In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Responsibility of International Organizations – The Problem of Attribution

16 Nov

I’d like to thank the folks at Opinio Juris for inviting me to reflect on the emerging body of rules addressing the responsibility of international organizations. My post will address the question of attribution and will continue Kristen Boone’s prior discussion of particularly controversial aspects of IO responsibility. The question of whether internationally wrongful acts are attributable to an international...

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14 Nov

The following is a guest post by Lt. Col. Chris Jenks, the Chief of the International Law Branch in the Office of the Judge Advocate General. Lt. Col. Jenks is posting in his personal capacity. A Canadian Court recently sentenced Désiré Munyaneza, a former Rwandan Army officer, to life imprisonment with eligibility for parole following his conviction in May for...

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11 Nov

Another day, another attempt by the Registry to undermine the fairness of Dr. Karadzic's trial. Rule 3.3 of the Registry's Remuneration Scheme for Persons Assisting Indigent Self-Represented Accused provides that a self-representing defendant's legal team is entitled to be paid for "a maximum of 150 out-of-court preparation hours...

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09 Nov

As I reported here, the two cases of Sullivan v. Florida and Graham v. Florida present the best opportunity for constitutional comparativism since Roper v. Simmons. We apparently are an international outlier and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, with 190 parties, categorically prohibits JLWOP for everyone under the age of eighteen. But from reading the transcripts...

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08 Nov

The New York Times reports on budget season at the UN and various battles hotting up.  It's a good piece by Neil MacFarquhar, dated November 7, 2009.  As the article says, that fact that it costs the United Nations an average of $2,473 per page to create every single document in its six official languages, while outside contractors complete the same...

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08 Nov

Both Martin Holterman and Sasha Greenawalt have questioned my repeated -- and quite deliberate -- insistence that "no competent barrister will accept appointment as stand-by counsel under these circumstances," and that any barrister who does accept the appointment will thus "be interested in one thing and one thing only: the free publicity that comes with it."  Martin's comment is the...

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06 Nov

[Daniel Bodansky, University of Georgia School of Law and OJ guest blogger, sends this second dispatch on the state of the Climate Change talks leading up to the Copenhagen Conference. Professor Bodansky will also be blogging from Copenhagen here at Opinio Juris in December.] This week, the chair of the negotiations and the executive secretary of the UN climate change...

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06 Nov

If you are going to be around Palo Alto next Thursday evening, you might consider attending a panel discussion on robotics and law at Stanford Law School.  I’ll be on a panel alongside some very interesting and knowledgeable folks taking up varied aspects of robotics (my particular interest is robotics and war, but the panel will be considering many areas of robotics).  The particulars are below the fold.  (I’ll also be giving a lunch talk/discussion that same day sponsored by various student organizations at SLS specifically on robotics and armed conflict.)
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06 Nov

[Alvaro Santos is an Associate Professor at Georgetown University Law Center] The current global financial crisis has provoked intense criticism of the regulatory framework for financial markets. Financial market flexibility, once considered the key to successful financial institutions and economic growth, has now come under intense scrutiny. In contrast, labor market flexibility is still promoted by scholars and...

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05 Nov

Compare the following.  First, Reed Stevenson for Reuters: Yugoslavia tribunal judges ordered legal counsel for former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and adjourned his trial until March 2010 to give the new defence lawyers time to prepare. Karadzic has been acting as his own attorney and has been boycotting the trial which charges him with some of Europe's worst atrocities since World...

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05 Nov

[Professor James Gathii, provides this timely insta-background on today's decision by the the ICC prosecutor to open an investigation into the 2007 post-election violence in Kenya. Professor Gaathi teaches at Albany Law School, where he is the Associate Dean for Research and Scholarship and Governor George E. Pataki Professor of International Commercial Law. He publishes extensively on legal developments in...

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05 Nov

As most readers probably know by now, the Trial Chamber has decided to adjourn Dr. Karadzic's trial until 1 March 2010 and appoint stand-by counsel who will step in if, at that time, Dr. Karadzic continues to boycott the trial.  Here are the relevant paragraphs from the decision: 19. On the issue of continuing the trial in the absence of the...

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