworn in as the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission . Cox, who became the 28th chairman of the SEC, took the oath of office from Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan. The SEC said in a press release that Cox's duties will officially begin [...]

Torture and Secret Detention: Testimony of the "Disappeared" in the "War on Terror," Amnesty International, August 3, 2005 . Excerpt: On 20 June 2005, Amnesty International delegates visited two Yemeni detainees said to have recently been transferred from the US detention facility at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. However, their accounts described another US detention regime [...]

Doe and Rabago v. Kamehameha Schools, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, August 2, 2005 . Excerpt: e agree with Doe and find that the Schools' admissions policy, which operates in practice as an absolute bar to admission for those of the non-preferred race, constitutes unlawful race discrimination in violation of § [...]