Here is a photo of Hitler you probably haven't seen: Strange, isn't it? We are used to seeing Hitler in black-and-white, not color. And that's the way Hitler wanted it, according to the Telegraph (UK) article about the photo:The Nazi leader believed that traditional black and white photographs best highlighted the sinister nature of his regime, presenting dramatic images...
I am at the AALS conference in New York and don't have as much time to blog as I would like, but I want to flag a critically important recent decision by a magistrate judge in the Eastern District of New York holding that human-rights groups have the same right as journalists to protect the confidentiality of their sources:A United...
As I have written before, the US has done much to minimize the unfairness of the Iraqi High Tribunal. Unfortunately, it has done exactly the opposite regarding Bilal Hussein, the Pulitzer-Prize winning AP photojournalist who has been imprisoned by the US military since April 2006 — most of the time without charge — and is only now facing prosecution...
I'm normally loathe to link to stories most readers will likely find themselves, but I'm making an exception for The Bush Administration's Top 10 Stupidest Legal Arguments of 2007, put together by my friend and law-school classmate Dahlia Lithwick. Here are the headings, arranged by increasing stupidity:10. The NSA's eavesdropping was limited in scope. 9. Scooter Libby's sentence was commuted...
I often wonder, as I sit happily ensconced in my ivory tower, what the world of international criminal law looks like to the average American. I now have my answer, courtesy of Rush Hour 3, perhaps the first Hollywood movie since Judgment at Nuremberg to revolve around the fast-paced, sexy world of ICL. The opening scene of the film takes...
President Bush has signed the Genocide Accountability Act of 2007. As I noted last month, the Act provides for conditional universal jurisdiction over the crime of genocide. 18 USC sec. 1091 previously provided as follows:(a) Basic Offense.— Whoever, whether in time of peace or in time of war, in a circumstance described in subsection (d) and with...
Noted without sarcastic comment:The Serbian Defense Ministry has announced an agreement to sell $230 million in military equipment to Iraq. In September and November, Defense Minister Abdul-Qadir al-Obaidi became the first top Iraqi official to visit Belgrade since the fall of Slobodan Milosevic. Milosevic had close ties to fellow former dictator, Saddam Hussein of Iraq. During his trips, Obaidi discussed developing a...
I thought that I Am Legend was at the top of my Christmas movie list — but then I read about My Enemy's Enemy, a new documentary by Kevin Macdonald that explores the possibility that the capture and subsequent murder of Che Guevara in Bolivia was orchestrated by...
It's been a tough December for Alberto Fujimori, the former President of Peru. Two weeks ago, a Peruvian court sentenced him to six years in prison for ordering an illegal warrantless search of an apartment owned by the wife of his murderous intelligence chief, Vladimiro Montesinos — the first time a former Peruvian head of state has been convicted...
I don't know very much about French legal education, but I'm still surprised by this article, which claims that because France lacks a first-rate law school, the most prestigious French law firms are now requiring their new hires to have an American or British law degree:It isn't easy for corporate law firms to find qualified law-school graduates in the land...
It is difficult to imagine what the Nuremberg Trial would have been like without Justice Robert Jackson. I still get chills when I read the final paragraph of his summation, which ranks as one of the great closing arguments in legal history:[T]hese defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring...
I have posted a substantially revised and expanded version of my essay "What Happens to the Acquitted?" on SSRN. Here again is the abstract of the essay, which is forthcoming in the Leiden Journal of International Law:According to the ICTR, Emmanuel Bagambiki is an innocent man. The Trial Chamber and the Appeals chamber have each unanimously acquitted the former...
