There is a fascinating article in the Guardian (UK) today discussing a number of UK criminal cases in which defendants charged with destroying or vandalizing military property were able to use the illegality of the Iraq war to argue the defense of necessity. An Irish case is particularly striking: Last year, five peace campaigners were acquitted after using an...
Over at National Security Advisors, my friend Tung Yin has a post about the sentencing of Lynne Stewart to 28 months in prison for allegedly conspiring with Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman to help him transmit messages from prison to his followers. Though Tung praises the judge's refusal to impose the absurd 20-year sentence the government requested, he seems...
I usually avoid commenting on Gitmo issues, deferring to those who have far more competence in national security issues than I. But I can't help but point out how sad this story makes me: The Navy lawyer who led a successful Supreme Court challenge of the Bush administration's military tribunals for detainees at Guantanamo Bay has been passed over for...
Peggy and I have both noted a subtle erosion in the Bush adminstration's opposition to the ICC. See, for example, here and here. That erosion continued today, as President Bush announced that he was using his authority under Section 2007 of the American Servicemembers Protection Act to permit the U.S. to resume military aid to 21 countries who...
My blogging will be light this week, as I prepare to participate in an international conference on the Saddam trial at Case-Western. Ken Roth, the Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, and I will be debating the fairness of the Dujail trial with Michael Scharf and Michael Newton. (Needless to say, Ken and I are on the "no"...
I think the beer — more sought after than the Ranfurly Shield — is mine:The last pre-election loophole through which John Bolton's confirmation might have snuck through the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was at 2:15 this afternoon at a previously called "business meeting" of the Committee. That meeting has been cancelled — and with it even the dimmest chance of John...
Sometimes pictures are indeed worth a thousand words. Here are the most recent covers of Newsweek sold in Europe, Latin America, Asia — and the U.S.: And we wonder why 43% of Americans still believe Saddam is personally responsible for 9/11? Hat-Tip: Michael Froomkin at Discourse.net ...
Luis Posada Carriles, the anti-Castro Cuban terrorist who blew up a commercial airplane in 1976 that carried 73 innocent people, is inching ever closer to being released from federal detention. On September 11, U.S. Magistrate Norbert Garney, who earlier ruled that Posada could not be extradited to Cuba or Venezuela because of the possibility he would be tortured, recommended...
Who wins the bet if this happens? Do Julian and I have to buy each other a beer? Steve Clemons has the latest on the Bolton nomination:So far, there has been no sign that the Bush administration's considerable efforts to get Ambassador John Bolton confirmed are yielding any success in changing the environment currently blocking him. But the White...
Here's my definition of a very bad week — first you're arrested on suspicion of genocide, then you lose your job:The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) on Wednesday cancelled the contract of a member of the defence council, Callixte Gakwaya, after being suspected of committing genocide. The case of Gakwaya had recently caused tension in relations between the regime in...
My thanks to Peter for the kind words about my new essay "The Rhetoric of Necessity (Or, Sanford Levinson's Pinteresque Conversation)." If anyone is interested in taking a look at it, it is available on SSRN here. ...
In an interesting counterpoint to all the controversy over the Pope's recent remarks about Islam, a group of European Church leaders recently went to Africa to apologize for slavery and colonialism: A delegation of European church leaders, recently in Harare, has publicly apologized to Zimbabweans and Africans for the historical wrongs of colonization and slavery. At a prayer conference in Harare...
