In association with the International Commission of Jurists

General

05 May

JP Morgan Chase recently adopted a comprehensive environmental policy that would subject its international project financing decisions to review for their impact on global warming. In so doing, JPMC followed in the steps of Citigroup, which earlier this year announced a policy that would screen financings for their impact on deforestation. JP Morgan's policy is remarkable for its scope and...

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04 May

Today is an important anniversary in modern Chinese history. In 1919, thousands of Chinese students marched in Beijing and throughout China to protest the terms of the Paris Peace talks that led to Japanese control of German concessions in China. The "May Fourth" movement was the seminal political and intellectual event of the early 20th Century. Of course, the...

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04 May

A couple of us are out of town this week, thus blogging has been slow this week. Apologies. I will be back to full-time blogging next week. Indeed, I have gone almost 72 hours without logging on to the internet. It is nearly killing me, but my wife tells me this is good for me. I'll be...

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30 Apr

Chris and I had a nice little exchange a few weeks ago about a speech made by former State Department Legal Adviser William Taft IV that criticized the U.S. detention policy in Guantanamo Bay. Today's Guardian has a long expose alleging that Taft, and other U.S. lawyers, were involved in pressuring the UK's attorney general to change his mind over...

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29 Apr

Why should an otherwise boring Supreme Court opinion Tuesday in Pasquantino v. U.S. on the applicability of federal "wire fraud" statute to activities involving avoidance of foreign tax laws (via SCOTUSBlog) affect our understanding of the President's foreign relations powers?Because Justice Thomas' opinion for the Court casually cites the legendary United States v. Curtiss-Wright case for the proposition that the...

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28 Apr

The WTO Appellate Body confirmed a lower panel ruling that the EU's system of subsidies for sugar producers violates WTO rules. The U.S. sugar subsidy system was similarly found in violation by a separate lower panel and this ruling suggests the U.S. will lose its appeal as well. Although it is unclear whether reducing the cost of say,...

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28 Apr

Euan Macdonald of the Transatlantic Assembly has a much more detailed discussion of the Goldsmith memo discussed below. He usefully notes that (1) Goldsmith plainly rejects the U.S. doctrine of preemptive self-defense, at least as articulated by the Bush Administration; and (2) the Goldsmith opinion supports Blair's claim that he did have legal advice assuring him that the Iraq...

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27 Apr

With all due respect to the hand-wringing over whether “The Interpreter” is too pro-UN (an impossibility in America’s current political climate, but I digress), you guys have missed the boat. Witness this: I’m watching Sesame Street with my daughter this morning and the muppets are in a furor. They can’t agree on who should start singing the Alphabet Song....

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27 Apr

Jeff V., an incoming law student, posted a series of questions to a post of Julian’s which can be boiled down as follows (a) does the ICJ have U.S.-styled clerkships and (b) how can someone learn more about careers in international law? Here are some general responses.First, concerning clerkships at the ICJ: the ICJ has not traditionally had...

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27 Apr

This interview with a local Ugandan NGO suggests the ICC should back out of its Ugandan investigation (an issue Peggy discussed in more detail here). Here's a key exchange between a reporter from the East African and David Kaiza:Does the ICC risk escalating the [Ugandan] war?The LRA [the Ugandan rebel forces -ed.] are not the kind of people who will...

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