The transcript for the oral argument in Abbott v. Abbott is out, raising the difficult question of what constitutes a right of custody within the meaning of the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. The treaty grants a parent the right to have a child returned to the child’s country of habitual residence if...
My former Pepperdine colleague, Kathryn Lee Boyd, has just filed a fascinating complaint relating to the distribution of funds secured by a treaty between the United States and Libya on behalf of U.S. victims of Libyan-sponsored terrorism. The facts as alleged in the complaint of Davé v. Crowell & Moring are complex. In brief, Libya has been implicated in terrorist...
The complex and often antagonistic interaction of hard and soft law was clearly one of the most interesting points in the book for several of the commentators, as indeed it was for us. Our core argument here is that hard and soft law can serve not just as complements but also as “antagonists,” both in a conflict-of-laws sense and in...
As its title suggests, When Cooperation Fails has two distinct aims. The specific empirical aim is to provide a definitive and theoretically informed account of one of the most bitter and politically charged international disputes of the past two decades, between the United States and the European Union over the regulation of genetically modified foods and crops. Our theoretical aim,...
I know this sounds like the title of a movie franchise, but Brad Roth of Wayne State has alerted me to an op-ed in today's New York Times that deals with both Somali piracy and unrecognized separatist regions. Jay Bahadur writes: There might be another way to make greater strides against pirates. However, it would involve allying ourselves with a place that...
The Trial Chamber has -- completely unsurprisingly -- rejected Dr. Karadzic's motion challenging Richard Harvey's appointment as stand-by counsel. As I explained in a previous post, that challenge was based on three grounds: (1) Harvey's appointment violates Article 21(4) of the ICTY Statute, which provides that a defendant has the right “to communicate with counsel of his own choosing” and...
Sixty-six years ago today, President Franklin Roosevelt addressed a national radio audience to discuss his recent meeting with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin at the Tehran Conference. Stalin secured commitments to open up a second front against Germany. Roosevelt secured a commitment from Stalin to support an international security organization. 1943 was the turning point in the...
I want to interrupt our Copenhagen focus to briefly flag a conversation that's on-going over at EJIL: Talk! My Temple Law colleague, Jeff Dunoff, along with Joel Trachtman (The Fletcher School) recently put out a new work--Ruling the World? Constitutionalism, International Law and Global Governance (Cambridge, 2009), which is the focus of EJIL's latest on-line symposium. Here's a description of the book project in brief: Ruling...
The Copenhagen process is multilateral, focused on reaching global agreements. But to get to a strong and truly effective global climate regime, bold bilateral initiatives may be needed. The conditions are propitious for a deal between China and the US, the world’s largest and second largest emitters, but that will call for imaginative and committed leadership on both sides as...
Der Spiegel has an excellent story on the possibility that a Eurozone country might default on its sovereign debt, with economic, political, and legal consequences that could be anything from serious to dire. The country is Greece: Greece has already accumulated a mountain of debt that will be difficult if not impossible to pay off. The government has borrowed more than...
[This is a guest post by Professor Greg Gordon of the University of North Dakota. Professor Gordon is the Director of the UND Center for Human Rights and Genocide Studies, an expert on international criminal law and a past guest blogger at Opinio Juris.] Earlier this week, Spanish National Court Judge Balthazar Garzon initiated money laundering proceedings against the widow...
I will write on this at greater length in a couple of days after a few of the key parties have made their arguments. For now, I just want to note that the oral proceeding transcripts will be available here. In the Tuesday morning session (which is all that has been posted at the time of this writing), Serbia set out...
