Seven years and 3,000 non-billable hours ago, I joined a handful of public-spirited lawyers as counsel for the plaintiffs in Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, Inc. v. Bush. The lawsuit challenged the legality of President George W. Bush's post-9/11 program of warrantless electronic surveillance. Our clients were an Oregon-based Islamic charity and two of its lawyers, who had been wiretapped in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Our proof of the surveillance was a top-secret document that the government had accidently disclosed to Al-Haramain's lawyers during proceedings to declare Al-Haramain a terrorist organization. Our goal was for the judiciary to rule that the president may not disregard an act of Congress in the name of national security.

We were not alone in litigating this case.

In 1999, I travelled to Iraq with Denis Halliday who had resigned as assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations rather than enforce a punitive UN embargo on Iraq. Devised and policed by the United States and Britain, the extreme suffering caused by these "sanctions" included, according to Unicef, the deaths of half a million Iraqi infants under the age of five.

Ten years later, in New York, I met the senior British official responsible for the imposition of sanctions. He is Carne Ross, once known in the UN as "Mr.Iraq". I read to him a statement he made to a parliamentary select committee in 2007 : "The weight of evidence clearly indicates that sanctions caused massive human suffering among ordinary Iraqis, particularly children. We, the US and UK governments, were the primary engineers and offenders of sanctions and were well aware of this evidence at the time but we largely ignored it or blamed it on the Saddam government. [We] effectively denied the entire population a means to live."

I said, "That's a shocking admission."

"Yes, I agree," he replied,

The first indictment against Dhafir contained 14 charges related only to the Iraq sanctions.

A lawyer for the Multicultural Association of Southern Oregon said the group's recent court victory...

EUGENE — Pete Seda will serve nearly three years in federal prison as a money launderer and tax-cheat but not as a financier of terrorism.

A Southern Oregon group has won a federal battle over its right to advocate for a now-defunct Ashland Al-Haramain chapter labeled a terrorist organization by the U.S. government.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday the Treasury Department correctly placed the Al-Haramain...

After substantial back and forth between the Treasury Department and the organization, in 2008 the government formally designated it as having connections to terrorism-related groups and activities.

A federal anti-terrorism agency violated the civil rights of an Islamic foundation in Oregon when it froze the group's assets without a warrant, the 9th Circuit ruled Friday.

Speaking of OFAC’s process for sanctions designations, the 9th Circuit has just ruled against it in a case involving...

WASHINGTON, Sept 23 (Reuters) - U.S. officials correctly designated an Islamic charity, Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation (AHIF) Oregon,...

A federal judge in Oregon denied a new trial for the leader of the U.S. branch of a now-defunct Islamic charity who was convicted of smuggling $150,000 that prosecutors said was intended for Muslim fighters in Chechnya.

In the early 1990s, evidence began to grow that it was funding Islamist militants in Somalia and Bosnia, and a 1996 CIA report detailed its Bosnian militant ties.

PORTLAND, Ore. (CN) - A naturalized citizen of Iranian descent says the FBI violated her privacy...

Pete Seda's lawyers will get their chance in open court to grill federal investigators in his money-laundering and tax-cheat case about why they failed to turn over evidence before the trial that the deceased husband of a witness against Seda was a paid FBI informant.

The federal government withheld basic information, failed to divulge evidence and otherwise denied...

Attorney David Cole made this argument before a US court during a hearing on Wednesday...

The ruling came in the case of Pete Seda, also known as Pirouz Sedaghaty, an Iranian-born U.S. citizen...

Pete Seda's Ashland charity had little recourse when the Treasury Department designated it a sponsor of terrorism. 

GRANTS PASS — A federal judge Thursday refused to open up the files of federal prosecutors sought by defense attorneys trying to win a new trial for an official of an Islamic charity.

GRANTS PASS — Federal prosecutors don’t want to turn over new evidence sought by lawyers demanding a new trial for an Ashland man convicted of tax fraud and conspiracy to help smuggle money to Muslim fighters in Chechnya.

The prosecution hasn't filed its response, and the assistant U.S. attorney who tried the case, Chris Cardani, said he could not comment.

SAN FRANCISCO – A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the U.S. government to pay more than $2.5 million...

Under cross-examination, Ignatchenko said the actual tape of that conversation had been destroyed as part of a Russian policy of destroying recordings after five years.

Pete Seda, the founder of an Islamic charity in Oregon, funneled $130,000 to an organization that required its graduates to commit acts of terrorism,...

Nelson, speaking by telephone from the US on Saturday, also said that in addition to convicting Seda,...

PORTLAND, OR—Last night, a jury in Eugene, Oregon, convicted the former leader of the U.S. Chapter of the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation...