In association with the International Commission of Jurists

International Criminal Law

17 Aug

[Melissa L. Simms is currently a Legal Officer with the United Nations and formerly with the International Criminal Court. The views expressed in this post are those of the author and do not reflect the views of the United Nations or the ICC.] Oumar Ba, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Morehouse College in Atlanta, United States has certainly stoked interest...

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16 Aug

[Owiso Owiso is a Doctoral Researcher in Public International Law at the University of Luxembourg.] Inter-governmental organisations are often theatres of inter-state politics. Why then does the suggestion that the International Criminal Court (ICC) may not be any different bother observers so? Well, that is perhaps because the ICC is not just another ‘ordinary’ inter-governmental organisation. It is also, and perhaps primarily, a judicial mechanism. As...

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13 Aug

[Susan M. Akram is Clinical Professor at Boston University and Director of the International Human Rights Clinic at the Law School. Gabor Rona is Professor of Practice at Cardozo Law School and former International Legal Director of Human Rights First.] In his Executive Order 13928 (EO) issued on June 11, 2020, President Trump declared the investigation by the International Criminal Court...

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12 Aug

[David J. Scheffer is Visiting Senior Fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations and Tom A. Bernstein Genocide Prevention Fellow, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and was the first U.S. Ambassador at Large for War Crimes Issues (1997-2001). The author’s observations and views in this article are solely his own and do not reflect any institutional position.] How will the survival and legacies of tens of millions...

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12 Aug

Our friends at West Point have just launched an ambitious new blog, Articles of War.  The "Authors" page lists seven contributors, all of whom are well-known in IHL, military law, and cognate-discipline circles: Col. Joshua F. Berry, Prof. Geoff Corn, Prof. Ashley Deeks, Lt. Gen. Charles N. Pede, Col. Shane Reeves, Prof. Michael N. Schmitt, and Prof. Sean Watts. The...

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10 Aug

[Gunnar M. Ekelove-Slydal has been Deputy Secretary General of the Norwegian Helsinki Committee since 1997. He is an adjunct lecturer at the University of Southeast-Norway.] The process to elect the third Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has run into difficulties. The Election Committee’s shortlist of four candidates to the top job has been met by many States Parties and other stakeholders by...

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10 Aug

[Nathaniel Berman is the Rahel Varnhagen Professor of International Affairs, Law, and Modern Culture at Brown University.] The Land between the River and the Sea, the land that cannot even be named without provoking heated controversy, has once again moved to the forefront of international debate. There are many possible explanations for this upsurge: perhaps the “Trump Plan,” perhaps Israeli threats...

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07 Aug

[Christian De Vos is a Senior Advocacy Officer with the Open Society Justice Initiative. He engages in advocacy across the Justice Initiative’s areas of work, with a particular focus on international justice and accountability for grave crimes.] It has been a pleasure to read the six reflections shared over the course of this symposium. I am grateful to Opinio Juris for hosting the discussion and to the...

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06 Aug

[Rod Rastan serves as Legal Advisor in the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, where he deals with international law issues, in particular in relation to jurisdiction, admissibility and judicial assistance. The views expressed herein are solely the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of the OTP or the ICC. ] It is fair to say that the...

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06 Aug

[Alexandra Huneeus is Professor of Law at University of Wisconsin Law School, where she directs the Global Legal Studies Center and Chairs the Human Rights Program.] Of the many innovations being advanced by Colombia’s peace mechanism (the Special Jurisdiction for the Peace, or SJP), one is the way it delineates its investigations. While some of its cases are organized by type of criminal activity – such as recruitment...

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05 Aug

[Judy Gitau is the Africa Region Coordinator for the global Women's Rights organization Equality Now, a lawyer, a published author in the fields of transitional justice and international criminal law and a member of Kenya's civil society.] In his book Complementarity, Catalysts, Compliance: The International Criminal Court in Uganda, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of Congo, Christian De Vos illustrates what was intended by the legal rules under the...

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05 Aug

[Jacques B. Mbokani is a Professor of Law at the Université de Goma in the Democratic Republic of Congo and a Consultant to Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa. A French version, provided by the author, appears below the English version of this post.] Introduction Christian De Vos's book on Complementarity, Catalysts, Compliance takes a fresh look at the relationship between the...

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