The men are part of the "Ocampo Six," and are facing trial [JURIST report] for allegedly inciting violence during and after the December 2007 Kenyan elections. The Ocampo Six include several high-ranking members of Kenya's government, the head of operations at Kass FM [official website] in Nairobi and the son of Kenya's first president, Jomo Kenyatta [Africa Within backgrounder]. Three of the men are members of the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) [party website] and the other three are members of the opposing Party for National Unity (PNU). The ICC summoned the suspects [JURIST report] after determining they would not be charged in Kenya for the alleged crimes. In April, Kenya requested that the ICC dismiss the case [JURIST report], arguing that the government is capable of prosecuting the six men domestically. Lawyers for the Ocampo Six called for the timely release of evidence [JURIST report] against their clients that month as well.

Last month, Syrian political cartoonist Ali Ferzat was found badly beaten [AP report], allegedly by pro-Assad forces. As an apparent message to critics of the Syrian president, the cartoonist's hands were specifically targeted during the attack. Also last month, Amnesty International [advocacy website] issued an urgent action [text, PDF] warning that Hanadi Zahlout, a Syrian women's rights activist and freelance journalist, was arrested by the Assad's forces earlier in the month and is at a "serious risk of torture or other ill-treatment."

Driver's licenses and immigration reform have been a contentious issue throughout the country. In August, the state of Arizona appealed the ruling [JURIST report] upholding the injunction against a controversial immigration law to the US Supreme Court. The act would require, in part, any individual with a license from a state which does not require proof of citizenship to obtain a license, such as New Mexico, to carry additional documentation [JURIST report] to prove their citizenship. In June, a group including the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Immigration Law Center [advocacy websites] succeeded in blocking [JURIST report] a controversial Georgia immigration law which would allow law enforcement officers to not accept driver licenses [JURIST report] from states that do not require a proof of citizenship to obtain a driver's license and detain individuals with these licenses for failure to prove citizenship. Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens [official website] announced in August that he would appeal the ruling [JURIST report].

Governments across the European continent have acted in line with the wishes of the US to prevent proper investigations, and particularly judicial scrutiny, of the abuses arising from rendition operations. The message is clear–good relations between the security agencies are deemed more important than preventing torture and other serious human rights violations.

The COE's renewed call for investigations into counter-terrorism actions corresponds with the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. In 2006, the COE urged member states to launch investigations after accusing [JURIST report] 14 European countries of collaborating with the CIA by taking an active or passive role in a "global spider's web" of secret prisons and rendition flights. The accusation followed publication of a COE report [PDF] detailing the results of an investigation into alleged secret detention centers [COE materials] and illegal rendition flights operated by the CIA in Europe. The report also referenced the cases of 17 detainees who claim they were kidnapped by US agents and transported to facilities around the globe, including in Romania and Poland. The European Parliament [official website] that year also conducted a similar investigation [JURIST report].

Sec. 4. Collective bargaining between the state and employee organizations and strikes by state employees are illegal. Sec. 5. The state shall not: (1) recognize a union or any other employee organization as a representative of the employees of the state; (2) bargain collectively with an employee organization; (3) enter into a collectively bargained agreement; or (4) require an employee to join or financially support an employee organization.

Restrictive collective bargaining laws have been advanced in several states this year. Ohio voters will decide whether to repeal a law [SB 5 text, PDF] limiting the collective bargaining rights of state workers after opponents of the bill gathered 915,456 signatures [JURIST report] in late July. The bill was passed [JURIST report] in March, but will not go into effect until it survives the public referendum in November. Ten Wisconsin unions filed [JURIST report] a lawsuit in federal court in June challenging the state's new collective bargaining law. The lawsuit alleges that the Budget Repair Bill [Senate Bill 11 text, PDF] violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments [texts]. According to the plaintiffs, the bill discriminates among groups of public employees and eliminates basic union rights, like bargaining, organizing and associating. In July, a judge for the US District Court for the District of Idaho [official website] issued a preliminary injunction [JURIST report] blocking the enforcement of an Idaho anti-union law [SB 1007] that bans a union program that subsidizes employment for its members. The law, called the Fairness in Contracting Act, prohibits union programs used by construction workers unions that pool portions of union wages on a voluntary basis to subsidize union labor to enable union members to be hired at the collectively bargained salary.

With no reports of violence at the polls, the referendum still had its procedural issues, including the NEC's distribution of defective paper ballots [JURIST report]. Despite the referendum, Liberia has been criticized for its poor human rights record in recent years. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon [official profile] emphasized [UN News Centre report] in a 2010 progress report [text, PDF] that reconciliation in Liberia [JURIST report] hinges on the development of its national security and its legal institutions. Liberia struggles [JURIST report] with corruption in its criminal justice system, poor detention conditions and sexual and gender-based violence, including rape and forced marriage, according to a UN Mission in Liberia [official website] combined quarterly report [text, PDF] released in April 2008. In 2007, the UN independent expert on the promotion and protection of human rights in Liberia urged the country to accelerate its human rights efforts [JURIST report], and in particular called on the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) [official website] to begin operations. The TRC held its first public hearings [JURIST report] after several months delay due to lack of funding. The TRC is investigating possible war crimes that occurred during the civil war that ended in 2003, but does not have the authority to try cases.

The scope and legality of the NSA program has been the subject of widespread reporting and debate for half a decade—it is hardly a secret. And Congress long ago crafted balanced and comprehensive security procedures to govern courts' handling of secret evidence about electronic surveillance to ensure that the Judicial Branch is always able to watch over Executive Branch spying while preserving national security. Yet the government still claims that any judicial scrutiny of the NSA program would disclose 'state secrets' and harm national security. It's time for these lawsuits to proceed and for the courts to be allowed to do their job and determine the legality of the NSA program.

The NSA has come under controversy for its surveillance since 9/11. Last January, the EFF published a report [text] summarizing nearly 2,500 pages of government documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) [text] litigation. Many of the documents are reports made to the Intelligence Oversight Board (IOB) [official website], an independent agency within the office of the president that oversees the Intelligence Community's compliance with the Constitution and all applicable laws, executive orders, and presidential directives. The report states, "[t]he documents suggest that FBI intelligence investigations have compromised the civil liberties of American citizens far more frequently, and to a greater extent, than was previously assumed." According to the documents, the reported violations to the IOB included violations of intelligence procedures governing investigations and abuses of the FBI's National Security Letter authority, and nearly a fifth were violations of the Constitution, FISA, or other laws governing criminal investigations. The FBI said the violations were due to technical mistakes [LAT report] and the amount of substantive violations is small. Last September, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) [official website] released a report absolving the FBI of charges [JURIST report] that agents conducted investigations of domestic groups based on their exercise of First Amendment [text] rights.

Escobar led the Medellin Cartel drug cartel, which was one of the world's largest suppliers of cocaine. He was killed by police in 1993. Colombia has been struggling with internal violence for decades. In May, the Colombian Senate [official website, in Spanish] passed a law to compensate citizens who have been victimized [JURIST report] by ongoing civil turmoil. The Victims' Law and Land Restitution Law [backgrounder, in Spanish] will provide financial compensation and restitution of land to victims of internal armed conflicts involving paramilitaries and guerrillas during the past 30 years. Individuals who feel they have been victimized by the conflicts since January 1, 1985, are eligible for financial compensation, and those who have also had their land seized or abandoned their land in the wake of armed conflict are subject to restitution of their land. The government estimates that 4 million hectares of land were abandoned and 2 million were seized during conflicts.

Sanader was extradited to Croatia in July in order to face these charges after he was arrested [JURIST reports] in Austria last December. Sanader had begun an appeal, arguing that it would be impossible to receive a fair trail in Croatia, but he dropped it after media speculation [JURIST report] suggested the appeal could harm Croatia's accession to the European Union (EU) [official website]. In June, the European Council [official website] agreed to grant Croatia EU membership following six years of accession negotiations. The decision calls for negotiations to close by the end of the month and the accession treaty to be signed by year's end, allowing for the country to become the 28th member of the EU on July 1, 2013. In the interim, EU leaders strongly encouraged Croatia to continue pursuing crucial reform initiatives.