Weekend Roundup: March 1-8, 2014

This week on Opinio Juris, we continued to follow the situation in Ukraine as it unfolded with an insta-symposium. Alexander Cooley gave an overview of the power politics at play, while Chris posted about Russia’s use of legal rhetoric as a politico-military strategy, and about how language affects the evolution of international law. This last post built on a discussion between Julian and Peter in which Julian argued that the crisis shows the limits of international law, while Peter took aim at the Perfect Compliance Fallacy.

Further issues of compliance with international law were raised by Aurel Sauri, who analysed when the breach of a Status of Forces Agreement amounts to an act of aggression, by Mary Ellen O’Connell’s post on Ukraine under international law, and by Julian who asked whether a Crimean referendum on secession would be contrary to international law. In a follow-up post on the referendum, Chris surveyed the current state of international law on the right to secede and self-determination. In response to a reader’s comment, Chris also delved into the issue of recognition to figure out who speaks for Ukraine.

Peter examined the legality of Russia’s extension of citizenship to non-resident native Russian speakers and pointed to the legal basis for President Obama’s decision to impose entry restrictions in response to the Ukrainian crisis.

In other news, Julian asked why the US did not call the knife attack in the Kunming railway station a terrorist attack, Charles Blanchard provided a guest post on autonomous weapons, and Duncan updated us on the US Supreme Court’s latest treaty interpretation case.

Finally, Jessica wrapped up the news and listed events and announcements.

Many thanks to our guest contributors and have a nice weekend!