Maher Arar, a Canadian who was detained by the U.S. and the subject of an "extraordinary rendition" to Syria, has lost his bid to maintain his lawsuit in U.S. courts. By a 7-4 vote, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, sitting en banc, has voted to dismiss his suit against U.S. government officials for alleged violations of...
I can't make the swearing-in on account of classes, but I wanted to offer my public congratulations to Lee Feinstein, who is being sworn in tomorrow at DOS as US Ambassador to Poland. Lee is an old friend, someone who combines first rate brains with outstanding judgment, and he is a great pick to represent the United States to an...
H/T to Orin Kerr for pointing this out, but this week is national pro bono week. Being an international law blog, I wanted to invite readers to mention any international or transnational pro bono work they do. Me? I serve as the board chair of a nonprofit global media assistance organization, the Media Development Loan Fund. I've served in that capacity...
[caption id="attachment_10327" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Raquel Rolnik"][/caption] In a further display of the UN Human Rights Council's sense of how to efficiently allocate its limited resources, its "special rapporteur on the right to adequate housing" has decided to conduct her next investigation in the United States, and in New York City in particular. (h/t the Corner). I'm sure that New York housing...
If I were to sit down and sketch out in a single sentence or two the current approaches ("theories" is way too strong for what I mean here) to corporate liability in the ATS, what would they be? I give it a shot as bullet points below; I welcome any additions, if you were trying to give a short but...
Cross-posted at Balkinization Here follows a revised version of the blog I posted earlier today. It turns out the final version of the legislation that passed the House was largely untouched after all. The full text of the mammoth Defense Authorization Bill in which the military commissions legislation is included is available here; the military commissions provisions are found...
[caption id="attachment_10236" align="alignleft" width="120" caption="Tara Melish"][/caption] [caption id="attachment_10102" align="alignright" width="101" caption=" "][/caption] Please let me thank Elena again for taking the time to respond to my piece, and for her always insightful, probing, and challenging questions. Let me attempt to respond sequentially to each of the five great points she raises. 1. Elena begins by querying whether the “thicker” interest-based description I offer to...
In something of a surprise move, the Supreme Court decided today to grant cert in Kiyemba v. Obama – an enormously important case about whether or not the federal courts have the power to order Guantanamo detainees (whose writs of habeas corpus have been granted) released into the United States. The NYTimes story is here. The Justice Department’s statement on...
(Please note that a commenter has rightly corrected me on two points, which I correct below) Former State Department Legal Adviser John Bellinger (and former OJ guest blogger) spoke today at Hofstra's biennial Legal Ethics Conference. His talk was typically engaging, honest, and interesting (it will not be news to many of our readers that Bellinger was an internal dissenter on...
OUP just sent along a review copy (note, per the FTC, free merchandise from OUP!!). The book is Rumu Sarkar, International Development Law: Rule of Law, Human Rights, & Global Finance. This isn't a review - I have only read the first chapter, and I am pretty certain I will find places both to agree and disagree. But I am finding...
As everyone in the world probably knows by now, Dr. Karadzic's trial is set to begin on October 26th. The current trial date is the culmination of two interrelated decisions by the Tribunal: the Trial Chamber's unsurprising decision not to require the Prosecution to trim its monstrous and completely unworkable indictment (choosing instead to impose insignificant time-limits on the prosecution's...
Wow! I know there has been some talk and some cases about an international right to internet access. But Finland has upped the ante by guaranteeing a right to high speed internet access. Finland's Ministry of Transport and Communications has made 1-megabit broadband Web access a legal right, YLE, the country's national broadcasting company, reported on Wednesday. According to the report, every person...
