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Search: Syria Insta-Symposium

20 Apr

the real threat. And the US has done absolutely nothing to protect Syrians from conventional weapons — it has simply funnelled even more into the country to support various rebel groups (including some that are allied with al-Qaeda) in their struggle against Assad. The US cares about protecting its own interests in Syria, such as preventing chemical weapons from being used against Americans. (The real message of the completely ineffectual attack.) It does not care about the lives of ordinary Syrians, as the ever mounting death-toll indicates. But let’s put...
20.04.17 | |

10 Feb

Matters in Syria are going from bad to worse. I am sure this won’t do any harm, but it is not going to help either. It will simply give the illusion that the international community is dong something about Syria. Syrian officials suspected of committing or ordering crimes against humanity should face prosecution in the International Criminal Court (ICC), the United Nations human rights office said on Friday. “We believe, and we’ve said it and we’ll keep repeating it, that the case of Syria belongs in the International Criminal Court....
10.02.12 | |

17 Sep

[Christopher K. Connolly is an Assistant United States Attorney, Southern District of New York. This post is written solely in the author’s personal capacity. The views expressed in this post are the author’s alone and cannot be attributed in any way to his employer or any branch of the U.S. Government.] On September 7th, faced with new polls showing a surge in support for Scottish independence, the British government made a pledge to the people of Scotland: vote “No” in this Thursday’s referendum, thereby remaining within the United...
17.09.14 | |

23 Apr

[William S. Dodge is Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Research at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. From August 2011 to July 2012, he served as Counselor on International Law to the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State, where he worked on the amicus briefs filed by the United States in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. The views expressed here are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the State Department or of the United States.] My...
23.04.13 | |

03 Jun

[Prof. Beth Stephens of Rutgers Law School at Camden has litigated and written widely on related issues. Additionally, she served a counsel for one of the (victorious) respondents in the Samantar case. We are of course honored that she is able to share her views with us. Again, a reminder that “Related Posts” will send you to a collection of all of the posts on this topic.] The Supreme Court decision in Samantar v. Yousuf put to rest to a line of Circuit court decisions that has baffled...
03.06.10 | |

06 Mar

...(despite the fact that some textwriters use the wrong test for imputation re: self-defense). Aurel Sari Jordan, thanks for the comments. I don't think that the limitation 'in contravention of the Charter' adds much for our purposes. The point of that qualification is simply to recognize that there could be instances where the first use of armed force does not qualify as an act of aggression because it is in accordance with the Charter, as in the case of force used or authorized by the Security Council. Since aggression is...
06.03.14 | |

06 Mar

We have invited several academic luminaries to post here at Opinio Juris over the next few days about the crisis in Ukraine, with particular emphasis on Russian intervention in Crimea. As we have done in the past with other symposiums, we also welcome young academics to submit guests posts for possible publication. We can’t guarantee we will publish every post submitted, but we would love to broaden the discussion to include new voices. So if you want to write a guest post for Opinio Juris about Ukraine of approximately 500...
06.03.14 | |

17 Sep

...the independence decision is a decision which the people of Scotland have a democratic right to make, and that it is a decision to be made by them alone. It also politically binds the Governments to respect the result of the referendum. In short, it represents an acceptance, in this instance, by the United Kingdom of the right of the Scottish people to secessionary self-determination. Irrespective of the outcome of the vote, the Scotland precedent puts pressure on other governments to grant similar referendums to secessionist movements in their own...
17.09.14 | |

17 Sep

...the decolonization context. Second, the right to self-determination in most instances authorizes a people to exercise its right to internal self-determination, which is typically reflected in a right to form a regional government and/or have other cultural, linguistic, and religious rights respected by the mother state. The right to self-determination, outside of the decolonization context, may lead to the secessionist type of external self-determination only in extreme instances where the mother state chooses to completely disrespect the people’s right to internal self-determination. According to the Canadian Supreme Court in the...
17.09.14 | |

16 Sep

[Jure Vidmar is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in the Faculty of Law and Research Fellow of St John’s College, Oxford. Some arguments made in this post are further elaborated on in this article.] The Treaty on European Union (TEU) now gives member states an explicit right to exit the EU and provides for a mechanism that makes this right effective. However, the TEU does not directly regulate the future relationship between the EU and a territory which is seceding from a member state. If Scotland votes for...
16.09.14 | |

16 Sep

[Stephen Tierney is a Professor of Constitutional Theory, University of Edinburgh and Director of the Edinburgh Centre for Constitutional Law.] In the Edinburgh Agreement of 2012 the United Kingdom Government committed itself to respect the outcome of the Scottish independence referendum. This suggests that, in the event of a Yes vote, the transition to independence will be relatively straightforward, as will the pathway to Scotland’s international recognition and membership of the United Nations – see here. How then would Scotland’s move to statehood be characterised under international law?...
16.09.14 | |

15 Sep

[David Scheffer is the Mayer Brown/Robert A. Helman Professor of Law and Director of the Center for International Human Rights at Northwestern University School of Law.] If the Scottish people vote in the majority on September 18th to become an independent nation, then a host of legal issues will descend immediately upon Holyrood, where the Scottish Parliament sits in Edinburgh, and Westminster, the legislative center of the United Kingdom Government in London. Some of these issues can be overcome if there is a willingness to negotiate in good...
15.09.14 | |