[Travel and other expenses related to my participation in the "100 Years Peace Palace" program provided by the Government of the Netherlands and Radio Netherlands Worldwide] August 28th will mark the 100th anniversary of the opening of the Peace Palace at The Hague. In commemoration of this, the Government of the Netherlands and Radio Netherlands Worldwide have brought a group of...
It looks like the tragic events surrounding a likely chemical weapons attack in Syria will spark a military intervention by the United States, France, and Britain without the authorization of the U.N. Security Council. We have already heard President Obama publicly state that international law is a factor in the decisionmaking process in the U.S. and the NYT suggests U.S....
[Drew F. Cohen is a law clerk to the Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court of South Africa. He is also a contributing columnist for US News and World Report where he writes about comparative constitutional law, international human rights and global legal affairs.] Recently, Botswana called on the South African Development Community (SADC) to open an investigation into voting irregularities in the recent Presidential election in Zimbabwe...
UN inspectors will be allowed into the Damascus suburb to investigate an alleged chemical weapon attack that killed approximately 355 civilians last week. Julian mentioned that the US may be looking into military intervention into Syria, a move that Russia is concerned about, warning the US not to repeat past mistakes in the region. Despite Russia's pleas for restraint, in Jordan,...
Although the government of Colombia was far from pleased when the ICJ issued a judgment last November in a long-running territorial dispute with Nicaragua, it did not go so far as to say it would simply ignore the ruling. But Colombia's vice president Angelino Garzon seems to be hinting in recent comments that Colombia is prepared to do just that. “The...
As regular readers may recall, I am skeptical that the use of chemical weapons, by itself, can justify the use of military force under current international law absent authorization from the U.N. Security Council. Of course, I wouldn't oppose the use of military force by the U.S. to stop the use of chemical weapons in Syria, I just doubt its...
My friend Dapo Akande has a superb post at EJIL: Talk! discussing whether the ICC could prosecute the use of chemical weapons by the government in Syria. I agree almost entirely with Dapo's analysis, but I do want to offer a couple of thoughts about his discussion of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties: The argument that chemical weapons are...
I am not sure if it is a trend, but recently several nations have raised dubious legal claims over territory that was ceded away by treaty. For instance, Spain has zero legal claim to Gibraltar, as far as I can tell, unless the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht ceding it to Britain "in perpetuity" can be wished away. Bolivia has zero...
Mark Bowden’s cover story in this month’s The Atlantic magazine (available here) is one of the best things I’ve seen written on drones in the past several years. The Black Hawk Down author’s descriptions and takeaways on most aspects of the drone program are consistent with my own experience in military aviation and the information I have gathered from human rights organizations, drone operators, military lawyers, senior military, and CIA personnel who have run the drone programs, as well as from senior military policy advisors who were involved in changing the way drones are used.
Perhaps most importantly, his description of the drone operator’s reaction -- one of shock and uncertainty -- to performing a specific mission clearly undermines the widely circulated but exceptionally irresponsible criticism that drones have created a “Playstation mentality” among their operators. An additional fact that the article did not include, but that has been understood (although not widely reported) for several years now, is that drone operators suffer from PTSD-like symptoms at rates similar to -- and sometimes greater than -- those experienced by combat forces on the ground. It turns out that even from 8,000 miles away, taking human life and graphically observing your handiwork is nothing like playing a video game.
Another highlight is his treatment of the question of civilian casualties.
[Peter Stockburger is an attorney with the international law firm of McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP and an Adjunct Professor with the University of San Diego School of Law where he teaches international law and appellate advocacy. The views of this post are the author’s own views and are not attributable to either McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP or the...
It is not surprising that the U.S. has not ratified the Maritime Labor Convention, which came into force yesterday seven years after its text was adopted by the ILO. As David Kaye reminds us, the Senate is not exactly in a ratifying mood these days. But it is worth remembering that treaty enthusiasts can't put always blame on the Senate's "sovereigntists" for...
