Labour pledges 80 new rape courts in bid to tackle backlog crisis

Plan for specialist unit in all police forces amid manifesto drive to reduce violence against women and girls

Labour will establish 80 new rape courts across and England and Wales to fast-track cases as part of wide-ranging plans to tackle violence against women and girls that will be announced in the party’s general election manifesto this week.

The specialist courts will be set up in unused rooms and spare capacity within every existing crown court, in an effort to end a growing backlog that causes 60% of rape victims to drop out before their cases even begin.

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Prince Harry wins right to appeal against security ruling

Duke of Sussex allowed to challenge high court decision that upheld Ravec’s finding on protection

The Duke of Sussex has been granted permission to appeal against the dismissal of his high court challenge over a change to his level of personal security when he visits the UK.

Prince Harry took legal action against the Home Office over the decision of the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (Ravec) that he should receive a different degree of taxpayer-funded protection when in the country.

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Two more British judges resign from Hong Kong’s top court

Democracy campaigners welcome move by Lord Sumption and Lord Collins, who cited political situation in statement

Two of the last remaining British judges to sit on Hong Kong’s top court have resigned, with one citing the political situation in the former colony.

Lawrence Collins and Jonathan Sumption, former UK supreme court justices, announced their resignations on Thursday. “I have resigned from the court of final appeal because of the political situation in Hong Kong, but I continue to have the fullest confidence in the court and the total independence of its members,” Lord Collins said.

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Big Mac v Supermac’s: McDonald’s loses EU trademark fight

Ruling by European court of justice ends 17-year legal tussle between Irish chain and global rival

The small Irish takeaway chain Supermac’s has won a David v Goliath court battle with McDonald’s over the use of the Big Mac trademark, paving the way for it to open outlets across Europe.

The ruling also means the US-founded fast food multinational has lost the right to use the name “Big Mac” in the EU in relation to chicken burgers.

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Tribunal cases to rise as UK firms push back on remote working, experts say

Some employers emboldened by ruling against FCA manager’s claim over working at home full-time

Lawyers and HR experts expect an increase in employment tribunal cases as companies increasingly clamp down on working from home and staff become resentful that the flexibility they have enjoyed since the pandemic is being slowly rolled back.

A number of companies are now advocating a full five-day return to the office, with others enforcing a minimum number of days in the workplace. Administrative staff at Boots, who previously worked in the office three days a week, will return to the office five days a week from September. Many US banks, such as Goldman Sachs, also expect senior staff to come in for the full week, and its chief executive, David Solomon, labelled remote working an “aberration”.

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Tories will allow bars on trans women, says Kemi Badenoch

Conservatives would change law so trans people could be excluded from single-sex spaces, if party wins election

Kemi Badenoch has said the Conservatives will change the Equality Act to rewrite the definition of sex and allow organisations to bar transgender women from single-sex spaces, including hospital wards and sports events.

The party will make clear that the protected characteristic of sex means biological sex, enabling those who wish to bar male-bodied people from organisations or activities to do so.

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Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda admission sparks legal action from detained asylum seekers

Migrants seek redress for ‘immense distress’ from deportations now thrown into chaos by election announcement

Asylum seekers detained by the Home Office and threatened with deportation to Rwanda are set to take legal action against the government after Rishi Sunak admitted that no flights will take place before the general election.

The Home Office started raiding accommodation and detaining people who arrived at routine immigration-reporting appointments on 29 April in a nationwide push codenamed Operation Vector.

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Ex-Mossad chief ‘disappointed’ over alleged threats against ICC prosecutor

Tamir Pardo says alleged campaign under his successor ‘sounds like Cosa Nostra-style blackmail’

A former head of the Mossad has described his disbelief and disappointment at allegations that his successor at the Israeli intelligence agency threatened a chief prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC), likening the conduct to mafia-like tactics.

Tamir Pardo, who served as director of the Mossad between 2011 and 2016, was responding to a Guardian investigation published this week about an alleged operation by the Israeli spy service to put pressure on the former ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda to abandon a war crimes investigation.

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Israeli journalist describes threats over reporting on spy chief and ICC

Haaretz journalist was warned of ‘consequences’ if he reported on attempts by Mossad chief to intimidate ex-prosecutor

An investigative reporter with Israel’s leading leftwing newspaper, Haaretz, has said unnamed senior security officials threatened actions against him if he reported on attempts by the former head of the Mossad to intimidate the ex-prosecutor of the international criminal court.

Amid growing concern over Israel’s censorship regime, enforced by the military censor’s office and by gag orders issued by the courts, Haaretz published an article on Wednesday with blacked out words and sentences to demonstrate the scale of redactions.

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How a single comma is allowing Israel to question ICJ Rafah ruling

Israel is among those arguing that international court of justice directive is ambivalent and far from a blanket order to halt its offensive

Israel has asserted that Sunday’s attack, which set ablaze a crowded refugee camp in Rafah and killed 45 Palestinians, is not in breach of last week’s International Court of Justice ruling – a directive widely seen to have instructed Israel to completely stop its military offensive in the southern Gaza city.

The apparent contradiction reflects a fierce and continuing debate over the ambivalent language of the ruling – and the placing of a single comma in a key sentence.

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Israeli campaign against ICC may be ‘crimes against justice’, say legal experts

International lawyers believe conduct of Israeli intelligence service should be investigated by prosecutor in The Hague

Efforts by Israel’s intelligence agencies to undermine and influence the international criminal court (ICC) could amount to “offences against the administration of justice” and should be investigated by its chief prosecutor, legal experts have said.

Responding to revelations about Israeli surveillance and espionage operations against the ICC, multiple leading international law experts said the conduct of Israeli intelligence services could amount to criminal offences.

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Spying, hacking and intimidation: Israel’s nine-year ‘war’ on the ICC exposed

Exclusive: Investigation reveals how intelligence agencies tried to derail war crimes prosecution, with Netanyahu ‘obsessed’ with intercepts

When the chief prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC) announced he was seeking arrest warrants against Israeli and Hamas leaders, he issued a cryptic warning: “I insist that all attempts to impede, intimidate or improperly influence the officials of this court must cease immediately.”

Karim Khan did not provide specific details of attempts to interfere in the ICC’s work, but he noted a clause in the court’s foundational treaty that made any such interference a criminal offence. If the conduct continued, he added, “my office will not hesitate to act”.

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Revealed: Israeli spy chief ‘threatened’ ICC prosecutor over war crimes inquiry

Mossad director Yossi Cohen personally involved in secret plot to pressure Fatou Bensouda to drop Palestine investigation, sources say

The former head of the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence agency, allegedly threatened a chief prosecutor of the international criminal court in a series of secret meetings in which he tried to pressure her into abandoning a war crimes investigation, the Guardian can reveal.

Yossi Cohen’s covert contacts with the ICC’s then prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, took place in the years leading up to her decision to open a formal investigation into alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in occupied Palestinian territories.

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UN’s top court orders Israel to immediately halt Rafah offensive

ICJ president says humanitarian situation in Gaza’s southernmost city is now classified as ‘disastrous’

The UN’s top court has ordered Israel to halt its assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah in a ruling that will ratchet up the pressure on the increasingly isolated country.

The president of the international court of justice, Nawaf Salam, said the humanitarian situation in Rafah had deteriorated further and was now classified as “disastrous”, meaning the ICJ’s previously issued provisional measures were insufficient.

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Court backlog target in England and Wales no longer achievable, says NAO

Watchdog says outstanding caseload has increased from 60,000 to 67,573 since MoJ set target of 53,000 in 2021

The Ministry of Justice’s ambition to reduce the backlog in crown courts in England and Wales to 53,000 by March next year is no longer achievable, a parliamentary watchdog has said.

The MoJ set the target in October 2021 when the outstanding caseload was 60,000, but by the end of last year it had reached 67,573 – its highest level ever – according to a National Audit Office (NAO) report.

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Lost laws: Which legislation will slip through the net before the UK election?

While some bills will be dealt with swiftly in the ‘wash-up’ period in parliament others could fall by the wayside

Rishi Sunak’s promise to deliver a secure and stable future for the country has been left hanging in the balance as a number of laws that would have kept people physically safe from terror attacks, dangerous cycling incidents or even from no-fault evictions, will probably not be introduced to parliament before the election. The legislation for his much-vaunted smoking ban is also in peril.

Sunak’s government had 16 bills subject to the “wash-up” on Thursday, a period in the parliamentary process when legislation is swiftly pushed through before an election. The laws not likely to be passed are:

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Former Georgian president had fair trial, Strasbourg judges rule

European court of human rights rejects appeals over Mikheil Saakashvili’s criminal cases heard in Georgian courts

The former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili was fairly convicted of abuses of power for ordering the beating of an opposition MP and pardoning four murderers, human rights judges in Strasbourg have ruled.

Saakashvili, who was president of Georgia from 2004 to 2013, was said by the European court of human rights on Thursday to have failed to show he had been unfairly treated in his trials in 2018.

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Jersey approves plans to allow assisted dying for terminally ill adults

Legislation expected to be brought by end of 2025, with service for residents in place by mid-2027

Jersey is to move ahead with allowing assisted dying for people with a terminal illness after a vote in its parliament on Wednesday.

Legislation is expected to be brought before the island’s states assembly by the end of 2025, and an assisted dying service for residents to be in place by mid-2027.

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Attacks on health workers in conflict zones at highest level ever – report

More than 2,500 attacks in 2023, including medics killed and clinics bombed, in war zones such as Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine

Attacks on health workers, hospitals and clinics in conflict zones jumped 25% last year to their highest level on record, a new report has found.

While the increase was largely driven by new wars in Gaza and Sudan, continuing conflicts such as Ukraine and Myanmar also saw such attacks continue “at a relentless pace”, the Safeguarding Health in Conflict coalition said.

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Blinken willing to work with Congress on potential sanctions against ICC

Republicans seek help from secretary of state after prosecutor Karim Khan requests arrest warrant for Israeli PM Netanyahu

The Biden administration is willing to work with Congress to potentially impose sanctions against international criminal court officials over the prosecutor’s request for arrest warrants for Israeli leaders over the Gaza war, Antony Blinken, the secretary of state, said on Tuesday.

At a Senate appropriations subcommittee hearing, Republican Lindsey Graham told Blinken he wanted to see renewed US sanctions on the court in response to the move announced by ICC prosecutor Karim Khan on Monday.

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