• Declaration of the High-Level Meeting of the 67th Session of the General Assembly on the Rule of Law at the National and International Levels (Sept. 24, 2012)

• United States Senate, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Federal Support for and Involvement in State and Local Fusion Centers, Majority and Minority Staff Report (Oct. 3, 2012)

• President Obama Executive Order-Strengthening Protections Against Trafficking In Persons In Federal Contracts (Sept. 25, 2012)

European Court of Human Rights

• Chabauty v. France (Oct. 4, 2012)

Supreme Court of the State of Nevada

• Gutierrez v. State of Nevada (Sept. 19, 2012)

• Kiobel et al. v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. et al. Oral Argument Transcript (Oct. 1, 2012)

Declaration of the High-Level Meeting of the 67th Session of the General Assembly on the Rule of Law at the National and International Levels (Sept. 24, 2012)

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The High-level Meeting of the 67th Session of the General Assembly on the Rule of Law at the National and International Levels, attended by UN Member States, non-governmental organizations, and civil society, took place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on September 24, 2012. The meeting, which was meant to address the rule of law at the national and international levels, resulted in the adoption by the General Assembly of the Declaration of the High-level Meeting of the General Assembly on the Rule of Law at the National and International Levels.

The Declaration reaffirmed the "commitment to the rule of law and its fundamental importance for political dialogue and cooperation among all States," emphasizing that rule of law applies equally to all states and international organizations, including the United Nations and its principal organs. The Declaration also acknowledged the importance of informal justice mechanisms to resolve disputes, provided that such mechanisms are in accordance with international human rights law. Finally, the Declaration recognized the importance of ensuring that women "fully enjoy the benefits of the rule of law, and commit to using law to uphold their equal rights and ensure their full and equal participation."

United States Senate, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Federal Support for and Involvement in State and Local Fusion Centers, Majority and Minority Staff Report (Oct. 3, 2012)

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A bipartisan report issued by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has concluded that fusion centers—information sharing centers that are meant to facilitate sharing of terrorism-related information between state, local, and federal agencies—failed to "produce[ ] useful intelligence to support Federal counterterrorism efforts." According to the report, the centers "forwarded 'intelligence' of uneven quality - oftentimes shoddy, rarely timely, sometimes endangering citizens' civil liberties and Privacy Act protections, occasionally taken from already-published public sources, and more often than not unrelated to terrorism." The report also accused Department of Homeland Security officials of often misrepresenting the centers' achievements: "DHS officials asserted that some fusion centers existed when they did not. At times, DHS officials overstated fusion centers' 'success stories.' At other times, DHS officials failed to disclose or acknowledge non-public evaluations highlighting a host of problems at fusion centers and in DHS's own operations."

The report recommended "that Congress and DHS revisit the statutory basis for DHS support of fusion centers, in light of the investigation's findings." It also recommended "that DHS improve its oversight of Federal grant funds supporting fusion centers; conduct promised assessments of fusion center information-sharing; and strengthen its protection of civil liberties in fusion center intelligence reporting."

President Obama Executive Order - Strengthening Protections Against Trafficking In Persons In Federal Contracts (Sept. 25, 2012)

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U.S. President Obama has issued an Executive Order outlining measures to improve the U.S. government's existing zero-tolerance policy on human trafficking in government contracting. The Executive Order provides concrete steps to be implemented by numerous federal agencies to strengthen the existing U.S. policy on trafficking in persons by federal contractors and subcontractors in solicitations, contracts, and subcontracts for supplies or services. Specifically, the President ordered that within 180 days of the date of the Executive Order, the Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council, in consultation with the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Labor, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Administrator for the United States Agency for International Development, take steps necessary to amend the Federal Acquisition Regulation to further the objective of the Executive Order.

European Court of Human Rights

Chabauty v. France (Oct. 4, 2012)

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The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights unanimously ruled in Chabauty v. France that France did not violate Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) taken together with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property) of the European Convention on Human Rights when it required that the applicant's land be included in the hunting grounds of an approved municipal association if the applicant is not opposed to hunting as a matter of personal conviction.

The applicant complained that the mandatory inclusion of his land within the municipal hunters' association, while owners of lands with a surface area above a certain threshold could object from the inclusion, amounted to discrimination. He relied on a 1999 Grand Chamber judgment, Chassagnou and Others v. France, wherein the Court held that "the difference in treatment between large and small landowners constituted discrimination on the ground of property within the meaning of Article 14 'since the result . . . [was] to give only the former the right to use their land in accordance with their conscience.'" The applicant read Chassagnou to mean that "large and small landowners cannot be treated differently on the basis of provisions which are contrary to Article 1 of Protocol [No. 1] taken in conjunction with Article 14 of [the] Convention."

The Grand Chamber disagreed. It concluded that findings of a violation in Chassagnou and Others "were based to a decisive degree on the fact that the applicants were opposed to hunting on ethical grounds and that issues of conscience were at stake for them." The Court made reference to several other judgments that confirm this rule, including the recently decided Herrmann v. Germany, wherein the Grand Chamber ruled that Germany's hunting law, which requires that landowners tolerate hunting on their lands even if they ethically object to hunting, violated the applicant's rights under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1. Since Chabauty is not opposed to hunting on ethical grounds, the Court found no violation of Article 14 taken in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1.

With respect to the different treatment of small v. large landowners, the Court concluded that states enjoy "significant margin of appreciation" in "assessing whether and to what extent differences in otherwise similar situations justify a difference in treatment."

Supreme Court of the State of Nevada

Gutierrez v. State of Nevada (Sept. 19, 2012)

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The Supreme Court of the State of Nevada has ruled in Gutierrez v. State of Nevada that Carlos Gutierrez, a Mexican national sentenced to death for the killing of his three-year-old stepdaughter, is entitled to an evidentiary hearing to determine whether he suffered actual prejudice due to the lack of consular assistance during his sentencing hearing. The Court specifically referred to the 2004 decision of the International Court of Justice ("ICJ"), Avena and Other Mexican Nationals, wherein the ICJ found that the United States violated Article 36 of the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations when it failed to notify fifty-one Mexican nationals on death row, one of whom was Gutierrez, of their consular notification and access rights. While the U.S. Supreme Court subsequently held in Medellin v. Texas that neither Avena nor the accompanying President's Memorandum purporting to implement Avena "constituted directly enforceable federal law," the Supreme Court of Nevada ruled that in cases where actual prejudice can be shown, state procedural default rules "may yield" to Avena.

According to the Supreme Court of Nevada, "[u]nlike Medellin and Leal Garcia but like Torres, Gutierrez arguably suffered actual prejudice due to the lack of consular assistance." Furthermore, the Court noted that "[i]t is apparent that Gutierrez needed help navigating the American criminal system. At the time of his arrest, Gutierrez was 26 years old, had the Mexican equivalent of a sixth-grade education, and spoke little English." The Court concluded that "[r]easonable minds can differ on whether these errors were prejudicial and that is precisely the reason an evidentiary hearing is necessary."

Kiobel et al. v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. et al. Oral Argument Transcript (Oct. 1, 2012)

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The transcript of the October 1, 2012 oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court in Kiobel et al. v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. et al. is available at the Court's website. In February 2012, the Court heard the first round of oral arguments in Kiobel, but one week later, it ordered briefing and re-argument on the additional question of "[w]hether and under what circumstances the Alien Tort Statute, 28 U.S.C. §1350, allows courts to recognize a cause of action for violations of the law of nations occurring within the territory of a sovereign other than the United States."