It's not exactly a hot topic, even among international lawyers, yet the ongoing dispute over the Western Sahara (and Morocco's claim to it) has drawn the attention of 54 U.S. Senators, who recently sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of State Clinton about it favoring support for Morocco's 2007 proposal for autonomy in the disputed region. This analysis claims the...
Happy Easter, everyone! I recognize this is a bit of an unpleasant topic to bring up on a holy day, but it is worth noting that the rumblings about litigation against the Vatican and the Pope over the various child-sex-abuse scandals continue. Lawyers in the UK are actively researching how and whether to bring legal action during the Pope's upcoming...
Genocide is one of those phrases with both highly potent political ramifications as well as highly complicated legal requirements. These two characteristics, GUÉNAËL METTRAUX argues in the IHT, make the obsessive focus on whether something is or is not a genocide (Armenia? Srebenica?) a largely hopeless and unhelpful exercise for historical events. The very proposition that legal concepts such as genocide could...
I love Foreign Policy's blog, Passport. Along with Democracy Arsenal, it's one of the two best blogs for analysis of (duh) US foreign policy. Which is why I was shocked to read a recent post by Andrew Swift entitled "Is Karl Rove a War Criminal?", because Swift's analysis would make a first-year law student blush in embarrassment. Here is how...
I don't know if I buy this article's suggestion that the various Catholic Church priest-pedophile scandals amount to a "crime against humanity" under international law, but I do think the Pope's right to "head of state" immunity under international law is a tough question. In the U.S., the Pope has been granted head of state immunity (thanks to President Bush...
This is probably just posturing, but it would be a rather dramatic turn of events if the IWC ended up a casualty of the vociferous Australian campaign against Japanese whaling. I see the Kiwis are trying to play mediator. The international body to control whaling worldwide could collapse if a deal cannot be reached to allow restricted commercial whaling, New Zealand's...
When the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber approved the Prosecutor's request for authority to investigate alleged "crimes against humanity" in Kenya, I didn't notice this long and powerful dissenting opinion (around p. 84) by one of the judges (Hans-Peter Kaul). The standard for authorizing an investigation is pretty easy to satisfy (at least it sounds that way to me), so the dissent...
Not a funny April Fool's Day joke, although it sort of sounds like one. Any of our readers in Coffs Harbour, NSW, please check out your window and give the Australian Federal Police a hand. THE Australian Federal Police are continuing to frantically search for an Australian accused of war crimes, after a five-year legal battle ended with the High Court...
Interesting discussion of innovative ways to deal with Haiti's long-term problems. Haiti is very close to a failed state. So it's time to think big. Here are four out of the box choices: 1) A New Haitian Constitution; 2) UN Trusteeship; 3) U.S. Protectorate; 4) U.S. annexation and status as a territory. Read the whole article. I actually think that...
Add another African case to the ICC's docket. The International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, has given its prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo the green light to investigate the role of senior politicians in Kenya's post-election violence that killed 1,300 Kenyans in 2008. The decision allows Mr. Ocampo to take the next step, which would be passing down indictments against senior Kenyan politicians, some...
There is an old adage that a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged. The rejoinder is that a liberal is a conservative who has been indicted. Speaking of which, an intriguing development in the case of the Christian terrorists: All members of the anti-government Hutaree group, who wanted to start a violent revolution against the government...
