In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Legislative Fixes to the Problem of Executing Terrorist Judgments Against Iran

06 Sep

Having followed the terrorism litigation against Iran for years, I was fascinated to read of the recent legislation—Section 502 of the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights--that creates a legislative fix for victims of one particular group of terrorist victims but not thousands of others. The law in question grants plaintiffs/judgment creditors in one and only one case—Peterson...

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06 Sep

Just when you thought you've seen everything -- you haven't: According to a statement posted on the website of the Special Court for Sierra Leone, Judge El Hadji Malik Sow, a Senegalese jurist who served as alternate judge for Trial Chamber II, has agreed to testify in the wake of the defense appeal. A guilty verdict was handed down against Taylor last...

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05 Sep

What I said last month, about Mauritania refusing to extradite al-Senussi to Libya?  Never mind: The man accused of having helped orchestrate some of the worst crimes committed by the regime of ex-Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi has been extradited back to Libya, according to a Mauritanian government statement. The communique carried by national radio and on Mauritania's official news agency said Abdullah...

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02 Sep

Calls for Papers The Southern Illinois University Law Journal is seeking scholarly legal articles from newer legal scholars for possible inclusion in a special Symposium issue, Guantanamo Bay: What Next?, on legal issues arising from the continued detention and trial of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Full submissions (in Microsoft Word) should be in by November 19, 2012. The International Organizations Interest Group of the American Society of...

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31 Aug

A recent post at Mother Jones mentions my view of UBL's killing and provides Ken's brief thoughts on his death: Kenneth Anderson, a law professor at American University Washington School of Law, disagrees. "Being wounded does not necessarily render one hors de combat; hors de combat means they’re not actually posing a threat to you," Anderson says, citing moments where wounded...

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29 Aug

Of the 1500+ posts I've written for Opinio Juris over the past seven years, none angered my fellow progressives more than the post in which I claimed that the killing of Usama bin Laden was perfectly legal under international law.  Here is what I wrote: To begin with, I think the applicable legal regime is international humanitarian law (IHL), not international...

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29 Aug

It is a draft platform, but these parts of the 2012 GOP Platform are certainly interesting. It appears to have strong language in favor of "American Exceptionalism" and American sovereignty. Under our Constitution, treaties become the law of the land. So it is all the more important that the Congress -- the senate through its ratifying power and the House through...

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26 Aug

Calls for Papers The Irish Yearbook of International Law has a call for papers for a special symposium issue regarding Climate Justice in International Law (Word document). Submission deadline is August 31, 2012. The University of Sydney is hosting a post-graduate conference on November 1-2, 2012 entitled Crossing Boundaries (Word document), open to post-grads in the Asia-Pacific region. Deadlines of abstract submission (no more...

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24 Aug

I hope this statement by Assange's legal team is just seeking leverage for negotiations, because I think their claim would be blown out of the water by the ICJ. It would be an international embarrassment for Ecuador. Actually, it would be a further international embarrassment for Ecuador, which is already beginning to seem a little ridiculous in its involvement in this...

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24 Aug

South Africa recently decided that, in order to avoid consumer confusion, goods imported from the Occupied Palestinian Territories must include special labels that make clear they were not produced in Israel.  Israel's outrage was predictable -- but its rhetoric was anything but: The Israeli Foreign Ministry said it would summon South Africa's ambassador to lodge a protest over the decision on...

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22 Aug

Mark Klamberg, who is a lecturer in public international law at the University of Stockholm, has a detailed post on his personal blog about the likelihood -- or unlikelihood, to be more precise -- that Sweden would extradite Julian Assange to the United States.  He has kindly given me permission to reprint a significant portion of it (I've made minor...

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21 Aug

While I am at it, I might as well flog my most recent piece on China's relationship with international tribunals and international adjudication more generally.  This study, which attempts to document all of China's treaties that include compulsory dispute resolution clauses (excepting bilateral investment treaties), concludes that China is unlikely to become a strong supporter and participant in mechanisms of...

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