In association with the International Commission of Jurists

General

13 Mar

There have been some interesting developments this past week regarding the legal proceedings against the UN following the outbreak of cholera in Haiti in 2010.  For background on this tragic and politically sensitive case see my prior posts here, here, here and here. Readers will recall that efforts to obtain compensation for the victims moved to US courts in October 2013,...

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10 Mar

[John H. Knox is the UN Independent Expert on Human Rights and the Environment, and the Henry C. Lauerman Professor of International Law at Wake Forest University School of Law.] In 2012, the Human Rights Council appointed me to be its first Independent Expert on human rights and the environment, and asked me to clarify the human rights obligations relating to the enjoyment of a...

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10 Mar

Your weekly selection of international law and international relations headlines from around the world: Africa The UN reports that Muslims are being "cleansed" from the west of the Central African Republic and thousands of civilians risk being killed "right before our eyes." Germain Katanga was convicted by the ICC of being an accessory to crimes including murder and pillage during an attack on a village in a diamond-rich region of...

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08 Mar

I normally find scam emails amusing -- especially the one where Ban Ki-moon wants to give me "scam compensation" in the amount of $500,000 on behalf of the "World Bank/United Nations Assisted [sic] Programme." But the one I received today is just sick: Dear Friend, I know this email will surprise you. Please accept my offer for charity plans. My name is...

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08 Mar

This week on Opinio Juris, we continued to follow the situation in Ukraine as it unfolded with an insta-symposium. Alexander Cooley gave an overview of the power politics at play, while Chris posted about Russia's use of legal rhetoric as a politico-military strategy, and about how language affects the evolution of international law. This last post built on a discussion...

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07 Mar

[Alexander Cooley is Professor of Political Science at Barnard College, Columbia University in New York and author of Great Games, Local Rules: the New Great Power Contest for Central Asia (Oxford 2012).] Among the many political layers of the crisis in Ukraine, I am especially interested in how these unfolding events are part of a broader attempt by Russia to confront the West's...

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07 Mar

Russian Prime Minister Dimitry Medvedev yesterday announced a legislative initiative to fast-track citizenship for non-resident native Russian speakers. He didn't single out ethnic Russians in Ukraine, but the context says it all. The citizenship shift (variations of which have been floated since the Maidan erupted last month) would allow Russia to amplify its protective justification for the action in Crimea....

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06 Mar

As Julian mentioned, the Crimean parliament is attempting to achieve the secession of Crimea through the use of a parliamentary vote and a referendum. More legal rhetoric in the midst of political crisis. Back in 2007 and 2008, Russia, the U.S. and the EU used quasi-legal arguments to try to explain why one could support the independence of Kosovo, but...

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06 Mar

President Obama issued an executive order this morning imposing entry bans on those responsible for actions that "undermine democratic processes or institutions in Ukraine," "threaten the peace, security, stability, sovereignty, or territorial integrity of Ukraine," or involve "misappropriation of state assets of Ukraine or of an economically significant entity in Ukraine." Sec. 2. I hereby find that the unrestricted immigrant and nonimmigrant...

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06 Mar

We have invited several academic luminaries to post here at Opinio Juris over the next few days about the crisis in Ukraine, with particular emphasis on Russian intervention in Crimea. As we have done in the past with other symposiums, we also welcome young academics to submit guests posts for possible publication. We can’t guarantee we will publish every post...

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03 Mar

[Expanding and moving this up from the comments section of my previous post.] In a comment to the previous post, reader "Non liquet" noted that: The UN Security Council Meeting was interesting in this regard today. Reportedly, the Russian Ambassador to the UN stated he received a letter from the former President of Ukraine dated 1 March requesting intervention of the Russian...

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