Baher Azmy, the legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), has flagged a very interesting ATS case that is due to be re-argued in light of the Supreme Court's recent -- and much discussed here at Opinio Juris -- decision in Kiobel. Here is CCR's description of the case, Al Shimari v. CACI: Al Shimari v. CACI was originally...
This according to the Commission of Inquiry on Syria, which has considerable investigative ability. Reuters: (Reuters) - U.N. human rights investigators have gathered testimony from casualties of Syria's civil war and medical staff indicating that rebel forces have used the nerve agent sarin, one of the lead investigators said on Sunday. The United Nations independent commission of inquiry on Syria has not yet seen...
Ari Fleischer, former Bush press secretary, explaining why terrorists are more dangerous than Nazis: They [the Nazis] followed the law of war. They wore uniforms and they fought us on battlefields. These people are fundamentally, totally by design different. And they need to be treated in a different extrajudicial system. Noted with horror but without comment....
I have no desire to get into an argument with Eugene Kontorovich about the ostensibly "landmark" decision of a French intermediate court -- especially because, like him, I am far from fluent in French and the decision strikes me as quite legally complicated. But it is important to push back against claims like these (emphasis mine): This is an extraordinarily important holding in...
I have now had the opportunity to read both Judge van den Wyngaert's request to be excused from the Kenyatta case and the Presidency's decision to grant that request. There is no question that workload did indeed play a role in the Judge's decision to withdraw. But it also seems clear that there was at least one other reason, as...
From the Court's press release: Today, 26 April 2013, Leiden University won the final round of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Trial Competition, English version, held in ICC Courtroom I in The Hague (Netherlands). Osgoode Hall Law School of York University (Canada) and Bond University (Australia) won, respectively, second and third place. The Best Speaker award went to Katherine Stewart of...
I cannot find the relevant document on the ICC website, but Kenya's CapitalFM is reporting that Judge Christine van den Wyngaert, sitting in the Trial Chamber, has withdrawn from the case against Uhuru Kenyatta because of concerns about the prosecution's behavior: In her opinion the prosecution failed to disclose to the Pre-Trial Chamber on the credibility of witness four and disclosing new...
Professor David Kaye has a thoughtful essay in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs analyzing the growing level of cooperation between the U.S. and the ICC. He correctly notes that the U.S. is not only no longer actively hostile, but it has taken various steps in recent years to actively support the work of the ICC (most notably in Uganda against...
Two years ago, I wrote a long post analyzing the most serious charge in Bradley Manning's court martial -- aiding the enemy, a violation of Art. 104 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) and 10 USC 904. I claimed in the post that someone like Bill Keller, the Executive Editor of the New York Times during the WikiLeaks era,...
In the wake of Obama's memorable statement, a number of bloggers have questioned whether the Boston bombings deserve to be labeled "terrorism." Most of those bloggers -- such as the excellent Ali Abuminah here -- emphasize that many US definitions of terrorism require the violent act in question to be politically or ideologically motivated, which is still an open question with regard...
The Pre-Trial Chamber has granted the OPCD's request to withdraw from the case and has appointed the OPCD's chosen replacement, John RWD Jones QC, to represent Saif until such time as he is either able to choose his own lawyer or the ICC finally rules on Libya's admissibility challenge. Jones is a fantastic choice -- he successfully represented both Oric...
So reports the Kuwait News Agency. The building is expected to be completed in late 2015. Here is the winning design: You can read more about the design, and see more artists renderings, here. It's not a bad design, but it's a bit too high-modernist for my taste. I preferred the one by Wiel Arets Architects & Associates that won third prize...
