If there is one thing we can agree on is that recognition of belligerency is in disuse – that it is a relic of the 19th century and that it died off sometime before the Spanish Civil War, right? Recognition of belligerency either “fell into desuetude” or is in a state of “current total disuse”. In fact, says Prof. Sivakumaran, “at least since 1949, and more...
Over at Just Security, my friend Adil Haque has written a fantastic post on self-defense and non-state actors. Adil’s main point is that Article 51 of the UN Charter does not apply to armed attacks by non-state actors given its “Latin American origin”. He explains how it should be read in accordance with the Act of Chapultepec, which referred only to inter-state uses of force. I highly...
[Nicolás Carrillo-Santarelli is a Colombian lawyer. He works as a researcher and lecturer of Public International Law at the La Sabana University, Colombia.] The morning of the 20th of October, Colombian media informed that the State of Colombia submitted an advisory opinion request to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights – which is not available in the webpage of the Court yet....
[Camila Teran is a lawyer with a LLB in Law and a LLM in International Criminal Law, both from the University of Sussex.] The ICC’s current crisis bears witness to the contentious relationship between the Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC (OTP) and States. The OTP’s progress is further frustrated by the small window triggering the admissibility phase that would allow the Prosecutor to formally investigate Colombia....
I want to call readers attention to an important case coming out of Brazil. This week, the 2nd Regional Federal Tribunal (TRF2), based in Rio de Janeiro decided a case against Antônio Waneir Pinheiro Lima, a retired army sergeant, accused of raping and torturing Inês Etienne Romeu, the sole survivor of a clandestine torture center known as the “House of Death”. The case is relevant because,...
[Sienna Merope-Synge is a Staff Attorney with the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti (IJDH). In partnership with its Haiti-based partner, the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux, IJDH advocates, litigates, builds constituencies and nurtures networks to create systemic pathways to justice for marginalized Haitians and to hold international human rights violators accountable for their actions in Haiti.] In 2017, in the...
[Owiso Owiso is a Doctoral Researcher in Public International Law at the University of Luxembourg and a member of the PhD Academy of the Cross Cultural Human Rights Centre, VU Amsterdam.] Introduction With the celebratory dust finally settled, stakeholders are beginning to take stock of the performance of the greatest achievement of the international criminal justice movement, the permanent International Criminal Court (ICC). Tough questions are now...
A few weeks ago I presented my book on the Peruvian armed conflict at FIL, Lima’s International Book Fair. The book, “Conflicto Armado en el Perú: La Época del Terrorismo bajo el Derecho Internacional” (“Armed Conflict in Peru: The Times of Terrorism under International Law”), published by Universidad del Pacífico Press, explores how politicized misinformation on the conflict’s history has...
Last Monday, Prof. Stephen Walt published a controversial article on his Foreign Policy blog. The title (which he did not choose and has since been changed) was regrettable: “Who Will Invade Brazil to Save the Amazon?” Written as part of the fallout from Brazil’s new (and terrible) deforestation policy, the post asks what exactly should the international community do to prevent states like Brazil from causing...
[Alonso Illueca is a lawyer and adjunct Professor of International Law at Universidad del Istmo] On July 12, 2019, Panama announced its decision to withdraw its flag from any vessel violating “sanctions and international legislation”. This decision resulted in the removal of 59 ships (mostly tankers) from Panama’s shipping fleet due to their link with the Islamic Republic of Iran (“Iran”)...
Paula Baldini Miranda da Cruz is a Lawyer, LLM Adv. Studies in Public International Law at Leiden University (Netherlands). Ph.D. candidate at Leiden University (Netherlands) and Rafael Braga da Silva is a Lawyer, LLM University for Peace and United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute (UNICRI) (Italy) and LL.M. Adv. Studies in Public International Law at Leiden University Netherlands). In...
On 23 January 2019, Juan Guaidó, the President of the Venezuelan National Assembly, proclaimed himself as the caretaker President of Venezuela in accordance with Article 223 of the Venezuelan Constitution. Guaidó’s Government falls foul of the criterion of effectiveness (control of at least some territory, habitual obedience of a majority of the population, and reasonable prospect of permanence), which remains with Maduro. The claim is purely...