Lawyers celebrated outside the court, chanting "Go, Musharraf, go!" The decision also prompted celebrations by hundreds of lawyers in major cities, including Karachi, Multan, Faisalabad, Quetta, Peshawar and Rawalpindi.

"Thank God, we got justice," said Ahsan Bhund, president of the Lahore High Court Bar Association, as he marched with 500 other lawyers.

The court also quashed charges of misconduct against Chaudhry that Musharraf had sent to a separate judicial tribunal. The decision was a surprise — many had expected the court to reinstate the judge while letting the investigation continue.

In a brief statement, a spokesman for Musharraf said he accepted the ruling by presiding Justice Khalil-ur-Rehman Ramday that the president's order suspending Chaudhry was "set aside as being illegal."

"The president respects the decision of the Supreme Court," Musharraf's spokesman, Rashid Qureshi, was quoted as saying by state-run Associated Press of Pakistan. "The president has stated earlier that any judgment the Supreme Court arrives at will be honored, respected and adhered to."

Exiled former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto declared it to be one of the most remarkable judgments in the history of Pakistan's judiciary.

The movement in support of Chaudhry had "turned into struggle against dictatorship, (for the) restoration of the Constitution and for supremacy of the Parliament," she said in a statement.

At the State Department, deputy spokesman Tom Casey said the reinistatement was in keeping with constitutional procedures and "respects the rule of law."

A Kremlin spokesman has promised a "targeted" response to Britain's expulsion of four Russian diplomats, raising the stakes in a dispute over the murder probe of a former KGB spy.

Russian deputy foreign minister Alexander Grushko briefed reporters in Moscow Tuesday, a day after Britain announced the explusions. Grushko told the Itar-Tass news agency to anticipate the Russian government's response to Britain's "provocative" move "in the very near future."

Grushko said it would be a "targeted and appropriate" response, but would not give further details other than to add that Russia's action would take into account "the interests of ordinary people and businessmen."

Analysts have said it is likely Russia will reciprocate by evicting British diplomats in Russia, but that they will stop short of hitting back at British business interests in Russia — a move that could be costly for both countries.

Meanwhile in London, a spokesman with the Foreign Office told reporters that "no reprisal on behalf of Russia would be justified."

The diplomatic row is rooted in the British investigation into the slaying of former KGB spy and fierce Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko, who was poisoned by the radioactive isotope polonium-210 while dining at a London hotel on Nov. 1, 2006.

British prosecutors believe that Andrei Lugovoi, another former KGB agent who met with Litvinenko that day, is a prime suspect and they want him extradited to stand trial in London.

But Russia has refused to co-operate, arguing that it is against its constitution to extradite citizens wanted for crimes in foreign nations.

In retaliation, Britain's Foreign Ministry announced Monday that it was ordering four Russian diplomats to leave London to show the country is serious about prosecuting Lugovoi for what British Foreign Secretary David Miliband called a "heinous" crime.

"This response is proportional and it is clear at whom it is aimed," Miliband said Monday.

Britain has reportedly sent a list of four names threatened with expulsions to Russian officials, but Russia said it would wait for Britain to follow through with the expulsions before acting.

Raised on fear and depression, children of Holocaust survivors say the Nazi terror has crossed generations, and want the German government to pay for their psychiatric care.

On Monday, Israelis who call themselves second generation survivors are filing a class action suit in a Tel Aviv court against the German government to finance therapy.

Thousands of people from Holocaust families are incapable of working, live with an irrational fear of starvation and suffer incapacitating bouts of depression, said Baruch Mazor, the director of the Fisher Fund which is filing the suit.

Mazor said 4 to 5 percent of the 400,000 children of survivors in Israel require treatment. Since many cannot hold steady jobs, they cannot pay for their own treatment, and aid from the Israeli government and health insurance has been inadequate, he said.

The suit seeks to set up a German-financed fund to pay for biweekly therapy sessions for 15,000 to 20,000 people, or about US$10 million (€7.3 million) annually for three years.

It was unclear what standing the Israeli court would have in a damages case against a foreign country.

Mazor said the Tel Aviv suit was a first step aimed at winning recognition that Germany should bear responsibility for the suffering of survivors' children. Armed with that ruling, the plaintiffs would try to negotiate a settlement, or would take their case to a German or an international court, he said.

Since the 1950s, Germany has paid more than US$60 billion (€44 billion) in reparations to concentration camp survivors, families of the some of the 6 million Jewish victims, and to the state of Israel. Much of that money went to the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, a New York-based organization that negotiates with Germany and distributes the payments.

Mazor said money handled by the Claims Conference is earmarked for survivors, and their children did not want to detract from those funds.

Instead, they wanted "recognition and responsibility of the German government" for their problems, he said.

The German Foreign Ministry declined comment.

But Germany was likely to see the suit as opening an indefinite channel for future claims, just as the generation that lived through the Holocaust was reaching its end.

The suit claims the second generation grew up "in the shadow of depression, grief and guilt of their parents, which created a powerful inclination among the children for paid and suffering."

Children had a "twisted relationship with their parents" that impeded their development and led to severe psychological problems, the suit claims.

One 58-year-old woman told her story to Israel Radio Sunday, saying the fear of starvation experienced by her parents in Auschwitz, where inmates prized any crust of bread they could obtain, had been passed on to her.

"I have and had obsession over food, especially bread," said the woman. "If you come to my house and open the freezer, loaves of bread fall on you, without any proportion to what I really need."

She declined to disclose her name, but Mazor said she spoke for thousands.

She had no childhood, she said, but felt as if she jumped directly into adolescence. "In our house it was forbidden to exhibit pain or say that you are sad. My father taught us not to show people how we feel, that it is forbidden to show people you are hurt, or that things are hard for you. And this was very, very hard," said the woman.

The feeling conveyed by her father was: "I went through hell, and what you are going through is nothing."

Others of the second generation say they cannot ride buses because it reminds them of the transports their parents took to the concentration camps, or they fear dogs because they were used by the Nazis to control crowds.

Mazor said the Fisher Fund, a charity representing the second generation, held lengthy negotiations with the German Embassy over the compensation claims, but the talks were cut off by the Germans.

A court sentenced 35 opposition politicians and activists to life in prison and denied them the right to vote or run for public office for inciting violence in an attempt to overthrow the government, a judge said Monday.

The prosecution had called for death sentences against the defendants, who included Ethiopia's top opposition leaders and five people charged, tried and convicted in absentia. Another eight defendants facing similar charges were sentenced to between 18 months and 18 years in prison, said Judge Adil Ahmed, reading the sentences on behalf of the three-judge panel.

International human rights groups had widely condemned the trial as an attempt to silence government critics, and opposition leaders have claimed it was politically motivated. In a statement Monday, Amnesty International said it was dismayed at the life sentences.

"On the basis of the information we have, most — if not all — of those sentenced today are prisoners of conscience imprisoned on account of their opinions, who have not used or advocated violence and should therefore be immediately and unconditionally released," Erwin van der Borght, director of Amnesty's Africa program, said in the statement.

The judges declined to follow the recommendation of the prosecution to hand down the death penalty, Adil said.

"The court has deemed life imprisonment as a comprehensive and sufficient verdict for the actions taken," he said.

All those sentenced to life imprisonment have also been permanently denied the right to vote or run for office. Those given lesser sentences were banned from office for five years.

The judges also ordered the closure of three publishing companies and fined each of them between US$1,700 and US$13,600.

Those facing life imprisonment include the leader of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, Hailu Shawel; Berhanu Nega, who was elected mayor of Addis Ababa; former Harvard scholar Mesfin Woldemariam; and former U.N. special envoy and a former professor at Virginia's Norfolk State University, Yacob Hailemariam.

The Federal High Court trial began in December 2005 following postelection violence that erupted during protests over balloting six months earlier.

The opposition won an unprecedented number of parliamentary seats in the 2005 vote, but Prime Minister Meles Zenawi held onto power. The opposition claimed the voting was rigged, and European Union observers said they were marred by irregularities.

Initially, the opposition leaders, journalists and others were charged with treason, inciting violence and attempted genocide. Judges dropped the treason and attempted genocide charges in April and later that month freed 25 prisoners, among them eight journalists.

Since April, a total of 43 people faced four other charges, but only nine chose to put up a defense.

Late last year, Ethiopia acknowledged that its security forces killed 193 civilians protesting alleged election fraud, but insisted they did not use excessive force. A senior judge appointed to investigate the violence had accused the security forces of excessive force.

London-based law firm CMS Cameron McKenna is to make almost half of its IT staff redundant as part of plans to outsource more work to India.

After embarking on a review of its IT operations at the end of last year, the law firm has now signed a £10m deal with Indian outsourcing company HCL.

CMS Cameron McKenna's IT services will now be delivered by a combination of in-house IT workers and dedicated HCL staff in London and Chennai, India.

Before the changes the size of CMS Cameron McKenna's IT department was 70 people, which included around 20 non-IT print room staff. Now that figure will be almost halved to 40 people as part of the outsourcing deal.

A spokesman for CMS Cameron McKenna said the consultation process is still ongoing but added that 20 IT staff will be made redundant and around 10 will transfer across to HCL. The moves are expected to be finalised over the next few weeks.

The spokesman said: "The target was to get a more flexible and highly skilled workforce to assist us with future development. There are cost issues as well."

Philip Rooke, head of IT at CMS Cameron McKenna, said the decision to make staff redundant was "not taken lightly".

He said in a statement: "We have been at pains to keep staff informed and consulted both within the department and with the firm's Staff Council throughout this review."

While some dedicated on-site IT support will remain in-house, HCL will be responsible for CMS Cameron McKenna's data-centre support, network, security and managed desktop services and application development, support and management.

The move comes after concerns by the president of the Law Society and the Solicitors’ Association of Higher Court Advocates that they are treated as second-class citizens when it comes to court dress.

The 2,000 solicitor-advocates are not allowed to wear wigs and also wear different robes — a simple black gown.

Kevin Martin, president of the Law Society, says that for some years solicitor-advocates have argued for parity with barristers: either there are no wigs at all or both kinds of advocate wear the same costume.

In a letter to the Lord Chief Justice, he says: “The difference can lead to solicitoradvocates being seen as inferior to barristers. Jurors may form the impression that a non-wigged lawyer is less credible.”

The problem is heightened by differences in mode of address: barristers describe each other as “my learned friend” but solicitor-advocates as “my friend”. Solicitors are concerned that the rules could be a breach of competition law.

Mr Martin says: “There are instances of clients indicating that they do not mind who the advocate is, as long as they wear a wig.”

While there is backing for reform, the public — and many criminal barristers — support keeping wigs in criminal trials. Any move to scrap wigs might make an exception for criminal trials. Mark Clough, QC, chairman of the Solicitors’ Association of Higher Court Advocates and one of only a handful of solicitor Queen’s Counsel who anomalously wear the same robes as barristers, says: “We have always argued for parity — with or without wigs.”

Lord Phillips favours a simple black gown and faulard or collar. Stephen Hockman, QC, the chairman of the Bar, is also believed to favour reform.