The Madrid Prosecutor’s Office in Spain asked the court on Thursday to drop the case against Begoña Gomez, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s wife, for the alleged crime of peddling influence and corruption, sources told Spanish news source EFE. The prosecutors appealed a local court’s decision to open preliminary investigations into the links between Begoña Gomez and private companies. Prosecutors also demanded the dismissal of the case, citing a lack of evidence. The case started after a private activist group named Manos Limpias filed a complaint on Wednesday against Pedro Sanchez’s wife. The c ..read more

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes announced on Wednesday that a state grand jury returned an indictment against 18 individuals associated with former US President Donald Trump’s effort to overturn Arizona’s election results in the 2020 presidential election. The indicted individuals face charges of fraud, forgery and conspiracy. The indictment names 11 of the 18 individuals, but seven names remain redacted and shielded from public knowledge. The indictment centers around the individuals’ collective effort to “prevent the lawful transfer of the presidency to keep [Trump] in office against the ..read more

Peruvian law students from the Facultad de Derecho y Ciencias Políticas, Universidad Nacional de San Antonio Abad del Cusco are reporting for JURIST on law-related events in or affecting Perú. All of them are from CIED (Centro de Investigación de los Estudiantes de Derecho, a student research center in UNSAAC’s faculty of law dedicated to spreading legal information and improving legal culture through study and research, promoting critical and reflective debate to contribute to the development of the country. Samanta Berenice Chavez Quispe is a law student from UNSAAC and a memb ..read more

Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported on Thursday that military forces in Burkina Faso executed at least 233 civilians in attacks on two villages. It labels the attacks as “among the worst army abuse in Burkina Faso since 2015.” These two mass killings occurred in the villages of Nondin and Soro on February 25. At the moment, there is no official justification by the military for the reason of the attacks. In an interview with a local radio station a day after the attacks, Burkinabè Defense Minister Mahamoudou Sana did not refer to these mass killings. Instead, the he stated the Islamist hostiliti ..read more

Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution sponsored by the US and Japan on Wednesday, which called on all nations to contribute to the peaceful use of outer space and to prevent a dangerous nuclear arms race. Furthermore, the resolution would have urged all nations “to refrain from actions contrary to that objective and to the relevant existing treaties in the interest of maintaining international peace and security.” The draft resolution received thirteen votes in favor, one abstention from China and one vote against from Russia. Since Russia is one of the five permanent members on the U ..read more

The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced a rule Tuesday banning employers from using non-compete clauses in worker’s employment contracts. Non-compete clauses are portions of language in employment contracts that restrict an employee from working in a certain sector of business or for certain employers after their contract with their current employer ends. The rule, which was first proposed in January 2023, “provides that it is an unfair method of competition—and therefore a violation of [the Federal Trade Commission Act]—for persons to…enter into non-compete clauses…with workers on or ..read more

A federal judge in North Carolina found on Tuesday that the state’s 147-year-old voting law is unconstitutional. US District Judge Loretta Biggs found that a state law, which prevents convicted felons from casting a vote, violates the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution. The lawsuit arose when civil rights group North Carolina A. Philip Randolph Institute and Action challenged the statute from 1877 was written with the intent to exclude Black people from voting and continues to have a disproportionately discriminatory impact. Th ..read more

The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Wednesday in the case concerning whether a 1986 federal law preempts Idaho’s near-total abortion ban. The Idaho statute criminalizes performing or attempting to perform an abortion unless not doing so would result in the mother’s death. The Biden administration argues that the Emergency Medical Treatment & Labor Act (EMTALA) preempts the Idaho law. The case is an appeal from a Ninth Circuit decision that halted Idaho’s ban. Attorney Joshua Turner argued on behalf of the petitioners. Turner asserted that states are responsible for licensing doctors ..read more

Amnesty International published “The State of the World’s Human Rights” report Wednesday, outlining human rights concerns during 2023 in 155 countries. The report highlighted human rights concerns, which include war crimes, economic crises, climate change, repression of dissents, women and LGBTI people’s rights backslash and online incitement to racial hatred. The report first addressed violations of international humanitarian law in armed conflicts from around the world. Parties to armed conflicts, such as Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, both the Sudan Armed Forces and Rapid Support ..read more

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled Tuesday that a UN judge was unlawfully detained in Türkiye in 2016. The Turkish court failed to recognise Aydin Sefa Akay’s diplomatic immunity when they arrested and detained him on terrorism charges following a failed coup d’État in 2016. Akay made his application to the ECHR in December 2016, arguing that his pre trial detention, searches of his home and person breached his human rights and “blatantly disregard[ed]” his diplomatic immunity. The court ruled in Akay’s favour and held Akay should have been “shielded from any form of arrest or det ..read more