US to release 50 Iraq detainees daily during Ramadan News
US to release 50 Iraq detainees daily during Ramadan

[JURIST] US forces in Iraq [JURIST news archive] will release 50 Iraqi detainees per day during the Muslim religious month of Ramadan, according to an announcement by Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi Friday. The US military confirmed Hashemi's announcement, saying the military has reached a deal with the vice president to begin releasing detainees [JURIST news archive]. Ramadan begins the second week of September, and the detainee releases could begin sooner.

US forces currently have some 23,000 Iraqi detainees [JURIST report] in custody, while Iraqi security forces have detained an additional 60,000. Both figures mark a sharp rise in the number of detainees from last year. Reuters has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, murdered by Henry II's knights

On December 29, 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by knights acting in the name of Henry II.

Becket and Henry had been entangled in a power struggle over, among other things, criminal jurisdiction over clergy. Read a contemporary account of the murder of Thomas Becket.

Texas attains US statehood

On December 29, 1845, Texas became the twenty-eighth state to join the United States of America when US President James K. Polk signed the Ordinance of Annexation. Texas had a complicated path to statehood because it had formerly been part of Mexico and then an independent republic. The US Congress passed the Annexation of the Republic of Texas Joint Resolution on March 1, 1845. Voters in Texas then approved the Ordinance of Annexation in October, before it was approved by the US Congress and signed into law by President Polk on this day in 1845. The US Supreme Court later ruled in Texas v. White that, despite its unique path to statehood, Texas did not have the right to secede from the union.