Cases and articles

Matthew Vella, Malta Today

It's the executioner's worst day yet. The Maltese government has outlawed
the trade of guillotines, gallows, electric chairs and all modern contraptions of capital punishment and torture.

On Friday, August 18, with dozens of his family members standing
outside of Central Prison in Raleigh, Samuel Flippen was executed by
the State of North Carolina. These photos are not able to completely
tell the story of the intensity and the agony of that night, but its
an attempt:

The Legislative Support Unit was created in 2004 within the ODIHR Democratization Department. Its activities focus on three areas:

(1) Strengthening capacity for legislative reform;

(2) Improving legislative efficiency and transparency; and

(3) Legislationline.org.

A core task of the Unit is to lend assistance to lawmakers upon request while the legislative process is underway in the form of either opinions or comments on individual pieces of legislation affecting or relating to human dimension issues. This primarily consists of providing legal expertise to assess compliance with relevant standards, making recommendations to improve draft legislation, and sharing good practices that may help law drafters explore options other than those originally considered. In terms of sharing good practices, the ODIHR's legislative database (www.legislationline.org) is a powerful tool for all those involved in legislative reform.

BY Niki Adams, The Voice (UK)

IT'S not often that a significant legal case is dealt with so seemingly unjustly that members of the legal profession here rally to make their feelings known across international borders.