The United Nations Human Rights Commission is an easy target for UN critics, but this doesn't mean that they don't deserve the disdain and contempt that is usually heaped on them. Case in point: eight UN human rights experts have issued a statement condemning the current US-Russia sponsored "Road Map" talks between Israel and Palestine because the negotiations currently do...
This report suggests that the international and domestic human rights groups have turned up the pressure on Iraq's new government to join the ICC. Indeed, this report indicates that the Iraqis drafting their permanent constitution are considering an "international law" supremacy clause that would subordinate domestic Iraqi laws, including constitutional laws, to international treaties, thereby giving institutions like the...
It's ICJ selection season with five of the 15 ICJ seats open for replacement. New Zealand is fast out of the box, as this article suggests, by sending its candidate on a global tour to drum up support. Of course, this is very early because, as I understand it, the selection won't be made until the fall of 2006 with...
I don't really understand why Bolton's nomination (and now recess appointment) has drawn so much criticism and, for that matter, why conservatives are so excited about his nomination. Bolton appears to be a smart, experienced, conservative guy. He isn't going to figuratively blow up the U.N., but he isn't going to go out of his way to be nice to...
Despite my lame attempt to make my blogging hiatus mysterious, I’ve decided to admit that I’ve spent the last two weeks in the least foreign foreign country that exists in the world for most Americans: Canada. Indeed, for many foreigners, Canadians and Americans have indistinguishable accents and might as well be compatriots (an idea that I’ve broached previously here ).To...
My blogging will be very light over the next two weeks as my wife and I retreat to a more or less undisclosed foreign location. We'll see whether I can stay away for long...
It looks like Justice O'Connor is not going to slow down much in retirement. As this article notes, she spent last week attending a conference of the Central and Eastern European Legal Initative (CEELI) in Istanbul. Apparently, Justice O'Connor is passionate about building and promoting independent judiciaries in the former Eastern Bloc and Soviet Union. Interestingly, she herself...
As I predicted back in April, a panel of the D.C. Circuit unanimously rejected constitutional and treaty-based challenges to a trial of alleged terrorists by military commission. The decision reversed a lower court's finding that the whole military commission system is a violation of the Geneva Convention. The D.C. Circuit's key holdings:The Sept 11 Resolution for the Authorization of the...
This week Japan granted undersea gas drilling rights to an area also claimed by China. This is a separate dispute from Japan's attempt to convert a rock into a Tokyo address. But it is another serious irritant in what is an increasingly contentious and dangerous relationship.Why can't Japan and China agree to submit their dispute to the ICJ like Benin...
While some (mostly right-wing) groups continue to worry about the transfer of "sovereignty " to the UN in treaties like that for the Law of the Sea Treaty, there is a far more important international struggle afoot: control of the internet.As CNET reports, a recent meeting of the U.N.'s Working Group on Internet Governance turned into a gripe-session where various...
I just wanted to thank those readers who have added very thoughtful comments to my post on deterrence and international criminal justice here. For those of you who haven't seen the comments, I hope you find time to take a look and maybe drop a few comments yourself....
A Chamber of the ICJ issued a decision today (only the summary is available so far) in the long-running border dispute between Niger and Benin. The Court awarded Niger 16 out of 25 disputed islands, including the largest island, lying in the Niger River on the border between the two countries. The two countries have been squabbling over...
