The UK has appointed a senior judge to lead the inquest in the death of Russian ex-spy Litvinenko from polonium poising in 2006 in London. Veteran international diplomat, Lakhdar Brahimi, has been tapped as Kofi Annan's successor as UN-Arab League joint special envoy for Syria. In the Syrian conflict, government troops have forced rebels from a key district in the city of Aleppo. In response to the PILPG...
According to the UN, Afghanistan civilan deaths are down for the first time since it started counting in 2007, though officials say that this is due to an extremely harsh winter rather than improved security. The United Nations also reports that targeted killings in Afghanistan have risen 53%. Ex-British Prime Minister Tony Blair has expressed his deep concern that the UK will...
I honestly believed that the Libyan government couldn't make a public claim more ridiculous than the one about the Swatch with a hidden camera and GPS locator. Silly me for my lack of imagination! Mark Kersten, whose Justice in Conflict blog should be prominently featured in your newsreader, called my attention to this recent gem from the prosecutor in charge...
Oxfam reports that hundreds are being raped and killed in Eastern Congo as the army's deployment to fight rebels has created a security vacuum. The International Criminal Court announced its decision on providing reparations to victims in the case of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo. IntLawGrrls offers two posts (here and here) with commentary about the decision. Foreign Policy offers more insight into the...
For you, dear reader, I risked life and limb to obtain the schematics of the video/GPS Swatch that the OPCD's interpreter used to undermine Libya's national security. After assuming deep cover, prowling some of the world's most dangerous locales, and making contact with too many shadowy characters to count, I finally succeeded. Here it is -- look at your own...
Syrian Prime Minister Riyad Hijab has defected from what he terms the "terrorist regime" of President Bashar al-Assad, while violence rages on in Aleppo. IPS offers an insight into what these high-level defections mean for Syria's future. Syria is also losing support of its ally Iran, whose Foreign Minister will visit Turkey today to discuss the situation in Syria and the capture of...
At Justice in Conflict, Mark Kersten calls attention to a recent motion filed by the Libyan government asking for more time -- read: stalling -- to reply to the OPCD's response to its admissibility challenge. The government doesn't actually want a deadline to respond; it would like to have 18 days from whenever it gets around to appointing a new...
In my previous post, I noted that Libya's admissibility challenge should fail regarding Saif Gaddafi because the government cannot demonstrate that it is able to obtain him from the Zintan militia that is holding him. It's now clear that the Libyan government has even less chance of obtaining al-Senussi: Mauritania's president has said former Libyan intelligence chief Abdullah al-Senussi must be...
Rebels have reported that they are coming under heavy attacks in Syria's Aleppo. Chinese media have told the United States to "shut up" about the dispute in the South China Sea and accusing the US of exacerbating tensions in the region. 19 people are dead after Kurdish rebels attacked military outposts in Turkey over the weekend. Israel barred the envoys of four state...
In my earlier post on Libya's admissibility challenge, I explained how the Libyan government's failure to provide Saif with due process could be relevant to the admissibility of the case against him. There is, however, a far stronger argument against Libya's admissibility challenge, one that I've discussed before: namely, that Article 17(3) deems a case admissible if "the State is...
In my post on the detention of Melinda Taylor and her team, I mentioned that the "guard" planted by the Libyan government to spy on the OPCD's official meeting with Saif first intervened when Saif tried to sign a statement describing his attitude toward the Libyan criminal-justice system. I thought readers might be interested in the statement itself: Unsigned statement/sentiments from...
Call for Papers The University of Liverpool is hosting a conference December 6-7, 2012, on Critical Approaches to International Criminal Law and is seeking abstract submissions of maximum 500 words before September 1, 2012. The University of Amsterdam's Center for International Law has issued a call for papers for a two-day seminar on Interfaces between International and National Legal Orders: An International Rule...
