I intend to closely follow the reactions to the Appeals Chamber's decision on the genocide charges against Bashir. The pushback has already begun in a predictable place: the Making Sense of Darfur blog, which has led the charge against the arrest warrant. The post itself, in which David Barsoum asks "what is the ICC really after in Sudan?", is not...
[David H. Moore is a Professor at J. Reuben Clark Law School, Brigham Young University] The Supreme Court’s decision in Medellin v. Texas has understandably generated substantial debate on the status of treaties in domestic law. Medellin has significant implications for three other areas of foreign relations law as well: Alien Tort Statute litigation, the domestic legal status of customary international...
As I predicted, the Appeals Chamber has rejected the Pre-Trial Chamber's interpretation of the "reasonable grounds" standard: Appeals judges said the court was wrong to conclude in March that there was insufficient evidence to merit charging al-Bashir with three genocide counts. Instead, it had charged him with seven counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity for allegedly...
I would first like to thank Professor Guy Mundlak for generously taking the time to respond to my Article, and Opinio Juris for hosting this forum. Professor Mundlak is very correct to note that over time civil liberties and socioeconomic matters have become more intertwined. What’s more, the overlapping identities and realms in which workers function mean that to be protected...
[Guy Mundlak is a Professor at Tel Aviv University Buchmann School of Law] I opted for law school because I wanted to take part in the practice of human rights. Several years later I found myself deeply engrossed in the study of labor law. At the time, Israel was still considered to be strongly collective, solidary, and densely covered by collective...
[Kevin Kolben is an Assistant Professor at Rutgers Business School] This Article argues that the move to human rights discourse and international legal institutions by labor scholars and labor movements, particularly American scholars and movements, deserves more reflection, debate, and perhaps reconsideration. Its thesis is grounded primarily in an intuition borne of personal experience. After graduating from college, I worked for several...
Thank you to Professor Corn for his exceptionally thoughtful response to the article. His observations illustrate vividly, and persuasively, the apparent choices undergirding the traditional approach my Article critiques. I’ll reply briefly to some of his comments and conclude by highlighting what I perceive to be larger issues in the law of war that our dialogue might provoke. Professor Corn casts...
[Geoffrey Corn is an Associate Professor at South Texas College of Law] Let me begin by extending my compliments to Prof. Watts for his exceptionally well-written article, and my thanks for his suggestion that I provide comment. I am also grateful to my friends at Opinio Juris for extending this opportunity to me—it is nice to be back! CNA obviously represents one...
[Sean Watts is an Assistant Professor at Creighton University Law School] A stunningly prescient, yet unfortunately anonymously authored, piece in the 1921 British Yearbook of International Law, argued that the application of science to warfare would inevitably lead to more destructive and intolerable forms of war. From this gloomy premise, the author concluded that efforts to develop laws of war were...
The Virginia Journal of International Law is delighted to continue its partnership with Opinio Juris this week in this online symposium featuring three articles and an essay recently published by VJIL in Vol. 50:2, available here. Today, Sean Watts, Assistant Professor, Creighton University Law School, will discuss his Article Combatant Status and Computer Network Attack. Professor Watts's Article examines the...
A note to our readers: I inadvertently jumped the gun a bit in my earlier post about the Security Council and raised Professor Michael Glennon's YJIL article, The Blank Prose Crime of Aggression, on which Kevin has also commented. We imagine that some readers will also want to weigh in. It turns out that in March, we will be discussing...
I want to offer two thoughts on Glennon's article, which -- though I am generally skeptical of the ICC's attempts to define the crime -- I find anything but convincing. The first has to do with his central thesis: that the Special Working Group on the Crime of Aggression's proposed definition of aggression "would constitute a crime in blank prose...
