A senior Islamic judge ruled on Wednesday that Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat's life support system must not be switched off. Arafat is currently clinging to life in a Paris hospital. Burial preparations have already begun. Sheikh Taysir Tamimi, chief Palestinian religious judge, arrived in Paris to rule on the treatment of Arafat. Sheikh Tamimi said [...]

The WTO sided with the island nation of Antigua and Barbuda, ruling that US legislation that criminalizes online gambling is in violation of global trade law. In a 287-page report released Wednesday, the WTO concluded that the US inconsistently applied gaming law so as to prejudice foreign countries, in violation of the General Agreement on [...]

In Wednesday's corporations and securities law news, Martha Stewart Omnimedia Inc. announced Martha Stewart has asked the company to reimburse her for $3.7 million in legal bills. Stewart, who is currently appealing her conviction for lying to investigators about a stock sale, is serving five-month prison sentence in West Virginia. Paper Chase has continuing coverage [...]

Judge Alfred Delucchi dismissed a juror in the Scott Peterson double-murder trial on Tuesday night over signs of misconduct. Frances Gorman, 58, was dismissed amid reports that she had conducted an independent investigation of the case. The jury, which had been deliberating since November 3, will now have to start over with an alternate juror [...]

AP is reporting that White House sources have said that President Bush will select White House counsel Alberto Gonzales to succeed John Ashcroft as US attorney general. Read the official biography on Gonzales. JURIST's Paper Chase has more coverage on Gonzales. 11:53 AM ET – The Washington Post has this profile on Gonzales. 12:00 PM [...]

The Bosnian Serb government apologized for the first time Wednesday to family members and friends of the roughly 8,000 Muslims killed in the Srebrenica massacre in 1995. The government issued a statement in which it said it "sympathizes with the pain of relatives of the Srebrenica victims and expresses sincere regrets and apologies over the [...]

The Scottish Executive Wednesday unanimously approved a ban on smoking in enclosed public places. Anti-tobacco and medical groups had urged the ban, claiming that voluntary measures currently in place were ineffective. Similar to those already adopted in Ireland, Norway and parts of the US, the ban will be enforced by environmental health officers, and violations [...]

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Environmental Protection Agency seeking to force the agency to take action on nitrogen entering the bay and harming animals. According to the environmental group, nitrogen entering the watershed from a variety of sources, such as manure runoff from farms and sewage plants, creates huge algae [...]

The late Tuesday announcement of Attorney General John Ashcroft's resignation (previously reported in JURIST's Paper Chase) prompted differing responses Tuesday and Wednesday from interest groups and lawmakers around the country, reflecting a sometimes divisive reign as the country's top law enforcement official. The conservative American Center for Law and Justice praised Ashcroft for providing "exceptional [...]

Sudanese police raided the El-Geer refugee camp near Nyala Wednesday morning, just one day after the signing of a peace accord between the government and rebel forces. The assault took place in front of African Union officials present to monitor the humanitarian conditions of the camp and only hours before official UN inspectors arrived to [...]