United States, Canada and
Central America
Canada
Cities won't
escape land claim impacts - 8 May
BC's need to settle native land claims is
seen by some Metro Vancouverites as a problem that will play itself
out far away, in the rugged mountains and forests of the province's
hinterland. The signing of the Tsawwassen treaty, which took effect
April 4, was the first big wakeup call of the potential impact of
urban treaty making. The government's
decision to pull 500 acres of new treaty land out of the
Agricultural Land Reserve so it can be developed by the Tsawwassen
First Nation was deeply unpopular among environmentalists and
farmland defenders. The vast tracts of Crown land that can be used
as the primary currency to settle treaties in rural areas are not
available here in the urban southwest. That's
forced government negotiators to choose :
put more cash on urban treaty tables or else enhance the value of
smaller areas of treaty land. With more local treaties likely,
there are fears more scarce farmland may be sacrificed. Metro
Vancouver member cities are also concerned that treaty First Nations
may unleash a tide of development in urban areas that doesn't
necessarily follow regional or local plans. The provincial
government, meanwhile, is poised to legally recognize aboriginal
title through a new recognition and reconciliation act. -
bclocalnews website
See also :
Tsawwassen Treaty
on the
Ministry of Aboriginal
Relations and Reconciliation website
Courts
Stocks could pose conflicts for court prospects - 6 May
Just last year, three justices' stock holdings and the job of
another justice's son prevented the court from hearing a case that
accused dozens of businesses of violating international law by
assisting South Africa's former apartheid government. The companies
and the Bush administration wanted the court to intervene. Because
four of the nine justices sat out, the court's only option was to
uphold an appeals court ruling that let the lawsuit proceed. Three
of the judges could have taken part in the case if they had sold the
investments in question. -
AP on Google website
Keyphrase :
United States. 'Apartheid Case'
Former Bank of China managers and their wives sentenced for stealing
more than $485 million, laundering money through Las Vegas Casinos
- 6 May
Two former managers of the Bank of China and their wives were
sentenced today after their convictions on Aug 29, 2008, by a
federal jury in Las Vegas on charges of racketeering, money
laundering, international transportation of stolen property as well
as passport and visa fraud. US District Judge Philip M Pro sentenced
Xu Chaofan aka Hui Yat Fai to 25 years in prison, Xu Guojun aka Hui
Kit Shun to 22 years in prison, Kuang Wan Fang aka Wendy Kuang to
eight years in prison and Yu Ying Yi to eight years in prison. All
four defendants were sentenced to three years of supervised release
and ordered to pay $482 million in restitution. Denaturalization
proceedings against Kuang Wan Fang and Yu Ying Yi have been
initiated by the government. -
Wall Street Journal website
Judge
turns down Polanski request - 7 May
A US judge has formally rejected Roman Polanski's request that a
1978 rape case against him is dismissed. Judge Peter Espinoza agreed
there was misconduct by the judge in the original case, but said Mr
Polanski must return to the US to apply for dismissal. Mr Polanski
fled to France in 1978 before he could be sentenced for having
unlawful sex with a 13-year-old girl. Mr Polanski's lawyers said he
would not return to the US because he would be immediately arrested
as a fugitive. He cannot be extradited from France. -
BBC News website
Symbionese Liberation Army member released on parole - 10 May
James William Kilgore, the last imprisoned member of the Symbionese
Liberation Army, was released on parole today from a northern
California prison. Kilgore, 61, was arrested in Cape Town, South
Africa, in 2002 in connection with a bank robbery and murder in
Sacramento in 1975. Hidalgo said Kilgore served a two-year federal
sentence from 2004 to 2006 for possession of an explosive device and
making false statements on an application for a passport. In 2006 he
began a six-year sentence for second-degree murder. The SLA earned
notoriety after kidnapping Patricia (Patty) Hearst in 1974. Kilgore
is the last of five captured members to be released from custody,
and will serve his parole term in Illinois where his wife lives. -
Los Angeles Times
website
The fight for our genes heads to court
- 24 May
Twenty percent of your body belongs to someone else. Don't believe
us? Check the US Patent Office. Twenty percent of all human genes
have been patented, mostly by private companies and research
institutions. These patents are crippling the ability of scientists
to study diseases and restricting patients from getting the
information they need to make important medical decisions about
their health. This month, six breast cancer patients filed suit
against Myriad Genetics, a company that owns both the patent on two
genes that are associated with an increased risk for breast cancer
and ovarian cancer and the patent on testing to measure those risks.
Some of these women are suing because they can't afford the $3
000 fee Myriad charges to determine their risk for breast or
ovarian cancer. Some of them are suing because, thanks to Myriad's
patent, they can't get second opinions about whether they should
have their breasts or ovaries removed - no one else is allowed to
perform another test for them. All of them are suing because they
did not, and should not, expect to have such a crucial and
excruciating medical decision stymied by patent officials run amok.
- San
Francisco Chronicle website
Emigration and
Immigration
LA judge
orders widows' green card cases reopened - 1 May
A federal judge on Friday ordered the government to reopen the
immigration cases of dozens of foreign widows whose American
citizen spouses died before they could get their green cards. US
District Judge Christina A Snyder ruled that the Department of
Homeland Security could not deny the widows' applications to
remain in the country legally because the agency didn't process
the paperwork before their spouses died. The ruling paves the way
for several dozen widows in western states to have their
applications for green cards reopened by the US government.
Snyder's ruling follows a 2006 decision by the 9th US Circuit
Court of Appeals in the case of a woman who had been ordered
deported to South Africa after her husband was killed in a car
accident. The 9th Circuit said she had the right to have her
residency application reviewed. -
Mercury News website
Court bars identity-theft law as tool in immigration cases - 4
May
The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a favorite tool of
prosecutors in immigration cases, ruling unanimously that a
federal identity-theft law may not be used against many illegal
workers who used false Social Security numbers to get jobs. The
question in the case was whether workers who use fake
identification numbers to commit some other crimes must know they
belong to a real person to be subject to a two-year sentence
extension for "aggravated identity theft".
The answer, the Supreme Court said, is yes. -
New York Times website
Environment
Justices limit liability over toxic spill cases - 4 May
The Supreme Court made it harder on Monday for the government to
recover the often enormous costs of environmental cleanups from
companies with only minor or limited responsibility for toxic
spills. The decision tightened the reach of the Superfund law, known
formally as the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act,
by limiting both the kinds of companies subject to liability and the
situations in which partly culpable companies can be made to bear
the entire cost of cleanups. -
New
York Times website
Finance
US plans
derivatives regulations - 13 May
The US Treasury wants more regulation of derivatives - the complex
financial instruments that brought down some of Wall Street's
biggest names. Proposals to be set out by Treasury Secretary Timothy
Geithner will call for an electronic system to monitor buying and
selling in the market. Firms trading in derivatives will need enough
capital in case they default and will face tough reporting
requirements. -
BBC News
website
Guatemala
Lawyer accuses Guatemala leader
- 12 May
The Guatemalan government has dismissed allegations which link
President Alvaro Colom to the death of a lawyer. A videotape
recorded by the lawyer, Rodrigo Rosenberg, prior to his death claims
that Mr Colom would be responsible for his murder. Mr Rosenberg
alleges that he would have been killed because of his links to a
client, a prominent businessman, who was killed in March with his
daughter. The 47-year-old lawyer was shot dead on Sunday in
Guatemala City. -
BBC News
website
Human Rights
US to
limit Guantanamo releases - 30 April
Between 50 and 100 detainees held by the US at Guantanamo Bay
cannot be released or put on trial, US Defence Secretary Robert
Gates has said. The fate of those detainees "is still open", Mr
Gates told members of the Senate Appropriations Committee. -
BBC News website
Interrogation debate sharply divided Bush White House - 3 May
The proclamation that President George W Bush issued on June 26,
2003, to mark the United Nations International Day in Support of
Victims of Torture seemed innocuous, one of dozens of high-minded
statements published and duly ignored each year. The United States
is "committed to the worldwide
elimination of torture and we are leading this fight by example",
Mr Bush declared, vowing to prosecute torture and to prevent
"other cruel and unusual punishment".
But inside the Central Intelligence Agency, the statement set off
alarms. The agency's top lawyer, Scott W
Muller, called the White House to complain. -
New York Times website
A post-script on Churchill, Obama and torture - 5 May
Given that the definitions and practices of brutal interrogation
methods, past and present, remain part of our modern-day debate,
it seems worthwhile to revisit the remarks President Obama made
during his "100 Days"
news conference about Winston Churchill's
views on torture and gather some of the discussion that has ensued
since then. -
New
York Times website
Torture memos : inquiry suggests no prosecutions - 6 May
An internal Justice Department inquiry has concluded that Bush
administration lawyers committed serious lapses of judgment in
writing secret memorandums authorizing brutal interrogations but
that they should not be prosecuted, according to government
officials briefed on its findings. The report by the Office of
Professional Responsibility, an internal ethics unit within the
Justice Department, is also likely to ask state bar associations
to consider possible disciplinary action, which could include
reprimands or even disbarment, for some of the lawyers involved in
writing the legal opinions, the officials said. -
New York Times website
Nazi
suspect ordered to surrender - 8 May
A man wanted in Germany for Nazi war crimes has been ordered by US
authorities to surrender to an immigration office for deportation.
John Demjanjuk, who lives in Ohio, has been fighting deportation
since March, when Germany filed charges against him. On Thursday,
the US Supreme Court rejected a request by Mr Demjanjuk, 89, to
intervene in the case. -
BBC News
website
'Nazi
guard' Demjanjuk deported - 11 May
Alleged Nazi war criminal John Demjanjuk has been deported from
the US on a plane bound for Germany. The frail 89-year-old is due
to face charges in Germany of being an accessory to the deaths of
29,000 Jews during World War II. He denies accusations that he
worked as a guard in the Sobibor Nazi death camp. -
BBC News website
Demjanjuk facing Germany charges - 12 May
Alleged Nazi war criminal John Demjanjuk is in Munich, to face
charges of being an accessory to the deaths of 29
000 Jews during World War II. The frail 89-year-old arrived
in Germany on Tuesday morning after being deported from the US,
police say. -
BBC News
website
See also :
Germany
Taxation Law
Obama
crackdown on tax loopholes - 4 May
President Barack Obama has proposed outlawing offshore
tax-avoidance techniques in a move that could hit US corporations
with overseas divisions. His proposals would axe some tax
deductions for firms that earn profits in countries with low tax
rates. His plan envisages 800 extra federal agents to police the
laws, and may reap $210bn (£140bn) in tax over the decade. The
president said he wanted to "make it easier" for US companies to
create jobs at home. -
BBC News
website
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