Search Results for: 2009-02-06

Under President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s leadership, the Sri Lankan civil war reached a brutal conclusion on May 18, 2009, ending a 25-year-long conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a separatist rebel group. Rooted in longstanding grievances, including discriminatory policies against Sri Lanka’s Tamil minority, the conflict saw the [...]

Publisher and activist Julian Assange appealed to London’s High Court this week in a last-ditch effort to avoid extradition to the US to face espionage charges. Following the hearing which spanned Tuesday and Wednesday, judges will consider whether Assange can appeal an earlier ruling ordering his extradition from the UK to the US, where he [...]

A group of Gabonese soldiers announced on public television Wednesday that they had seized control of the country and canceled the results of its 2023 presidential election, just after incumbent President Ali Bongo was declared the winner amid claims of electoral fraud. The soldiers, part of the newly formed Committee for the Transition and Restoration [...]

Niger Foreign Minister Massoumi Massoudou told France 24 on Thursday that the administration is attempting mediation with members of Niger’s military who conducted a coup of President Mohamed Bazoum’s administration. His statement comes only hours after Niger’s military announced they supported the coup carried out by military members of Bazoum’s elite guard on Wednesday. Colonel [...]

After a meeting Thursday morning, the US Senate Judiciary Committee advanced a bill that proposes ethics reforms for the Supreme Court, which has recently faced a series of scandals involving Justices Clarence Thomas, Sonia Sotomayor and Samuel Alito. Bill S 359—also known as the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency Act—passed out of the Democratic-controlled [...]

July 17 is the Day of International Criminal Justice. This year it also marks 25 years since the adoption of the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court (ICC). ICC member countries will gather today at the United Nations headquarters in New York City to discuss strengthening political and practical support for [...]

Pakistan’s transgender community finds itself embroiled in an ongoing struggle for inclusion, facing a recent setback with a verdict from the Federal Shariat Court (FSC). Transgender activists in Pakistan have appealed the judgement of the Federal Shariat Court (“FSC”), which adjudicates based on the tenets of Islam, to the Supreme Court (“SC”). As many as [...]

JURIST Features Editor Ingrid Burke Friedman talked with Brian Concannon, a human rights lawyer and the executive director of the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti about the ongoing civil unrest in Haiti. Below is a transcript of their conversation, which has been edited for clarity. Could you please tell us more about your [...]

The Russian Federation Thursday announced its withdrawal from the Council of Europe (“the Council”). The country claimed that EU and NATO countries are using their absolute majority to continue to destroy the Council, of which Russia will no longer will be a part. Russia joined the Council of Europe, a leading human rights organization of [...]

We all recall the famous photo in 1938 of the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain stepping off his plane holding up an agreement with Adolf Hitler that averted a possible conflict with Germany. He gave away the Sudetenland and the political independence of Czechoslovakia to do so. Chamberlain proudly declared “peace in our time.” [...]