The New York Times is reporting that Moreno-Ocampo has offered Spain's Judge Garzon a temporary position as one of his advisors: Spain’s well-known investigating magistrate, Baltasar Garzón who is being prosecuted in a case filed by far-right Spanish groups, has been offered a temporary post as an external adviser to the prosecutor at the International Criminal Court in...
Roger blogged below about how Kagan called in 1995 for substantive questioning of Supreme Court nominees. Just in time to avoid being asked such questions herself, she's changed her mind: The White House Monday said that Supreme Court nominee won’t follow her own advice from 1995 in answering questions on specific legal cases or issues, supporting Kagan’s flip flop...
In 1995, while Elena Kagan was an Assistant Professor of Law at the University of Chicago, she wrote a review about Stephen Carter’s book, The Confirmation Mess. Carter’s book, of course, was highly critical of the confirmation process and identified numerous ailments, including most famously, the handling of the confirmation hearing of Robert Bork. Kagan begs to differ....
There's hypocrisy, and then there's Omar al-Bashir: Sudan's justice minister has asked Interpol to arrest the leader of Darfur's most powerful rebel group, state media said on Monday, a step likely to dash hopes of progress in a faltering peace process. [snip] The Sudanese Media Centre quoted Abdel Basit Sabderat as saying the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) leader,...
Yesterday a federal court in New York granted Chevron's request for discovery of outtakes from the 2009 documentary Crude about the multi-billion dollar litigation in Ecuador. Chevron's request was pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 1782, which authorizes a judge in the United States to order discovery of evidence to be used in proceedings before a foreign tribunal. As reported here, Chevron's...
That is what Mike Allen is reporting at Politico. If he's right, our next Supreme Court Justice will likely be the woman who recently argued this (h/t: my friend Steve Vladeck): [W]ith regard to the material support statute, there are substantial (pending) issues with regard to its scope, given that the Ninth Circuit invalidated the "service," "training," and "expert...
[caption id="attachment_12297" align="alignright" width="180" caption="Judge Thomas Buergenthal"][/caption] Sure, some guy named John Paul Stevens is retiring from the U.S. Supreme Court, but there is another big judicial resignation this spring to note. Thomas Buergenthal, the U.S. member of the International Court of Justice, has announced that he will not finish out his term on the court. I am breaking some news...
Michael Kearney at the University of York has written a long and interesting response to Julian's post, which I have posted below to make sure people see it. I'm far from expert about the law of statehood, so I'm reluctant to comment on the international-law debate. I continue to believe, though, that accepting the Palestinian declaration would be disastrous for...
Last year, the Palestinian National Authority filed a declaration accepting the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. This declaration is controversial, to say the least, because it could potentially give the ICC jurisdiction over Israeli military forces operating in Gaza or the West Bank. Today, the ICC released a summary of the submissions it has received on whether the Palestinian's...
What's the only modern international or internationalized criminal tribunal that either has or had universal jurisdiction? Answer: The Special Panels in East Timor....
I hadn't been aware of this group, Human Rights at Home, which is seeking to "create a national political culture that supports and advocates for human rights." In fact, they have some interesting ideas of how to reform U.S. legal infrastructure to implement U.S. international human rights obligations. revitalizing an Interagency Working Group on Human Rights to coordinate the efforts of the...
Kudos to Northwestern's Searle Center on Law, Regulation, and Economic Growth for a wonderful conference on ATS litigation last week. The papers by David Scheffer & Caroline Kaeb, John McGinnis & Ilya Somin, Jide Nzelibe, Michael Barsa & David Dana, Anthea Roberts, and Eugene Kontorovich were all outstanding. There are many topics worthy of retelling, but I wanted...
