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Akhmed Zakaev was an envoy of the Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov. Zakaev was arrested in the UK in 2002 and his extradition was requested by the Russian Federation. The Russian Federation alleged that during the First Chechen War (1994-1996), Zakaev committed murder, wounding, false imprisonment (imprisonment not made in accordance with the law), and conspiring. On 13 November 2003, the Bow Street Magistrates' Court declined to extradite Zakaev because the Court feared he would be subjected to torture and would not receive a fair trial if he would be brought back to the Russian Federation.

In the aftermath of the 1970 Chilean presidential elections, General Rene Schneider was killed as several military officers attempted to kidnap him. His sons allege that Henry Kissinger, then National Security Advisor to president Nixon, knew of the plans to kidnap Schneider and did nothing to stop it. The Court did not allow the case to proceed, stating that the claim made by Schneider’s sons could not be viewed separately from the context of US foreign policy at that time and that the judge should not rule on this.  Questions regarding foreign policy, the Court reasoned, should remain strictly within the domain of politics. Also, the Court held that Kissinger had acted within the constraints of his position of National Security Adviser and that therefore the defendant should be the United States, not Kissinger personally. However, the Court held that the United States enjoyed immunity for the alleged crimes. Therefore, the case was dismissed.

Indonesia had illegally occupied East Timor since 1975 in a climate of tension between the Indonesian’s who favoured continued occupation and the Timorese who favoured independence. Following the referendum of 1999 in which an overwhelming majority of Timorese voted in favour of independence, hostilities escalated between the Indonesian Armed Forces and associated militias, and the independence supporters.

In the context of these hostilities, the Accused (all members of the Sakunar militia) killed two independence supporters – one was attacked with a machete and the other was beaten to death. A third was also severely beaten in plain view of his entire village.

The Special Panels for Serious Crimes convicted all the Accused for the crimes against humanity of murder and other inhumane acts; Cab, Fuli and Lelan were sentenced to 5 years’ imprisonment, Cloe to 4 years. At sentencing, the Court considered that the Accused were victims of the circumstances themselves and attributed responsibility to the Indonesian Armed Forces who pitted local populations against each other in order to secure their power over the Timorese.

Eleven Guantanamo detainees petitioned for habeas corpus, claiming that their continued detention without a right to judicial review was unlawful.

The Court partly agreed with the detainees. While they are not US citizens, they are being held under control of the US government. The fact that Guantanamo Bay is conveniently placed outside US sovereign territory does not change this. Hence, Guantanamo detainees have the right not to be deprived of liberty without due process of law, a fundamental constitutional right. This right had been violated, and the Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) procedures were found unconstitutional. And regarding alleged Taliban fighters, the Court held that they are state forces - regular soldiers or combatants - and should therefore receive prisoner of war-status and -protection under the Third Geneva Convention. Where they had not received such protection without proper reasons, their detention was illegal.

All other claims (based on the Sixth, Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment and the Alien Tort Claims Act) were rejected, they were inapplicable on the current cases.

Léon Mugesera, a former politician of the party the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development (MRND) in Rwanda, fled Rwanda in 1993 – before the actual start of the Rwandan genocide in 1994 – after the authorities had issued an arrest warrant against him for incitement to genocide and murder, as he had given one of the first inflammatory public speeches that eventually led to the genocide. Mugesera, together with his wife and their five children, sought asylum in Canada, which was granted. However, in 1995, the Immigration and Refugee Board became aware of the arrest warrant and issued an order to deport Mugesera to Rwanda for trial.

After several years of litigation, the Federal Court of Appeal held that the deportation order should not have been issued as there was not sufficient evidence that Mugesera had indeed been involved in the Rwandan genocide as alleged. However, the Canadian Supreme Court quashed this decision on 28 June 2005, ruling that the Court of Appeal had applied an incorrect standard of review and that, in fact, the Immigration and Refugee Board had been right all along. The deportation order was affirmed.