Here's the text of the resolution passed in the House this afternoon on Libya, as introduced by Speaker Boehner. It's not insignificant, as an institutional pronouncement, even though it's non-binding. It amounts to a kind of soft law. The resolution provides that "the President shall not deploy, establish, or maintain the presence of units and members of the United...
I have just posted a new essay -- my first since finishing the NMT book! -- on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Scholars have long debated to what extent the Rome Statute’s principle of complementarity permits states to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity, and acts of genocide as ordinary crimes such as rape and murder instead...
The ABA's International Lawyer Year-in-Review has just been published and as always it is a monumental achievement. The issue is not available on the web, but the International Lawyer's home page is here. The issue includes 450 pages of international law discussion and over 150 pages of foreign and comparative law analysis. If you are looking for a thumbnail...
In honor of the US government's decision to charge Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other men responsible for 9/11 with the non-existent war crime of conspiracy, I want to call readers' attention to an excellent new article by Samuel Morison about the equally non-existent war crime of material support for terrorism. Morison vivisects the government's attempt to justify material support...
I'm traveling in Europe for the next few weeks, so posting will be a bit light. As always, I'm happy to meet up with Opinio Juris readers in the places I'm visiting. Here's my schedule: June 4-7, Helsinki; June 7-9, Tallinn; June 9-13, Berlin; June 13-15, Leuven; June 15-18, Amsterdam; June 18-20, London. On June 6, I'm giving a talk...
In a post last week, I recommended Human Rights First’s new report on U.S. detention and trial operations in Afghanistan for its insights into the evolving situation there. I also raised a question about the legal framework the report used to analyze the sufficiency of detention procedures. HRF (in my view correctly) describes the current conflict in Afghanistan as a...
The Wall Street Journal reporting on un-classifed portions of a report anticipated for release next month. I concentrate on robots, not cyber, so I leave it to others to comment, but I do recall that this report and its conclusions have been discussed a fair amount in academic circles, and as far as I know this will not surprise people...
Cross-posted at Balkinization Bobby Chesney writes back with a thoughtful post responding to my question about whether the United States has forward-going detention needs in its counterterrorism operations that are currently unmet by the 2001 statute known as the AUMF. The question arises in light of Congress’ current debate over whether to pass (as the House already has) new legislation...
Cross-posted at Balkinization The U.S. House of Representatives today passed its version of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act, including provisions that prevent any of the Gitmo detainees (or indeed any terrorism suspects) from being subject to criminal trial, and also “affirms that the United States is engaged in an armed conflict with al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated forces,” whomever those...
Opinion here in Chamber of Commerce v. Whiting . The Court green-lights state use of licensing laws as a tool of immigration enforcement, consistent with the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act. It also upheld Arizona's imposition of the e-Verify system as a mandatory requirement on employers, where Congress had deemed the system voluntary. The decision is important in...
In Serbia, not surprisingly: Ratko Mladic, the Bosnian Serb general accused of overseeing the worst massacre in Europe since the end of World War II, has been arrested, Serbian authorities said Thursday. Mladic is Europe's most wanted war crimes suspect for his alleged role in the 1995 slaughter of 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys in the enclave of Srebrenica,...
Readers will be delighted to know that Jacob has restarted International Law Reporter, your one-stop-shopping center for all new international-law scholarship. And I'm delighted to learn that Jacob's new essay, entitled "The Regulatory Turn in International Law," is now forthcoming in the Harvard International Law Journal, which has recently partnered with our blog. The essay looks fascinating; check it out...
