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16 Oct

[ Jens Iverson is a Researcher for the ‘Jus Post Bellum’ project at the Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies, part of the Law Faculty of the University of Leiden.] The debate on the legality of a U.S. strike in Syrian territory is unlikely to produce consensus, in part because those involved in the debate take fundamentally different approaches to international law. Unless the underlying commitments of each approach are brought to the foreground, contributors to the debate risk talking past each other. As a result, an important opportunity will...
16.10.13 | |

06 Nov

[Jens Iverson is a Researcher for the ‘Jus Post Bellum’ project at the Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies, part of the Law Faculty of the University of Leiden.] Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have recently published reports (AI, HRW) regarding drone strikes. They are admirable. They further the debate on the legality of drone strikes. (This debate continues on Opinio Juris and elsewhere by Deborah Pearlstein, Ryan Goodman, and Kevin Jon Heller amongst others.) Each report provides unique reporting and strong legal arguments on an important issue. There...
06.11.13 | |

03 Oct

...assert that recklessness is not included on the spectrum of mens rea for war crimes in international law, at least not in the context of potential violations involving targeting scenarios. Second, I conclude that the airstrike was not in fact “reckless” in either the legal or colloquial sense. Like Jens, the point of embarkation for my analysis is the Rome Statute. Also like Jens, my analysis begins with the expression of the distinction principle reflected in the treaty. Unlike Jens, though, my analysis of the Kunduz airstrike does not extend...
03.10.20 | |

03 May

however, this situation does not exist. As long as the defendant whose attack harms a civilian population meant to attack only a legitimate military objective, his knowledge that the attack would incidentally harm a civilian population would not qualify as the war crime of intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population. He would be guilty of that crime only if he meant to attack the civilian population itself. Your thoughts, Jens? NOTE: This post generally takes the same position Adil Haque took in a series of comments on Jens’s post....
03.05.16 | |

04 Jun

[Craig Martin is Associate Professor of Law at Washburn University School of Law, and author of another of the chapters in Targeted Killings] This post is part of the Targeted Killings Book Symposium. Other posts in this series can be found in the related posts below. Jens Ohlin’s chapter in Targeted Killings, “Targeting Co-Belligerents,” provides an important analysis of one of the key questions in the targeted killing debate, and makes a persuasive argument in favor of one possible response to it. In doing so, however, I wonder if it...
04.06.12 | |

18 Jan

Gabor Rona posted a response to Jens Ohlin yesterday. Jens responded at LieberCode — and now Gabor has responded to Jens’s response (and John Dehn’s comment on his OJ post). Here is what Jens wrote (reposted with permission): Many thanks to Gabor Rona for taking the time to continue this conversation. There’s a lot in Rona’s post, but I want to cut to the heart of the conceptual issue here regarding the inter-operation of these bodies of law. In terms of the relationship between IHL and IHRL, and the notion...
18.01.12 | |

01 May

...whether civilians were the object of the attack, not whether they died as a result of an attack. Martin Lederman Jens: I've only just glanced through the report, but noticed that it does appear to conclude that there were violations of the requirements of precaution, distinction and proportionality, wholly apart from any criminal culpability. Is that your understanding? Adil Haque I agree with Zach Jens David Ohlin This doesn't solve the problem because knowledge is a higher mental state than recklessness. In a situation where the attacking force is aware...
01.05.16 | |

04 Jun

[ Jens David Ohlin is an Associate Professor of Law at Cornell Law School; he blogs at LieberCode .] This post is part of the Targeted Killings Book Symposium. Other posts in this series can be found in the related posts below. In his comments to my chapter “Targeting Co-Belligerents,” Craig Martin asks a very pertinent question: Is the US really in an armed conflict with al-Qaeda? Or, more abstractly, can a state ever be in an armed conflict with a non-state terrorist organization? Martin is correct to assume that...
04.06.12 | |

02 Sep

It is my great pleasure to announce that Jens Ohlin, Professor of Law at Cornell, is joining Opinio Juris as its newest masthead member. (Astute readers will have noticed he was added there yesterday!) I doubt Jens needs much introduction, but here is a snippet from his Cornell bio anyway: Professor Ohlin specializes in international law and all aspects of criminal law, including domestic, comparative, and international criminal law. His latest book, The Assault on International Law , forthcoming from Oxford University Press, challenges the prevailing American hostility towards international...
02.09.14 | |

05 Mar

Chesney, introducing Kevin’s guest post at Lawfare, links the earlier posts.) There is an important voice taking part only indirectly in the Lawfare discussion, however – Jens Ohlin. I earlier flagged at Lawfare a new piece by Jens on exactly this question, “The Duty to Capture,” that reaches, as Kevin has noted, a conclusion almost diametrically opposite to Ryan’s. So much so that when I tagged it as a “Readings” at Lawfare, I suggested that the title might benefit from a question mark – The Duty to Capture? The debate...
05.03.13 | |

06 May

[Jens Iverson is a Researcher for the ‘Jus Post Bellum’ project and an attorney specializing in public international law, Universiteit Leiden.] I would like to thank Opinio Juris for the opportunity to discuss the contrast between Transitional Justice and Jus Post Bellum . This is a subject I have explored in Jus Post Bellum: Mapping the Normative Foundations , in the International Journal of Transitional Justice , and in Jens David Ohlin’s blog, Lieber Code . I begin with basic definitions of each term, and then briefly discuss the application,...
06.05.14 | |

15 Jan

...in the Court, as a subject of international law, committing a breach of international law. This is Walter's point and, I gather, Guillermo's point as well. Daniel I meant "qua UN Members under art. 103 of the Charter" not "art. 113 of the Statute", of course. Jens Iverson I realize Kevin wasn’t speaking to me, but for fun (and since my answer seems to differ from Jens David Ohlin’s): Kevin poses six Chapter VII hypotheticals: (1) the Security Council passes a resolution demanding that Sudan ratify the Rome Statute; (2)...
15.01.13 | |