In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Africa

15 May

Like thousands of other high school kids, today is AP Comparative Government exam day in the Alford household. According to the AP College Board, "The course aims to illustrate the rich diversity of political life, to show available institutional alternatives, to explain differences in processes and policy outcomes, and to communicate to students the importance of global political and economic changes." But in order to move the discussion from the abstract to the concrete, AP Comp. Gov. students are required to study six--and only six--representative countries. Can you guess the six countries chosen as suitable for comparison? And could you answer the short- or long-essay questions these high school whiz kids are required to answer? Details after the jump:
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09 May

So reports Mark Kersten in a blockbuster post at Justice in Conflict.  You have to read the whole thing; here is a taste: While haggling between the ICC and Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) over the fate of Saif al-Islam Gaddafi and Abdullah al-Senussi continues, Libya quietly, but controversially, passed a blanket amnesty for pro-Revolution rebels. According to Lawyers for Justice in...

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26 Apr

At International Criminal Law Bureau, Kirsty Sutherland calls attention to a surprise moment during the Taylor verdict that has received, to the best of my knowledge, absolutely no attention from the media: In an unexpected turn of events, as Justice Lussick (Presiding), Justice Doherty and Justice Sebutinde rose to leave the courtroom after delivering the verdict, Justice Sow addressed the Court:  “The...

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22 Apr

In my previous post, I discussed the Registry's report of its visit with Saif Gaddafi in Libya, which was posted on the ICC website and then removed without explanation a few hours later.  It has come to my attention that the Office of Public Counsel for the Defence (OPCD) also prepared a report of that visit -- and that the...

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21 Apr

So reports Radio Netherlands Worldwide.  The dispute, not surprisingly, involves Luis Moreno-Ocampo and Libya: This week the court’s public defender, Xavier-Jean Keita, accused chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo of siding with the Libyans and demanded he be removed from the case. In a court filing boiling with indignation, he accused Ocampo of making misleading statements during a visit to Tripoli this week...

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21 Apr

I have uploaded a copy of the report, which was available for a couple of hours on the ICC website but then removed without explanation.  (It's marked public.)  Representatives of the Registry spent five days in Libya in late February and early March, so things could have changed significantly since that time.  Nevertheless, the report paints an interesting -- and...

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20 Apr

[Michael A. Newton is Professor of the Practice of Law, Vanderbilt University Law School] The Kony 2012 campaign had the laudable goal of increasing public awareness in order to aid the search for justice and accountability in the wake of LRA atrocities. In fact, the worldwide attention had the paradoxical effect of demonstrating the lamentable reality that the optimal pathway towards...

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20 Apr

[Mark A. Drumbl is the Class of 1975 Alumni Professor at Washington and Lee University and author of Reimagining Child Soldiers (OUP, 2012).] How does Kony2012 inform our understanding of child soldiers? How does it sculpt international efforts to prevent child soldiering? Kony2012 feeds into and reinforces pre-existing assumptions and narratives. I argue in my book Reimagining Child Soldiers that these assumptions...

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20 Apr

[Julie McBride is a PhD Candidate at Queen’s University Belfast, researching the development of the war crime of child soldier recruitment in international criminal law, and a member of the United Nations Global Experts, specializing in international crime and transitional justice. You can find her on Twitter @JA_McBride] When the Kony2012 video was launched last month, I found myself, for one of the first times,...

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19 Apr

[Anne Herzberg is the Legal Advisor at NGO Monitor, a Jerusalem-based research institution. Her post is based on a forthcoming paper (2012), presented at the “Old Laws, New Technologies Conference” sponsored by the Hebrew University Minerva Center for Human Rights and the ICRC (early draft here). Anne is the co-author of Best Practices for Human Rights and Humanitarian NGO Fact-finding (Nijhoff 2012).] Many...

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