The US Supreme Court, including newest member Sonia Sotomayor, will begin a new term today with issues including gun rights and counter-terrorism on the docket, and growing speculation about the possible departure of a judge.
The nine justices on the highest court in the US have agreed to examine 55 cases this term. They will soon decide whether to add to that roster an appeal brought by Guantanamo Bay detainees who have been cleared for release and are seeking resettlement in the US.
Another sensitive case likely to be taken up by the court is US President Barack Obama’s request to block the release of photos showing detainee abuse at the hands of US personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite a court order demanding the images be made public.
The justices have already agreed to take on a case that involves defining the outer parameters of the term “material support to terrorism,” a charge that has been leveled in recent years in dozens of cases to obtain some 60 convictions.
It has become an important tool for prosecutors because it is such a broad term, but its use is being contested by a rights group on behalf of an organization that has worked on conflict resolution and human rights issues with members of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
Whatever decision the court makes, it will affect dozens of detainees at Guantanamo who have had the charge filed against them.
On the domestic front, the court will hear a case asking it to specify whether its ruling in June last year ruling confirming Americans’ rights to bear firearms, at home and for self defense, applies even where local and state governments ban weapons.
The justices will also decide whether minors can be sentenced to life in prison without parole for crimes other than murder — there are some 100 prisoners in this situation in the US.
The case in question involves two Florida prisoners, who were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole at ages 13 and 16 for rape and burglary.
In a case with international scope, the court will be asked to decide whether the immunity of former Somali prime minister Mohammed Ali Samatar can be lifted to allow him to be pursued for alleged torture and murder carried out in the 1980s.
Other issues on the docket include questions over whether financial strategies or management principles can be patented, whether videos showing animal cruelty are illegal, and legality of a two meter cross that stands in the middle of a desert.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not