The US Naval War College international law conference, held in June in Newport, Rhode Island, is now online in video format. It was a terrific discussion, with great panels and discussants, and I counted it as a privilege to be there. One reason the video for this conference is so interesting, however, is that the audience - and this year...
With an election scheduled for August 21, Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Opposition Leader Tony "Check Out My Speedo" Abbott were set to debate tomorrow night at 7:30 pm. There was just one problem with that idea...
Dave Hoffman has a post today at Concurring Opinions reporting the results of an empirical study of how often law reviews have cited various blogs. According to the study, blogs have been cited 5460 times since 2006, with the following blogs representing the top-10 in terms of citations: FindLaw's Writ -- 618 citations Volokh Conspiracy -- 402 SCOTUSBlog -- 305 Balkinization -- 259 Patently-O --...
According to the Associated Press: The United Nations' highest court says Kosovo's declaration of independence from Serbia did not break international law. The nonbinding opinion sets the stage for a renewed push by Kosovo for further international recognition of its independence. Reading the opinion Thursday, International Court of Justice President Hisashi Owada said international law contains no "prohibition on declarations of independence." ...
CIA director Leon Panetta has named a new National Clandestine Service chief, reports Peter Finn in the Washington Post today. The new chief, John Bennett, has been serving as station chief in Pakistan, overseeing in particular the expansion of the drone campaign carried out by the CIA there. One can safely take that as further evidence that the Obama administration...
Is this for real? . A Phillippines newspaper is accusing a sitting Philippines Supreme Court justice with plagiarizing articles published in law reviews on matters of international law when he authored a key opinion for the court on reparations for comfort women. The articles supposedly plagiarized include this one by Evan Criddle and Evan Fox-Descent in the Yale Journal of...
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit upheld this week the conviction of "Chuckie Taylor" for violating the U.S. Anti-Torture Act, which implements U.S. obligations under the Convention Against Torture. Taylor is the son of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, currently on trial himself in the Sierra Leone Special Court. The opinion is a good and important one...
Yes, says Daniel Hannan, a journalist and British MEP. At least under those famous Montevideo factors, now that the E.U. has recently acquired the capacity to sign treaties. I don't know if things are quite so easy. For one thing, the E.U. does not itself necessarily consider itself a state, and it is not exactly clear if other states recognize the...
I agree that the relatively slow progress in U.S. treaty-making is not all the fault of the sluggish Obama Administration. The Senate no doubt is a big obstacle to treaty-making, . Still, I think the idea that the U.S. should join treaties, simply in order to show the world that we are willing to join treaties, is a really bad...
The showdown between the ICC and its prosecutor Moreno-Ocampo over the trial of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo continues, as the Court ordered Lubanga's release. I assume Moreno-Ocampo will appeal (he has five days), but if his appeal is rejected, this could turn out to be a huge embarrassment for the prosecutor. In any event, it is certainly messy. Judges at the International Criminal...
This web video nearly fooled people into believing France was about to pay Haiti billions in reparations for payments Haiti made to France ensure its independence. Yes, like that was going to happen. France quickly released a statement declaring the whole thing a hoax. This hoax was so well done that it leads me to wonder what other interesting statements could...
The massive U.S. financial regulation legislation, known as "Dodd-Frank", is finally heading to President Obama for signature. In addition to containing a partial reversal of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Morrison v. National Australia Bank, the bill also contains some rather stern instructions for the U.S. representative at the International Monetary Fund. The instructions are so stern that they...
