John Bellinger makes a solid observation in the NYT on the Obama Administration's general approach to international law. The bottom line: Obama is basically the same as Bush (at least during the second term) on international law. Last month marked the one-year anniversary of President Obama’s first signature foreign policy initiative: the issuance of three executive orders ordering the closure of the...
The UN special tribunal to investigate the murder of Lebanese leader Rafik Hariri seemed like a good idea at the time it was established, back in 2005. Some folks claimed it vindicated the role of the UN in resolving this kinds of delicate political disputes. But the opposite has turned out to be the case. Half a decade later, however, the...
Dapo Akande, who seems to know more about head of state immunity than anyone else, has an interesting post on the recent ICC Appeals Chamber non-decision decision in the case against Sudan's President Bashir. He points out that the Appeals Chamber failed to even mention the question of head of state immunity, which is important in this case because as...
The Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS), in partnership with ASIL and the One Earth Future Foundation, have released a report entitled: "Suppressing Maritime Piracy: Exploring the Options in International Law". It is a useful report, and it is the product of a very smart and knowledgeable group of international law experts including friends of this blog like...
The UN's new temporary quarters, during renovations, are not too popular with the staff. For the next four years, the United Nations' nerve center, including Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's office, will be situated in a squat, three-story, corrugated steel building on the U.N.'s north lawn that looks like a cross between a suburban big-box store and a high-security lockup facility. Bantánamo, a nickname embraced...
Last week, the U.S. and Canada reached an agreement to permit Canadian firms to bid on projects funded by U.S. stimulus money based on the legislation enacted last year. The confusing part is just how exactly this will occur. According to CTV, Canadian firms will be exempted from "Buy American" restrictions under seven of the stimulus programs, in 37 U.S. states...
Apparently, the Obama Administration has decided it will not seek ratification of the ICC Rome Statute. There is still no official policy, as far as I know, but this is the latest from Assistant Secretary of State for War Crimes Stephen Rapp. This is not exactly a surprise, but it shows just how far the U.S. is from the Rome...
The NY Times Opinionator has a nice roundup of lefty-blog reaction to the Obama Administration's claim of the legal authority to kill and assassinate U.S. citizens abroad (and its admission to having already done so). Most lefty-blogs seem unconcerned about this policy, with the notable exception of Glenn Greenawald. From a legal perspective, the relative lack of outrage among the...
As Kevin notes, the ICC Appeals Chamber has overruled the Pre-Trial Chamber on the question of whether Sudan's President Bashir can be charged with genocide. In a very useful note, Chile Eboe-Osuji points out here that the Appeals Chamber did not in fact provide the Pre-Trial Chamber with guidance on what standard it should adopt to determine whether there was...
I've been on blog-silence the last few months, but one of my students today made me feel a little guilty about my lack of blogging, so I'm back (at least for now). So while not wanting to interrupt this great online symposium, I'll just point our readers to this remarkable little exchange between U.S. Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair...
I don't know what I think about this report by two Switzerland-based NGOs analyzing a number of popular video games for their consistency with rules of international humanitarian law (h/t kotaku). Apparently, many video games encourage blatant and unrepentant violations of the laws of war. In the scenes, there seems to be no assessment of proportionality in the attacks realised in...
James Comey and Jack Goldsmith provide here the best (although not completely convincing) defense of the decision to try KSM in New York. I agree that the most defensible explanation is that military commissions remain constitutionally vulnerable, hence it makes sense to use the civilian courts for your most important cases. I don't quite buy this, but I think this...
