In association with the International Commission of Jurists

General

16 Dec

[Bede Sheppard is the deputy children’s rights director at Human Rights Watch, based in Barcelona] At an event at the United Nations in Geneva this morning, the ambassadors of Norway and Argentina unveiled a set of six new “Guidelines” aimed at better protecting schools and universities from being used for military purposes during times of armed conflict. They are intended to respond to the practice of government forces and non-state armed groups converting schools and universities into bases or barracks, or using them as firing positions or places to cache weapons and ammunition. This practice endangers students and teachers by turning their schools into targets for enemy attack. Students and teachers have been injured and killed in such attacks. It also exposes students to sexual violence, forced labor, and forced recruitment by the soldiers sharing their schools. Students must either stay at home and interrupt their education, or study alongside armed fighters while potentially in the line of fire. The Guidelines urge all parties to armed conflict to refrain from using schools or universities for any purpose in support of the military effort, but state specifically that “functioning schools” should not be used, even if it is outside of normal school hours, or during the weekend or on school holidays. Schools that have been abandoned or evacuated because of the danger presented by the armed conflict should also not be used, except in circumstances in which fighting forces are presented with no viable alternative, and only as long as no choice is possible between such use of a school and another feasible method for obtaining a similar military advantage. The Guidelines reiterate the prohibition on destroying a school as a measure intended to deprive opposing parties of the ability to use them in the future, and provide guidance on how to respond if enemy forces are using a school, or if military forces are the only option for providing essential security in response to threats of an attack on a school. Concerns about the negative consequences of where soldiers are accommodated—and resulting efforts to regulate their billeting—date back a long time.
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15 Dec

Your weekly selection of international law and international relations headlines from around the world: Africa Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir claimed victory over the International Criminal Court on Saturday after it shelved further investigation of war crimes in Darfur, and reaffirmed his hard line on the rebel region. The ICC confirmed four charges of crimes against humanity against Charles Ble Goude, and committed the ally of...

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13 Dec

Looking back at the week that was, Opinio Juris bloggers covered a number of news-related issues. Several provided commentary on the release of the US Senate's Torture Report. Prior to its release, Kevin expressed disbelief at a post by ACLU Director Anthony Romero urging blanket amnesty for those responsible for torture, and as soon as it became available, Jens announced the report's availability and...

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11 Dec

The 525-page executive summary of the torture report released this week, and the debate that has followed thus far, is in many respects so dense it is a struggle just to decide where to begin engaging. Having spent years of my life as a human rights lawyer working on precisely these issues – preparing reports on secret detentions, and indeed detainee deaths in U.S. custody, among other things – and having spent plenty of days in shock and horror at what we learned then, I had come to feel almost inured to new revelations. Power drill to the head? We’d seen that earlier. Detainee died of hypothermia having been left mostly naked in his dungeon-like cell? Knew that too. But beyond the important new detail about our treatment of detainees the report offers, it is for me the facts the report reveals about the level of fundamental professional incompetence giving rise to this program, and the extent of the CIA’s efforts to keep information about it from other parts of our own government – including the director of the FBI and two U.S. secretaries of state – that leaves me newly in awe. Among the many telling (and I believe unrefuted) passages of incompetence (p. 11 of the Report): “Numerous CIA officers had serious documented personal and professional problems – including histories of violence and records of abusive treatment of others- that should have called into question their suitability to participate” in the interrogation and detention program. More, the private psychologists CIA hired to develop, operate and assess its interrogation program lacked any “experience as an interrogator, knowledge of Al Qaida, background in counterterrorism, or any relevant cultural or linguistic expertise.” Even as I continue to work through the text of the report, it is clear that it should be required reading for all Americans. For now, though, I want to begin with one of the questions the report raises that I find much more difficult to assess: whether and how those responsible for the acts of torture described in the report should be held accountable.
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10 Dec

Right now we are locked in a complex dispute over the claims in the SSCI Torture Report that the CIA's torture program was ineffective (as well as illegal). Part of the dispute can be frustrating because I think we are conflating a number of more distinct questions when we ask whether the torture was effective or not. Consider the following article from...

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10 Dec

For those of us fortunate enough to end up with a career in international law, we all have our mentors, our guiding lights.  Mine was Professor Alfred P. Rubin of the Fletcher School.  He died last week.  I write to express my condolences to his family and friends and offer a few words on his influence on my life as well as...

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09 Dec

At long last, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has released the executive "summary" of its report into torture conducted by the CIA. The report is available here. Here are some first reactions. The nature and conditions of the interrogations are indeed horrendous. The report specifically concludes that the CIA interrogations were harsher than previously recognized and the report's allegations certainly back...

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08 Dec

Your weekly selection of international law and international relations headlines from around the world: Africa The International Criminal Court has withdrawn charges of crimes against humanity against Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, a decision met with mixed reaction. Suspected rebels stabbed and hacked to death at least a dozen people in a village in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo on Saturday, a local government...

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05 Dec

This week on Opinio Juris, Roger commented on Joel Trachtman's article on customary international law, which attracted a lot of debate from our readers in the comments. Kevin lamented US Courts' insufficient understanding of IHL and wondered if Paddington would prefer Australia's Christmas Island. He also responded to Ryan Vogel's post on Lawfare on the OTP's Afghanistan's investigation. Julian explained why he does not fully agree with...

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