Fantastic news: New York – A federal appeals court vacated an order Monday by a New York judge that barred an $18 billion judgment in Ecuador against Chevron Inc. for contaminating the Amazon. The three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had previously expressed skepticism that a New York judge could wield jurisdiction outside...
It is hard to know how seriously to take this report, or even if it is accurate. But if it is accurate, this could be trouble for the U.S. drone strike program in Pakistan. ISLAMABAD: Human Rights Ministry (HRM) has decided to take up matter of drone attacks with United Nations under international humanitarian law and file an official complain to...
Philip Alston has posted an important new essay on targeted killing on SSRN. Here is the abstract of the essay, which is forthcoming in the Harvard National Security Journal: This Article focuses on the accountability of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in relation to targeted killings, under both United States law and international law. As the CIA, often...
I don't know very much about the individual prosecutors, but the lineup doesn't exactly strike me as indicative of an anti-African, neo-colonialist international organization: Ms Adesola Adeboyejo is to handle the Muthaura hearings for the Office of the Prosecutor. Adeboyejo has worked at the International Criminal Court for Rwanda (ICTR) as a prosecutor and handled the case against Pauline Nyiramasukuko...
International lawyers from outside the U.S. often wonder why exactly the U.S. has yet to join the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. This is a good question, since most U.S. international lawyers support joining the treaty, they are not usually able to give a fair description of the basis for opposing the convention. I am a squish...
In addition to Brennan’s fascinating remarks on targeting, etc. last night, which Marty reprints below, he took occasion to address the legislation now pending in Congress that aims to guide (to use a word) U.S. terrorism detention operations. For those who lost track over the summer, when last we left off, both houses of Congress were considering bills that...
The first part of John Brennan's speech, as I explain below, is an explication of the Administration's understanding of the U.S. armed conflict with al-Qaida and its co-belligerents, the legal constraints governing our use of force, and the self-imposed parameters of the government's use of force outside of "hot battlefields." That is to say, it is a description of the...
In his speech last evening, Deputy National Security Advisor John Brennan clarified and strengthened a number of important points that the Obama Administration had previously articulated or suggested, and helpfully tied them together to provide a more comprehensive account of the President's counterterrorism approach, particularly with respect to the U.S. commitment, emphasized by Brennan, on adherence to the rule of...
One of the most remarkable aspects of how conservative U.S. scholars approach international law is their absolute certainty that the American position on extraordinarily difficult issues is always correct. Consider, for example, Jack Goldsmith's articulation today of when the UN Charter permits the U.S. to use force in self-defense against non-state actors: If the president is authorized to use force against...
John Brennan just finished delivering this speech at the Harvard Law School. I believe it is the most comprehensive single statement of the Obama Administration's policies and practices with respect to al Qaeda and other terrorist threats. There's a lot of material here that will be of interest to OJ readers. I will use boldface to identify what seem to...
Something I learned about while I was in China is that China claims, as a matter of international law, that it has "indisputable sovereignty" over most of the (oil-rich) South China Sea. This graphic illustrates the scope of China's sovereignty claims. China hasn't had a navy that could enforce this claim, until now. So Vietnam and the Philippines have been...
Peter Margulies (Roger Williams) responded to my blogging about criminal membership and al-Bahlul at Lawfare. I wrote a response, which Lawfare's Bobby Chesney was kind enough to post for me. Instead of reposting the lengthy exchange here, interested readers should check out the posts at Lawfare. You can find Peter's original post here, and my response here. Feel free to...
