Events and Announcements:

Summer School

Al-Haq International Law Online Summer School Program: Al-Haq Center for Applied International Law is pleased to announce its Seventh International Law Summer School for professionals, legal researchers, post-graduates and academics in the fields of international law and human rights. The 2021 program will run entirely online through ten days from 31st May – 12th June 2021.

The summer school aims to assist professionals in developing a coherent understanding of the legal and human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) while closely studying the application of international law in the OPT. The summer school offers lectures by human rights professionals, civil society organizations and human rights groups on key human rights issues and trends of violations witnessed in the OPT. This year the program will take place online through morning and afternoon lectures in English.

Al-Haq’s summer school is a unique opportunity for professionals interested in the Palestinian context, the history and the future of the OPT and includes virtual field visits to a diverse number of locations, giving participants the chance to see and hear firsthand accounts of violations committed by different state and non-state actors.

Al-Haq is an independent Palestinian non-governmental human rights organization based in Ramallah, OPT. Established in 1979, Al-Haq’s mission is to protect and promote human rights and the rule of law in the. The organization monitors and documents violations of human rights, conducts legal research; human rights education; prepares reports, studies and interventions against the violations of international human rights and humanitarian law in the OPT; and undertakes advocacy before local, regional and international bodies. 

For more information about the Al-Haq Center for Applied International Law and the International Law Summer School, watch our introductory video here.

The ten-day online program will include sessions on various topics, including: 

• Historical overview of the Palestinian struggle; 
• International human rights framework applicable in the OPT;
• International humanitarian framework applicable in the OPT;
• Business and Human Rights in the OPT;
• Current human rights situation and developments in the OPT;
• The historic and ongoing displacement “Nakba” of the Palestinian people. 
• International accountability mechanisms;

The international law summer school is open to professionals and post-graduate students of law and related fields, legal scholars, human rights defenders and researchers. We encourage particularly the applicants and participation of professionals from the Arab region, from Palestinian origin and from other professionals that might have difficult or no-access to the country. The program can only accommodate a limited number of participants, it is free of charge and those participants attending all the sessions online will be granted a certificate of completion. 

Interested candidates should send their CV and a cover letter to: ilcenter[at]alhaq[dot]org, no later than the 9th of May. The selection and confirmation of participation will occur by the 15th of May. And the online program will run from 31 May – 12 June 2021. For more information, please contact: ilcenter[at]alhaq[dot]org.

Call for Papers

Call for submissions at ‘asia blogs’ for the Second Edition of the Symposium on Development Aid: ‘asia blogs’ is pleased to announce a call for submission for the Second Edition of the Symposium on ‘Development Aid: Charity, or an Oppressive Tool of Inequality?’ This Symposium is the extension of its first edition and invites papers from scholars from the Global South and elsewhere who are interested in critical international law scholarship on development aid, with the ultimate goal of finding reformative solutions that will ensure self-reliance of the Global South. Interested scholars can contribute to the Symposium within the deadline of 20th May 2021. The details regarding contributing to the blog can be found here.  

Reconceptualizing International Law Session 5 – Reconceptualizing International Economic Law: This series features leading academics and practitioners who will engage in critical thinking across the core topics of public international law to conceptualize practical measures and mechanisms to convert and transform normative foundations of justice into procedural and substantive realities for today’s world.

Session 5, to be held on Wednesday 5th May at 11AM EST, focuses on the system of international economic law, which has been scrutinized for its relationship with colonial power structures, and criticized for perpetuating imbalances of rights, including between States and between States and foreign investors. In an effort to re-balance the scales, some States have responded by withdrawing from bilateral and multilateral agreements or by rethinking their role in international trade.  This session will explore the historic roots of international economic law, the various critiques that have been made in relation to this branch of international law, and discuss proposals and practical solutions to reconceptualize its practice.

Panelists:

• Moderators: Ms. Charline Yim, Counsel, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, and Ms. Marryum Kahloon, Associate, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP
• Speaker 1: Prof. Margot Salomon, London School of Economics and Political Science
• Speaker 2: Prof. James Gathii, Wing-Tat Lee Chair of International Law, Loyola University of Chicago School of Law
• Speaker 3: Ms. Meriam Nazih Al-Rashid, Global Co-Chair of International Arbitration, Eversheds Sutherland (US) LLP
• Speaker 4: Prof. Fabio Morosini, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul School of Law.

This series is co-organized by Independent International Legal Advocates (IILA), the International Arbitration Group of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, and the TWAIL Seminar, at UCLA Law, and the Center for International Law, National University of Singapore. Registration for the Zoom webinar can be found here.

Call for abstracts: PluriCourts Research Conference on Compliance Mechanisms: PluriCourts issues this call for abstracts on the topic of “International Courts versus Compliance Mechanisms: Comparative advantages of non-compliance mechanisms and complaint procedures.”

In this project, we ask:

• Whether and why in some circumstances the use of more informal NCMs might be more effective to bring states into compliance with their treaty obligations or address situations of non-compliance than the recourse to ICTs for breach of a treaty;
• How NCMs and other means of dispute resolution, such as international courts, relate to each other; and
• What their comparative advantages and disadvantages are.

Contributions will be published in an edited volume by Cambridge University Press (tbc) or a special edition of a legal journal (tbc). This project is administered by Prof. Dr. Christina Voigt. The deadline for submission of abstracts is June 30, 2021. To learn more and apply, go here.

Call for Papers: The ISIL Yearbook of International Humanitarian and Refugee Law: The ISIL Yearbook of International Humanitarian and Refugee Law (IYBIHRL) is a quarterly journal, internationally refereed publication. The Editorial Board (EB) of ISIL YBIHRL is pleased to invite submissions for Volume 21, 2021, which is due to be published in December 2021. The EB welcomes both long in-depth articles and short articles, notes and commentaries, case note, recent development on any aspect of international humanitarian and refugee law. The EB particularly encourage submissions that are relevant to the developing countries, Asian and African approaches to International Humanitarian and Refugee Law and India.

Notes and commentaries should be between 3,000 to 7,000 words. Articles may be from 8,000 to 15,000 words. Submissions will be considered on a rolling basis. However, the closing date for submissions for Volume 21 (2021) is 15 August 2021.

Contributions must be original unpublished works and submission of contributions will be held to imply this. Manuscripts must be word-processed and in compliance with the IJIL guidelines. The guideline is available here. Submissions should be provided in English, using MS Word-compatible word processing software, and delivered by email to the Chief Editor/Managing Editor at yearbookisil[at]gmail[dot]com. For more details, go here.

Podcasts

New international law podcast: Borderline Jurisprudence: Başak Etkin (Univerité Paris II Panthéon Assas) and Kostia Gorobets (University of Groningen) launched a philosophy of international law podcast “Borderline Jurisprudence”. The podcast focuses on jurisprudential and philosophical issues of international law, international legal theory, and critical engagements with international law. The format of the podcast is interviews with international legal scholars and legal philosophers both on general questions and their current research. The first episodes, already available on all major podcast platforms, featured conversations with Prof. David Lefkowitz (University of Richmond) on “International Law and Jurisprudence”, Dr. Ntina Tzouvala (Australian National University) on “Critique and International Law”, and Prof. Adil Haque (Rutgers University) on “Morality and International Law”. Episodes come out twice a month.

If you would like to post an announcement on Opinio Juris, please contact John Heieck at eventsandannouncements[at]gmail[dot]com with a one-paragraph description of your announcement along with hyperlinks to more information. Failure to provide said information may result in delayed posting of your announcement. Thank you!