A. whereas the first democratically elected President of the Republic of Maldives, Mohamed Nasheed, who had been accused of ‘terrorism’, was sentenced on Friday, 13 March 2015 to 13 years in prison; whereas a former defence minister and a member of parliament were convicted in the same case of the detention of a serving chief judge accused of corruption in 2012; whereas two of the three judges in the case also testified against Mohamed Nasheed during the course ...[+++] of the investigation;

F. whereas some 1 200 death sentences were handed down in mass trials in March and April 2014 against Muslim Brotherhood members and alleged supporters of ousted President Morsi, on charges ranging from threatening public order to sabotage to involvement in the killing of police officers; whereas on 2 October 2014 the Egyptian judge involved in the handing out of death sentences in the Minya cases was removed from the criminal judiciary;

36. Applauds the agreement between Senegal and the AU to establish a Special Tribunal to prosecute former Chadian President Hissène Habré for war crimes, torture and crimes against humanity, and the agreement between the governments of Senegal and Chad to allow Senegalese judges to conduct investigations in Chad; encourages strongly political leaders in the Sahel countries and all public authorities to explicate and give swift effect to their resolve to end the culture of impunity for alleged war criminals and human rights violators in Chad and elsewhere in the region; notes, in this connection, that Chad remains the only Sahel country ...[+++] not to have signed up to the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Establishment of an African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights; encourages Chad to do so, as a strong signal of its commitment to punishing systemic abuses of human rights and providing redress to victims; regrets, moreover, Burkina Faso’s recent law granting amnesty to heads of state; fears that this sends the wrong signal to violators of human rights in the region and runs counter to the spirit of tackling impunity;

56. Notes that the increasing Chinese presence in Africa has contributed to economic development, with a particular focus on infrastructure projects; appreciates the Chinese leadership’s acknowledgement of the serious criticism of its imbalanced, raw-material-centred African policy during the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), held in Beijing on 20 July 2012, as demonstrated by its current open promotion of a diversification of its activities on the African continent; welcomes the pledge by State and Party leader Hu Jintao at this FOCAC meeting of a record credit of USD 20 billion to African countries over the next three years ...[+++]for developing their infrastructure, agriculture, manufacturing and SMEs; welcomes the support expressed by China for the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) and encourages the Chinese authorities to follow the global trend towards more transparency and to increase their concrete commitments in this area; calls on the EU to remain vigilant about the political, economic, social and environmental impact of China’s growing investments in Africa;

any judge of a superior, county or district court in Canada, and any person who has held office as a judge of a superior, county or district court in Canada, may, at the request of the Chief Justice of the Federal Court of Appeal made with the approval of the Governor in Council, act as a judge of the Federal Court of Appeal, and while so acting has all the powers of a judge of that court and shall be referred to as a deputy judge of that court.

The latter fact has been noted by prominent jurists, the international press and also, today, by the American judge, Mr Calabresi, head of the Court of Appeal in New York, who says that Italy is setting out in the opposite direction to that taken by the United States and the whole international community.