Legendary British military historian John Keegan weighs in with an insightful criticism of the effect of modern international law (and especially institutions like the International Criminal Court) on the ability of a military to operate effectively. Reviewing the upcoming prosecutions of UK soldiers in UK courts, and perhaps in the ICC, he writes:The United States has been much denounced...
This piece does an decent job of trying to unpack the WTO's somewhat obscure dispute resolution system, which is now about to tackle the epic multibillion-dollar struggle between the U.S./Boeing and the EU/Airbus over aircraft subsidies. The WTO dispute resolution system is a hybrid between binding arbitration and a permanent stand alone court like the ICJ. The panelists are, as...
For those not already sick of the topic, I, along with Greg Fox of Wayne State, Andreas Paulus of the Institute for Public International Law in Munich, and others, have been continuing to discuss the AI report in the comments section here....
All right, it's not the Today Show, but for anyone in the New England area who might be interested (or curious what I sound like), I will be discussing Amnesty International's recent human rights report on "Nite Beat with Barry Nolan" around 7:30 p.m. tonight on CN8, which is part of The Comcast Network. Also featured will be the...
This report details a curious effort by a South African businessman to attach an expected forthcoming money judgment from the International Court of Justice in favor of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. DR Congo has filed a claim against Uganda in the International Court of Justice seeking reparations for Ugandan violations of Congo sovereignty. In theory, DR Congo might...
French voters decisively rejected the proposed EU Constitution today by a 57-43 margin. This doesn't mean the EU is dead, but it does probably mean that the EU Constitution, which was a treaty intended to push Europe into an "ever closer Union" is probably dead, at least in its current incarnation.We haven't blogged much about the EU here, but I...
Just as Congress attacks the U.S. for failings in its Container Security Initiative ("CSI"),, the leading post-Sept. 11 effort to tighten security checks on shipping into U.S. ports, the U.S. announces that it is trying to expand the CSI framework to encompass all of the members of the World Customs Organization. (Brazil signed on to the CSI just this week)The...
As Peggy notes, Amnesty International's annual report is almost certainly getting more press than usual because of its aggressive condemnation of U.S. policy toward detainees in Guantanamo Bay. In fact, it's a bit more than aggressive, as this statement by Amnesty U.S.A.'s director suggests, Amnesty is putting out a list of "torture architects" and is asking foreign jurisdictions to arrest...
The U.N. announced today that it would once again hold a "treaty" day this September during which countries would be encouraged to sign various multilateral treaties. This seems like a fairly pointless event, since countries can sign treaties whenever they want. I somehow doubt that they will do so just because the U.N. is offering drinks and hor d'oeuvres along...
The financing of international organizations is a complex question, but one thing is fairly predictable. Nations are less likely to make "voluntary" as opposed to "mandatory" contributions to international organizations. The Sierra Leone Special Court for War Crimes is discovering this reality the hard way, as the President of the Court reported to the U.N. Security Council this week. In...
Not that there was much doubt, but a key U.S. House of Representatives committee has approved continued U.S. membership in the WTO. Under U.S. law, every five years any member of Congress can petition the Congress to withdraw from the WTO. As in 2000, the unlikely coalition of Socialist Vermonter Bernie Sanders and Libertarian Texan Ron Paul have made such...
Seems like Japan can't cut a break these days. While the Chinese continue to thumb their nose at Japan's attention to the graves of its war criminals, Australia is protesting Japan's palns ot increase the number of whales it can hunt. In fact, Australia's opposition party is pushing the Australian government to sue Japan in the ICJ for...
