Irish president Mary McAleese has signed the Defamation Bill 2006 and the Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009 into law. The Defamation Bill updates Ireland’s defamation law, aims to encourage quicker apologies from publishers and renews the offence of blasphemy provided for under 1960s legislation, while the Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009  allows for the greater use of non-jury trials in suspected gangland criminal cases. Both have proved controversial with the Defamation Bill provoking outcry over its inclusion of a charge of blasphemous libel. Read more here