The Crown Prosecution Service has dropped its case against Darryn Walker, the civil servant who was facing trial under the Obscene Publications Act for writing a violent pornographic fantasy story about pop group Girls Aloud. Darryn Walker was...
Azerbaijan has a new, harsher religion law and new penalties for producing, selling, circulating, importing and exporting religious literature without state permission, reports Felix Corley of Forum 18 When two Azeris crossed a remote border...
Transparency is no longer just an obsession for journalists and campaigners, writes Chris Ames The Telegraph may –-- or may not –-- have reached the bottom of the very large barrel that is the MPs’ expenses scandal. But beyond new revelations about...
The ruling against blogger NightJack suggests that anonymous speech is bad for society, says David Banisar The decision by Mr Justice Eady that the identity of police blogger NightJack could be released has been characterised by many observers as...
Reporter Saeed Kamali Dehghan describes the struggle to get information in and out of Tehran Huge rallies in Tehran yesterday saw hundreds of thousands of people defy bans and take to the streets to protest at the declaration that the president,...
A private investigation into the Iraq war will only backfire on Gordon Brown, writes Chris Ames Does Gordon Brown really think he will get away with a secret Iraq inquiry that --- surprise, surprise --- will report after the general election?...
English libel law turns US protection for free speech on its head. Floyd Abrams considers how the UK became an international libel tribunal English defamation law is under fire. Last July, the United Nations Human Rights Committee expressed...
Tamsin Allen asks why a former intelligence agent is being denied the right to a fair hearing MI5 officers guard many secrets. But, as Stella Rimington well knows, they can tell their own personal stories providing no genuinely secret and damaging...
The House of Lords ruling on secret evidence raises the need for the admission of intercept intelligence in terror trials, says Roger Smith Nine-nil. A judicial decision of the House of Lords does not get more decisive than that. It was by this...
We need more transparency on jury trial deliberations, says Frances Gibb Does the jury system work? No one knows --- because under the present law, no disclosures can be made about what goes on when a jury retires; nor can research be conducted...