The Guantanamo Bay prisoners and their detention is probably one of the most legally debated issues in the United States. Ever since the US action in Afghanistan in 2001, and the detention of terrorists and others from there, there has been a raging debate over their treatment. On the one hand there is the need to prevent the release of people (some of the detainees) who everybody knows are hard-core terrorists, who if released would go back to taking part in active operations against the United States and other countries. On the other hand, there is the need to ensure that all the detainees get their rights to a free trial, which is a due process of law, something that is a hallmark of a civilized society. There is no doubt that there will be some detainees who are innocent, or have committed minor crimes, and yet have been locked away for 7 years now.
The case of the 17 Uighur Muslims from China’s Xinjiang suddenly jumped into the limelight this week when a single judge ordered that they be released and brought into the United States. Now, these are detainees whom the Administration is quite clearly not going to file a case against, and who if returned back to China will almost certainly land them in clear trouble.

continue reading "Debate in the US over Muslims from Chinese Uighurs"

In a decision that shocked the Texas State Government, an appellate court decision on the 22dn of May 2008 threw out the Government action in taking away children from their mothers in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints case, whereby the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services had raided the gated compound of the Church (a known polygamist compound where there have been many cases of girls being married off when they were under-age and forced to have sex with their elder husbands) and taken away around more than 400 children from their mothers, giving a reason of their being in constant danger of being forced to marry and have relationships when they are under-age.
So, while this taking of children was being discussed in a somewhat chaotic lower court, an appellate court stepped in (in response to petitions from the mothers) and stopped proceedings in the trial court and ordered the return of children of the 38 mothers who had filed the suit. The decision by the appellate court was a severe indictment of the action of the state, essentially stating that the children were not in the peril that the state claimed; further, continuing news reports of this whole incident pointed out several problems – the state was not able to find the person who supposedly made the complainant, many of the people who were claimed to be underage were actually adult, and so on.

continue reading "Texas appellate court decision on children to be appealed"

President Musharraf must be smiling, nay, positively laughing. For all their political life, the parties of Nawaz Sharif (Pakistan Muslim Leadue -N) and the Pakistan People’s Party of Asif Ali Zardari have been political opponents. They came together just a few months ago when neither of them got a majority in the last elections, and they needed to deny President Musharraf the political instability; hence they made the grand decision to form a coalition. Pakistan took a sigh of relief at this prospect, and welcomes the change of having a somewhat stable parliament. However, as of now, this seems to be a mirage:

continue reading "Nawaz Sharif pulls out of Pakistani coalition"

During the last crackdown by President Musharraf late last year, rattled by a judiciary that was seemingly not subservient enough to him, the dictator General had removed a number of judges of the Pakistani Supreme Court and moved them to house arrest. The authority under which this had been done ? Well, he was the President and had just done a second coup, and so what he said and wrote was law ! He was fearful that the judges would not be scare of him and order his election to be unlawful.
With the election of the 2 main opposition parties and their combined might being a majority in the assembly, it was always expected that they would bring back the sacked judges, with the only constraint being that the PPP chief Asif Ali Zardari would be a bit hesitant due to the judges picking up the earlier amnesty ordinance for consideration and for whether it is lawful or not. However, with Nawaz Sharif sticking to his demand, the case for getting the judges back had to become a reality:

continue reading "Pakistan reaches settlement on judges restoration"