Opposition and civil rights groups in Kenya have called for three days of protests leading up to Friday's deadline for a proposed constitution, despite a ban on a planned protest march. The opposition accuses Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and his government of diluting cross-party recommendations for re-writing the constitution and, primarily, failing in the latest [...]

Vietnamese officials said Tuesday that Vietnam will make its court decisions public for the first time to increase transparency as it seeks to comply with requirements for joining the World Trade Organization . Vietnam's Supreme People's Court has already published two volumes of civil, criminal, commercial, labor and administrative cases issued in 2003 and 2004 [...]

After his conviction for torture and hostage-taking Monday, Afghan warlord Faryadi Sarwar Zardad was sentenced Tuesday by a UK court to two concurrent 20-year prison terms. The jury sitting at London's Old Bailey found Zardad guilty after hearing the vicious examples of hostage-taking that Zardad oversaw or directed between 1992 and 1996. Zardad, whose first [...]

Press statement on resumption of military commissions, US Department of Defense, July 18, 2005 . Excerpt: The Office of Military Commissions intends to take the following additional actions this week: Move forward with commission proceedings against Yemeni detainee Ali Hamza Ahmad Sulayman al Bahlul and Sudanese detainee Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi. Each of these [...]

Maurice Strong , a special adviser for North Korea to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and a prominent Canadian business executive, will not continue his position as top UN envoy to North Korea, according to UN officials. In recent months, Strong has been implicated in the Iraq oil-for-food scandal based on his ties to South [...]

The National Rifle Association Monday announced plans to relocate its 2007 national convention from Columbus, Ohio after the Columbus City Council approved an assualt weapons ban. The ban , extends the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which expired on September 13, 2004 , and outlaws 19 types of military-style assault weapons in the city. In a [...]

The Lebanese parliament voted Monday to grant amnesty to former militia leader Samir Geagea . Geagea, Lebanese Forces militia leader during the 1975-90 civil war, was arrested in 1994 and sentenced to three consecutive life terms for his involvement in crimes during Lebanon's civil war, including the murder of a prime minister. Lebanese President Emile [...]

US officials at Guantanamo Bay Monday extradited Moroccan Lahcen Ikassrien to Spain to answer charges that he assisted al-Qaida cell leader Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas in planning the September 11 attacks. Ikassrien was arrested and sent to the prisoner camp in late 2001. Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon first petitioned the US to extradite Ikassrien, later [...]

Leading Monday's securities and corporations law news, the SEC has charged three men with conning investors in a microcap scam. The scam involved sending faxes that were designed to look like a confidential stock tip from a financial planner to a client. In a press release, the SEC said that in 2 separate scams the [...]

Leading Monday's states brief, the California Supreme Court ruled today that a boss's sexual affairs with subordinates may result in the sexual harassment of other employees in violation of the state's Fair Employment and Housing Act . In the case, two former state prison employees alleged that the warden was having affairs with several women [...]