The former owners of the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, whose sale to the Japanese government has unleashed hundreds of violent anti-Japan protests across China, are calling for Japan to send the dispute to the International Court of Justice. China is very outspoken about its position over the Senkaku Islands, but Japan has its own position as well, and it needs to get that...
The Obama Administration appears to have shifted its views on the nature of the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya that resulted in the death of four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens. Rather than blaming the attack on a "spontaneous" reaction to the offensive US film (which U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice seemed...
Amnesty International reports that Syrian civilians are under "relentless" and "indiscriminate" attacks from Syrian forces. In news about the anti-Islam flim, The Innocence of Muslims, Saudi Arabia has demanded that YouTube shut down access to the film within its borders; an actress in the film is suing the director and YouTube for fraud, slander, and intentional infliction of emotional distress; UN Secretary...
Courtesy of Shanghaiist, a video of Chinese protesters (about the 1 minute mark) surrounding U.S. Ambassador Gary Locke's car in Beijing. The protesters throw bottles, try to grab the car, and shout: "Down With American Imperialists!" Boy, so much fun to be a U.S. diplomat these days. ...
Yesterday, Harold Koh, the Legal Adviser of the U.S. State Department, spoke at the U.S. Cyber Command Inter-Agency Legal Conference on the applicability of international law to cyberspace and, particularly, cyberwar/ cyberconflict. For a couple of takes on the speech, see the Washington Post here and Defense News, here. In our ongoing efforts to make full-text presentations of international...
Syrian rebel forces clash with government troops near the Turkish border as UN envoy says the Syrian crisis is worsening. According to diplomats, Sudan and South Sudan have made progress on reaching a border deal. Iraq has re-opened its border to refugees from Syria, but is excluding young men from entry for security reasons. The European Court of Human Rights ruled yesterday that UK...
The group claiming responsibility for a suicide bomb that killed 12 near Kabul, Afghanistan, including nine foreigners, said the attack was revenge for the anti-Islam film, Innocence of Muslims. Other protests throughout Asia and the Middle East were carried out in response to the film in multiple cities in Pakistan, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Tunisia, Azerbaijan--and as far as Britain and Australia. NATO has ordered a suspension...
A few weeks ago, I wrote a long post explaining the one way in which the absence of due process in a national prosecution could make a case admissible before the ICC. The post drew a distinction between two different kinds of national prosecutions: (1) one that fails to satisfy international standards of due process; and (2) one that fails...
Story here: Investors can begin construction in six months on three privately run cities in Honduras that will have their own police, laws, government and tax systems now that the government has signed a memorandum of agreement approving the project. . . . The "model cities" will have their own judiciary, laws, governments and police forces. They also will be empowered to...
The UN's High Commissioner on Human Rights, Navi Pillay, urged an end to the violence brought about by the anti-Islam film released last week, while Hezbollah's leader called for a week of protests. Myanmar's Aung Sun Suu Kyi has begun her visit to the United States and is slated to receive the highest civilian honor, the Congressional Gold Medal, and meet...
Upcoming Events On October 1-2, 2012, Leiden University and the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam will host the Second Annual Expert Seminar on Foreign Investment Law, entitled: Foreign investment in the energy sector: Balancing private and public interests at Leiden University in The Netherlands. Registration is free, but space is limited. Friday, October 12, 2012, St. John's Law Review, St. John's Center for International and Comparative Law and St. John's...
While U.S. embassies around the Middle East continue to face angry mobs, the Japanese Embassy in Beijing also faced its own angry (but less violent) mob today. As China blogger Sinostand reports, hundreds of Chinese citizens threw eggs and rocks at the Japanese Embassy in protest at Japan's actions to nationalize the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea....
