Author: JURIST – Paper Chase

[JURIST] The Internet has experienced a 20 percent increase in militant and hate content over the past year, according to a report released on Monday by the Simon Wiesenthal Center for Tolerance. The report, titled “Digital Terrorism and Hate 2010,” cites to the low levels of regulation of Internet content as one of the enabling conditions of the increase. The increase is most prevalent in social networking sites and personal blogs. The report also singles out some examples of websites whose creators went on to carry out terrorist or hate crimes, and warned that content found online not only incited, but also detailed how to carry out such crimes.
The US State Department 2010 annual rights report released last week decries Internet censorship abroad. In August, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) reported that right-wing nativist and so-called “patriot” anti-government militias are again on the rise in the US. The SPLC said that such groups, which had declined severely since the 1990s, are generally anti-tax, anti-immigration, and increasingly racially motivated since the election of the country’s first African-American president, Barack Obama.

[JURIST] The trial of 14 members of a neo-Nazi group, Nomad 88, opened Monday before the criminal court of Evry, in the Parisian suburbs. Founded in 2008 to “purge” the suburbs, the group gained public attention in May 2008 when three members went on a shooting spree in an area with a strong population of immigrant origin. Following their arrest, the police seized a haul of weapons, including machine guns, along with a large quantity of ammunition and extremist literature. During the hearing, one of the defendants claimed they wanted to “clear out” the “no-go” areas in the suburbs. The trial is expected to last through Friday.
Nomad 88 formed as a result of the 2005 civil unrest, when tension between the police and the youths of the suburbs was at its height, leading the government to decree that the country was in a state of emergency. Though extremist far-right groups represent only a fringe movement, the phenomenon is considered worrying because they operate in semi-clandestinity, and subsist despite efforts to clamp down on them.

[JURIST] Vietnamese authorities on Monday released a Catholic priest and leading rights activist from Hanoi prison. Father Nguyen Van Ly was released early Monday morning and has been reunited with his family in Hue. Ly had been arrested and charged in 2007 under Article 88 of Vietnam’s Penal Code, which provides for the incarceration of individuals involved in “conducting propaganda against the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.” Ly was sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment for distributing anti-government documents and communicating with foreign pro-democracy activists. He suffered two strokes in 2009 that left him partially paralyzed. Calls for Ly’s release included a June 2009 letter from 37 US senators addressed to President Nguyen Minh Triet. Ly is known as one of the founders of Vietnamese pro-democracy movement Bloc 8406. Ly’s international counsel Freedom Now has praised him as a “prisoner of conscience”.
Ly’s release comes days after the release of leading Vietnamese rights lawyer Le Thi Cong Nhan. No clear connection has been identified between the two incidents, but the releases happen in the midst of what some rights groups such as Human Rights Watch have termed a “campaign to silence dissent.” At least 16 activists have been jailed in the last few months. Despite the releases of Ly and Nhan, other high-profile activists, such as human rights lawyer Nguyen Van Dai, are still serving sentences.

[JURIST] UN Special Rapporteur for North Korea Vitit Muntarbhorn said Monday that the North Korean human rights situation is continuing to deteriorate. Presenting his report to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), Muntarbhorn noted that any attempt to halt human rights violations in North Korea would require Security Council (SC) action. The rapporteur also said he has not been admitted to North Korea and has thus relied on reports from UN agencies, concerned rights groups, and refugees in making his assessment. Muntarbhorn also stated that sanctions imposed on North Korea in an effort to promote denuclearization have fallen short of improving the country’s human rights situation. North Korean diplomat Choe Myong Nam rejected the special rapporteur’s allegations.
In October, Muntarbhorn criticized North Korea for human rights violations. Muntarbhorn said that North Korea was responsible for a broad range of human rights violations, including torture, public executions, and widespread hunger. In March 2009, Muntarbhorn told the UNHRC that he found egregious human rights violations in North Korea. In October 2008, Muntarbhorn urged North Korea to improve its treatment of prisoners and unsuccessful defectors, as well as to cooperate in locating kidnapped foreign citizens. In January 2008, Muntarbhorn made similar comments during his visit with a special UN envoy to Japan to assess the impact of the North Korean rights situation on that country. North Korea has frequently been accused of human trafficking, press repression, and “actively committing crimes against humanity”.

[JURIST] The Irish Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Dermot Ahern, on Sunday proposed holding a referendum later this year to remove the criminal offense of blasphemy from the Irish Constitution. Blasphemy is a punishable offense under section 40 of the constitution, but the language of the text had been deemed too vague to hold any prosecutions. Ireland’s Defamation Act of 2009, which went into effect in January, redefined blasphemy as publishing or uttering “matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion” and imposed a penalty of a fine of up to 25,000 euros for those convicted. The Irish public has been very critical of the controversial law. Earlier this year, advocacy group Atheist Ireland publicly challenged the law on their website by posting 25 potentially blasphemous statements from both religious and public figures. The group praised Ahern’s proposed referendum:
We reiterate our position that this law is both silly and dangerous: silly because it is introducing medieval canon law offence into a modern plularist republic; and dangerous because it incentives religious outrage and because its wording has already been adopted by Islamic States as part of their campaign to make blasphemy a crime internationally.Ahern has stated that he only saw the Defamation Act as a short-term solution and that he was under his constitutional duty in reforming the old blasphemy law. Blasphemy laws have been a controversial issue in several countries. Last month, a Pakistani government official told the Agence France-Presse that the country would begin to revise its blasphemy laws later this year. Pakistan currently punishes blasphemy against Islam by death, but no one has yet been executed for the offense. Last year, the death sentence of Afghan journalism student Sayad Parwaz Kambaksh for blasphemy was reduced to 20 years’ imprisonment by an Afghan appeals court. Kambaksh was sentenced to death for distributing papers questioning gender roles under Islam. In 2008, the UK House of Lords voted to abolish the criminal offenses of blasphemy and blasphemous libel from the UK common law.

[JURIST] The former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka on Monday criticized the government’s treatment of detained opposition leader General Sarath Fonseka. Sarath Nanda Silva, who retired from the Sri Lankan Supreme Court last year, accused the government of using the military justice system to prevent Fonseka from participating in the upcoming elections scheduled for April 8, and of violating Fonseka’s civil rights. Silva’s charge implicates Fonseka’s presence in the military, rather than civilian system, which he says provides no recourse for Fonseka. Silva also said that Fonseka’s arrest was made in violation of the country’s constitution. The military has charged Fonseka with mixing politics with the military, and improperly awarding procurement contracts. Fonseka’s court-martial hearing begins on Tuesday. Fonseka is also scheduled for a hearing before the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka on April 26, where he will challenge his detention.
Also Monday, Sri Lanka criticized a US State Department report, released last week, which accused Sri Lanka of violating its citizens’ civil rights. Last month, the Sri Lankan Supreme Court rejected a petition to release Fonseka, who was taken into custody in early February. Also in February, Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who defeated Fonseka in the January election, dissolved parliament and called for early parliamentary elections in an attempt to harness momentum from his victory to gain more seats in parliament for his political party, Freedom Alliance. The Sri Lankan Supreme Court ruled last month that Rajapaksa’s second term will begin in November. Fonseka has disputed the election results, citing vote counting irregularities and violence.

[JURIST] The US military on Monday transferred Camp Taji, one of the two remaining detention facilities under US control, to Iraqi authorities. Located approximately 25 kilometers north of Baghdad, Taji currently houses about 2,900 detainees held on arrest warrants, detention orders, or as convicted prisoners. About 100 detainees will remain in US custody. During the ceremony transferring Camp Taji, Brigadier General David Quantock, United States Forces-Iraq deputy commanding general for detainee operations, praised the Iraqi staff currently running the facility. Quantock added that Camp Cropper, the only remaining US-run detention facility, would be transferred to Iraqi control on July 15.
The US began to scale back its Iraq detention facilities in September when Camp Bucca in Southern Iraq was closed pursuant to the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA). According to the agreement, all US troops must be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of 2011, and the US must release all prisoners or transfer them to the control of Iraqi authorities. The Iraqi government must have arrest warrants or detention orders to accept transferred prisoners into Iraqi facilities, otherwise risking release. In anticipation of prisoner releases and transfers, the US opened a new facility in February to train Iraqi corrections officers. A fourth US-run prison, Abu Ghraib, was transferred back to Iraqi control in 2006 following the release of photographs depicting prisoner abuse by US military personnel.

[JURIST] The Chinese National People’s Congress (NPC) on Sunday approved an amendment to the electoral law mandating equal representation for rural and urban citizens. The electoral reform was adopted at the close of the Third Session of the Eleventh National People’s Congress and was hailed by the People’s Daily, a publication of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, as having a “great significance to the improvement of the people’s congress system and the development of the socialist democracy, as it could better demonstrate equality among people, regions and ethnic groups.” The electoral reform also bans family members of candidates from acting as ballot counters and has been described as key to equal rights by government officials. The NPC on Sunday also approved the Government Work Report, which predicts an 8 percent increase in GDP for 2010, along with the 2010 budget, including a 7.5 percent increase in defense spending over last year, and the work reports of the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate.
The electoral reforms were first proposed at the start of the annual session last Monday. China’s prior electoral law provided four times as many congressional representatives to residents of urban districts than residents of rural ones. This ratio was an improvement over the previous one that had been in place since 1953, which provided eight times as many representatives for urban districts over rural ones. Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee Wang Zhaoguo explained the need for the reform at the beginning of the session by pointing to the growth of the Chinese urban population since the last reform, which has grown from 13 percent in 1953 to nearly 30 percent in 1995, and in 2009 was nearing 50 percent. Despite reforms, China continues to face international criticism over human rights issues. China’s human rights record was criticized in the US annual rights report for its repression of Tibetan and Uighur minorities, prompting Chinese criticism of the US rights record on issues of crime, racial discrimination, and poverty. China has also received criticism for its treatment of rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng, who was last seen in public on February 4, 2009.

[JURIST] Egypt’s Supreme Constitutional Court ruled Sunday that female judges can serve on the State Council (Maglis id-Dowla), an administrative court system with jurisdiction over cases involving the state. In its ruling, the court emphasized the equality of all citizens. Last month, the general assembly of the State Council voted to bar the appointment of female judges to the court. The council’s supervisory committee later overruled that bar, which led Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif to ask the Supreme Court to rule on the issue. Sunday’s ruling stated that the general assembly did not have the authority to determine who can serve on the court and that only the supervisory committee can approve new judges. The supervisory committee is expected to review the issue later this month.
Last month, Human Rights Watch (HRW) condemned the general assembly’s vote and argued that all judicial positions should be open to women. In 2007, 31 Egyptian women were selected as judges by Egypt’s Supreme Judicial Council, and later appointed by presidential decree despite ongoing resistance from the nation’s conservatives. Council chief Mukbil Shakir selected the judges from a pool of state prosecutors who had passed a test for the positions. The move marked the first time in Egypt’s history that women were named to preside over criminal or civil cases. In 2003, Tahany el-Gebaly became the nation’s first female judge as a member of the Egyptian constitutional tribunal.

[JURIST] Italy’s highest administrative court, the State Council, announced Saturday that it would not restore a candidate list from the ruling coalition of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. The candidate list for the region of Lazio was submitted late and contained People of Freedom party candidates for regional elections scheduled to be held at the end of this month. Lazio is the central province of Italy and includes Rome. The State Council’s decision flies in the face of an emergency government measure instituted earlier this month to ensure that the list would be validated.
Earlier this month, the Italian Senate approved a bill allowing cabinet ministers, including Berlusconi to postpone criminal proceedings against them on the grounds that they would interfere with official duties. Critics contend that the legislation is specifically designed to protect Berlusconi from the prosecutions he faces. In January, hundreds of Italy’s judges walked out of their courtrooms to protest the passage of legislation that placed strict time limits on the trial and appeals process. That bill was also criticized as being tailored for Berlusconi’s benefit and would result in the automatic dismissal of two pending cases against him. Berlusconi was previously acquitted of false accounting and bribery, and has had other charges against him dropped.

[JURIST] In a telephone conversation Saturday, US President Barack Obama and Russia President Dmitry Medvedev approved of progress towards the first nuclear weapons reduction treaty since 1991. Wrapping up talks on the treaty to replace the recently expired Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I Treaty), Obama and Medvedev reviewed the negotiations, agreed to provide additional guidance to delegations, and discussed plans for bilateral contacts. The landmark treaty will include significant reductions in both the number of deployed nuclear weapons as well as the number of nuclear-delivery systems. Although a no time frame was given, the Kremlin says the conversation opened the possibility for setting a firm date for signing. White House National Security Council spokesperson Mike Hammer described the talks as encouraging, saying that both Obama and Medvedev are committed to reaching an agreement soon. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is scheduled to visit Moscow on Thursday and Friday where she will discuss START with Russia Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov.
Both US and Russia officials have recently expressed a desire to have the treaty in place prior to the upcoming Global Nuclear Security Summit in April, and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference in May. Last month, US Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller went to Paris to finalize the treaty after Obama and Medvedev reached an in-principle agreement. In January, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that nuclear arms reduction negotiations with the US were likely to resume in early February. Nuclear disarmament between the US and Russia, whose nuclear arsenals comprise 95 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons, languished during the Bush administration. The treaty is considered a key part of easing tensions between the former Cold War rivals, which reached their worst point after the 2008 Georgia conflict. Advocacy groups, including the Arms Control Association, support the treaty for not only limiting the number of nuclear weapons, but for also providing methods for each side to moderator the other. The US and Russia began nuclear disarmament talks last April and originally set a deadline for December, when START I expired. Last July, Obama and Medvedev agreed to tentative terms for the treaty.

[JURIST] Spokesperson for Serbia’s Office of the War Crimes Prosecutor Bruno Vekaric Saturday announced the arrest of nine individuals suspected of committing war crimes during the 1998-1999 Kosovo war. The nine, members of the Serbian paramilitary group Sakali, are accused of the systematic murders of 41 ethnic Albanians in May 1999. In all, roughly 200 civilians residing in and around the village of Cuska are believed to have been killed by these and 15 other suspects. Those in custody are scheduled to appear before an investigative judge.
In June, Amnesty International (AI) marked the 10-year anniversary of the conflict’s end by reporting that many human rights abuses that occurred during the war in Kosovo have gone uninvestigated and unpunished. Prosecutors have nonetheless secured several convictions. A week after AI’s report, a Serbian court convicted four former paramilitary officers of killing 14 Albanians in northern Kosovo. In April, four Serbian ex-policemen were convicted of killing of 48 Albanian civilians in Suva Reka. In October 2008, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina sentenced ex-policeman Vaso Todorovic to six years in prison for the capture and detention of 40,000 Bosnian Muslims in 1995. Earlier that month, four Bosnian Serbs were arrested for the killing of 200 civilians in Koricanske Stijene.

[JURIST] Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu Saturday jointly denounced the Swedish Parliament’s Thursday passage of a resolution recognizing the Ottoman Empire’s killing of Armenians between 1915 and 1923 as genocide. At a meeting of European foreign ministers in northern Finland Davutoglu questioned the rationale of the move, one that Bildt characterized as the “politicization of history.” Davutoglu insisted that his country would not succumb to political pressure. Both ministers noted concerns that the resolution would undermine the progress that Armenia and Turkey have made toward stabilizing their relations.
The Swedish Parliament adopted the resolution by a vote of 131-130, prompting Turkey to recall its ambassador from Stockholm and cancel official events in Sweden. The Swedish resolution came only a week after the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs voted 23-22 to adopt a resolution labeling the killings as genocide. The US government has indicated that it will seek to block the resolution from being put before the full House of Representatives. A similar resolution was passed by the committee in 2007, but it never reached the House floor.

[JURIST] The Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) war crimes court indicted the former Serb commander of a special police brigade Saturday for his alleged role in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre during the Bosnian civil war. The BiH prosecutor accuses Nedjo Ikonic of participating in the killing of thousands of Muslim men and boys including more than one thousand who escaped Srebinaca but were detained in a warehouse in the nearby village of Kravice. Ikonic was extradited to BiH in January after he was arrested on an international arrest warrant. Three other former Bosnian Serb policemen have been indicted on charges of genocide for their alleged roles massacre.
The BiH war crimes court was set up in 2005 to relieve the caseload of the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and is authorized to try lower-level war crime suspects. The court delivered its first sentences against war crimes suspects from Yugoslavia’s violent ethnic conflicts of the 1990s in July 2008, convicting seven of genocide for their involvement in killings committed at the Srebrenica prison camp. The ICTY retains jurisdiction over high-level war crimes allegations, such as those against Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and General Ratko Mladic.

[JURIST] A court of first instance in Marseilles Friday ordered that anti-Islamic campaign posters put up by the far-right National Front be taken down. The posters, proclaiming “No to Islamism”, depict a fully veiled woman standing next to a map of France with the pattern of the Algerian flag on it, and are directly inspired by Swiss posters deployed during the referendum on minarets. The court held them to constitute an unlawful disturbance of public order. In a press release, the party denounced the decision as “a serious violation of the freedom of opinion and of speech during an election period” and said it will appeal against it. The Algerian government had issued a complaint about the posters Monday.
The National Front drew international attention in 2002 when party leader Jean-Marie Le Pen came second in the first run of the presidential elections. From 2002 to 2006 the party was the third largest one in the country, and is expected to come fourth in the regional elections.

[JURIST] The California Orange County District Attorney (OCDA) filed a consumer protection suit against car manufacturer Toyota on Friday, alleging that the company knowingly sold vehicles with acceleration defects. The suit seeks up to $2,500 in penalties for each violation of California’s Unfair Business Practices Act. The OCDA outlined the case against Toyota, saying it
…intends to prove the following in the litigation: Despite knowledge of the defects, Toyota continues to sell and lease its cars and trucks while knowingly concealing and suppressing information about the defects from consumers. Since 2001, Toyota is accused of falsely representing to the public that Toyota-manufactured vehicles are safe and reliable. Toyota continues to conceal from consumers that their vehicles cause sudden, uncontrollable acceleration when drivers are not touching the accelerator and attempt to use their brakes.In response to the OCDA announcement, Toyota said that it had not yet received the formal complaint and would not comment on pending litigation. The OCDA suit is the first consumer protection action brought against Toyota by a US district attorney; numerous individuals, however, have already brought suits against the Japanese automaker seeking compensation for damages and injuries. In a recent JURIST op-ed, law professor Bruce Aronson noted that Toyota’s traditional governing structure contrasts with the typical American model and suggested that in light of its current manufacturing and public relations crisis, Toyota consider changing its corporate structure to give its board of directors more oversight power.

[JURIST] Three special masters sitting in the US Federal Court of Claims Friday rejected three compensation actions brought in a coordinated omnibus proceeding by families of autistic children who had argued that their children’s autism was induced by vaccines containing mercury-laden thimerosol. The families had sought compensation under the no-fault National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Special Master Patricia Campbell-Smith wrote that her petitioners had not “presented a scientifically sound theory”, citing evidence that it was “biologically implausible.” In February special masters in the same court rejected arguments made in three other test cases against the US Department of Health and Human Services by families alleging that their children’s autism was caused by a combination of common childhood vaccines.
Thimerosal, a mercury-based preservative, has been at the center of several health debates. In 2005, HHS officials said that state laws prohibiting thimerosal could impede efforts to fight an avian flu pandemic should an outbreak occur. Most doctors believe thimerosal is safe, saying it does not affect the body in the same manner as mercury found in pollutants, but several groups claim that use of the preservative can be linked to neurological diseases including autism. Creation of mercury-free vaccines requires packaging individual doses, which is expected to pose a major problem if large batches of the vaccine need to be rushed in the event of an avian flu pandemic. Doctors partially attribute recent outbreaks of measles and other infectious diseases in the US to an increasing reluctance among parents to expose children to vaccines.

[JURIST] UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar Tomás Ojea Quintana released a report Friday castigating the government of Myanmar for long-standing human rights abuses and said some of those might qualify as war crimes prosecutable by the International Criminal Court in The Hague. Quintana observed:there is a pattern of gross and systematic violation of human rights which has been in place for many years and still continues. The human rights that are part of this pattern are broad ranging and include the rights to life, to liberty, to personal integrity, to freedom of expression, assembly and religion, to judicial remedy and due process of law, to nationality, to protection of civilians and internally displaced communities and to prohibition against discrimination, among others.
Given the gross and systematic nature of human rights violations in Myanmar over a period of many years, and the lack of accountability, there is an indication that those human rights violations are the result of a State policy that involves authorities in the executive, military and judiciary at all levels. According to consistent reports, the possibility exists that some of these human rights violations may entail categories of crimes against humanity or war crimes under the terms of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.Myanmar is expected to hold elections in October. Myanmar has a long history of human rights abuses. The UN released a report Thursday stating that the elections expected in October will not meet international standards of fairness. Earlier this week, the military junta enacted five laws to govern the upcoming election and has been publicly announcing them one-at-a-time in state-run newspapers. One of the most notable ramifications of the new laws is that Suu Kyi will be prevented from participating in the election unless she is released from prison. The new law would also prevent Suu Kyi from remaining as the head of the NLD if the party wishes to participate in the election.

[JURIST] Taiwanese Justice Minister Wang Ching-feng resigned Thursday in defense of her position against the death penalty. Though Taiwan has not executed a criminal since 2005, Wang said she would not sign the execution warrants of any of the 44 prisoners still on death row. Her resignation was sparked by possible criticism of her position by the office of Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou, a member of her own Kuomintang party. Three-fourths of Taiwanese citizens favor the death penalty. Taiwanese Premier Wu Den-yih has already appointed a replacement.
In February, UN Under-Secretary-General Sergei Ordzhonikidze praised the increase in the number of countries that have suspended or abolished the death penalty. Speaking at the 4th World Congress Against the Death Penalty in Geneva, Ordzhonikidze expressed hope that countries that have not abolished the death penalty would adopt the 2007 UN Resolution 62/149, placing a moratorium on the use of capital punishment.

[JURIST] US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg endorsed a ban on the election of judges at the state and local level on Thursday while speaking at a conference for the National Association of Women Judges. Ginsburg said she supported her former colleague, retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, in her campaign to urge state legislatures to move towards merit-based judicial appointments instead of direct judicial elections. Both women take issue with the fundraising aspect of judicial elections and the campaign promises that are made in order to secure funds. According to the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System (IAALS) there are 33 states that select judges through direct elections. Ginsburg noted in her speech that she dissented from a 2002 decision which stated that no limits could be put on the issues and topics discussed by judicial candidates. She claims that the First Amendment allows “sensible limits” to be put on candidates to ensure the impartiality the distinguishes a judicial office from a political office.
The O’Connor Judicial Selection Initiative (OJSI) came in response to a June 2009 decision by the US Supreme Court that West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals Justice Brent Benjamin violated the due process rights of a civil plaintiff when he did not recuse himself from a case where the defendant was one of his major campaign contributors. The OJSI is urging legislatures to adopt a system similar to one O’Connor helped to introduce in Arizona, where a state commission made up mostly of non-lawyers pick judges, governors appoint judges selected by the commissions, and voters decide in future elections whether the judges stay in office. Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCaffery has called the appointment system elitist and says that elections make him accountable to the citizens of Pennsylvania, rather than the governor or a commission.