I've slammed Amnesty International in the past for their seemingly one-sided criticism of U.S. and Israeli forces, so I should note in all fairness that Amnesty International has a new report out alleging that the Taleban forces in Afghanistan are engaging in intentional and repeated violations of the law of war. The BBC summary is here. The Taleban have...
[Professor Bill Dodge teaches at Hastings College of Law and is an expert on the Alien Tort Statute] Last September, Opinio Juris hosted an online workshop to consider the forthcoming article by Curt Bradley, Jack Goldsmith, and David Moore, “Sosa, Customary International Law, and the Continuing Relevance of Erie.” The article has now come forth, and I have written a brief response...
Let me beat Roger to the punch on this one. Where are the international and foreign law precedents in today's landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a federal law banning the so-called "partial birth abortion" procedure? As far as I can tell, today's opinion is free of any such references. This is surprising because the right to choose...
James Gathii of Albany Law School has organized the third annual Third World and International Law (TWAIL) conference, to be held at Albany Law School on April 20 and 21. According to the conference description:One of the primary goals of this two-day conference, to be held between 20th to the 21st of April 2007, is to bring together a...
I'm wondering if this line will pop up in the wake of the Virginia Tech massacre. The shooter, Cho Seung-Hui, was a permanent resident alien. I don't know if the National Rifle Association conceives its mission to include the rights of noncitizens to bear arms (a little tricky given the Second Amendment's use of "the People"), or whether...
In the wake of the Virginia Tech shooting, (the second worst shooting spree in world history) there has been a tremendous outpouring of criticism in the world press, particularly European press, against the United States regarding our gun control laws (or lack thereof). I am quite sympathetic to those arguments. But just to put matters in perspective, I did a...
In light of today's tragic events in Virginia, and given that yesterday was Holocaust Remembrance Day, I thought it might be an opportune time to mention an uplifting story: for the first time ever, an Arab Muslim, Khaled Abdelwahab, is set to be named a "Righteous Gentile" by Yad Vashem, the Holocaust remembrance authority. The title is reserved for...
Remember those "missing" documents that the ICJ never considered in its judgment finding Serbia not liable for the Bosnian genocide? In another twist, Croatian media is reporting that the documents were withheld and redacted as part of a "deal" between the Chief Prosecutor at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, Carla Del Ponte, and the Serbian...
Yesterday was Holocaust Remembrance Day, and in honor of that day I am planning to do a series of posts in the coming days on different subjects relating to genocide and the Holocaust. Primarily the focus will be on the neglected subject of the intersection between genocide and religion. But today I wanted to just flag a great op-ed in...
The WSJ editorial page has a predictable but still quite powerful defense of Paul Wolfowitz today based on the documents recently released about his case. The upshot: Wolfowitz is the target of a smear campaign aided and abetted by media organs like the NYT. (UPDATE: Prof. Ruth Wedgwood has a similarly outraged defense of Wolfowitz in the LA Times...
In an interesting development, the British government has decided to stop using the term "War on Terror":Development Secretary Hilary Benn will risk the wrath of Tony Blair's closest international ally by warning that US rhetoric has given terrorists a "shared identity". Mr Benn is to say openly that President George Bush's phrase "War on Terror" strengthens small disaffected groups with widely...
Serbia's war-crimes court, established in 2003 to handle "lesser" crimes referred by the ICTY, has convicted four Serbian paramilitaries of murdering six young Bosnian Muslims during the infamous Srebrenica massacre. Although one soldier was acquitted, the case against the defendants was straightforward: they filmed themselves committing the murders:The trophy video - which lasts about 20 minutes - shows several...
