I have been reading Roger's fascinating missives from Rwanda with great interest and agree with much of what he has to say. But I have to demur from the claim that "Kagame is personally invested in making Rwanda a country that is committed to reconciliation, human rights and self-sufficiency." Self-sufficiency, perhaps -- there is no question that Rwanda has experienced...
That is the conclusion of the most comprehensive study of the issue to date, "Confronting the Yugoslav Controversies: A Scholars' Initiative," conducted by Purdue University. From the New York Times, which held follow-up interviews with some of the sources cited in the study: Charles W. Ingrao, the study’s co-editor, said that three senior State Department officials, one of them retired, and...
Pardon the title of this post being a somewhat-obscure allusion to the standard trope of movie-trailer voice-overs, but over at Danger Room, they are well under way in their Iron Eagles search: their "celebration of the most awesomely-bad videos of the military industrial complex." Videos that often mix bad animation, worse narration, explosions, and weaponry statistics. But, for my money, they have...
The following is a guest post written by Kate Cronin-Furman and Amanda Taub, the brains behind the must-read blog wronging rights. My thanks to them for contributing it. Two weeks ago, Pre-Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for the arrest of Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir. (We’re sure you all remember; it was kind of a...
In public, Sudanese government officials have uniformly defended Bashir against the supposed depredations of the ICC. According to the Institute for War & Peace Reporting, however, they tell a different story in private: A minister with the president’s National Congress Party, NCP, said that members were left reeling by the announcement of an arrest warrant issued against Bashir by ICC judges...
I want to follow up briefly on Kevin's post earlier re Darfur and responsibility to protect. Being located in Washington and having a think tank connection - Hoover - as well as a law professor job, I serve on various task forces on international law and foreign policy issues. I was one of the experts on the Gingrich-Mitchell task force...
Two genocide bloggers at Change.org, Michelle F. and Michael Bear Kleinman, have been engaged for the past couple of weeks in an impassioned debate over the ICC's arrest warrant for Bashir. (See here and here, for the most recent installments.) Michelle, though certainly not unaware of its dangers, supports the warrant. Kleinman opposes it, blaming the ICC -- like many...
One of the most important issues in international criminal law is whether a genocidal policy or plan is an element of the crime of genocide. The ICTY Appeals Chamber held in Jelisic that it is not -- and that, as a result, genocide can be committed by a lone genocidaire. Some scholars disagree, most notably Bill Schabas, who pointed out...
Everything you need to know about the majority's dismissive attitude toward the Prosecution's evidence of genocide is contained in this paragraph: 179. In relation to the alleged insufficient resources allocated by the GoS to ensure adequate conditions of life in IDP Camps in Darfur, the Majority considers that the Prosecution's allegation is vague in light of the fact that, in addition...
Having now read the decision on the arrest warrant, I am more convinced than ever that the majority completely misunderstands Article 58's "reasonable grounds" requirement. The rationale for the majority's argument that there are no reasonable grounds to believe Bashir is responsible for genocide comes in paras. 158 and 159, concerning the Prosecution's proof of the Sudanese government's genocidal intent...
In what proved to be the worst kept secret in the world, the Pre-Trial Chamber (PTC) has decided to issue a warrant for Bashir's arrest on the war crimes and crimes against humanity charges, but not on the genocide charges. More substantive analysis will have to await an explanation of the PTC's reasoning. For now, a couple of quick thoughts. To...
I have posted to SSRN an article I recently published in the Oregon Review of International Law, entitled Imagining Sovereignty, Managing Secession:The Legal Geography of Eurasia’s "Frozen Conflicts." This article was written for a symposium on law and geography at the University of Oregon Law School that was organized by Hari Osofsky (of IntLawGrrls). I use my article to argue that...
