Search: crossing lines
08 Apr O’Connell’s “Who’s Afraid of International Law?” and the Koh Nomination
...5, 6, 7), by conservative students at Yale, and also by prominent officials from across party lines. A few days ago, Ted Olson defended Koh from the right-wing criticism. A letter in support of the Koh nomination that has been recently delivered to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee includes signatories such as former Republican State Department Legal Advisers John Bellinger, William Taft, and Davis Robinson as well as former Democratic Legal Advisers David Andrews, Conrad Harper, Roberts Owen and Herbert Hansell. If I had to throw in my lot with...
18 Nov Fighting over the Spoils of the “Holy Land”: Attachment to Land as a Basis for the Rights of Ethnic Minorities?
...under Article 27 as forming part of enjoying one’s own culture, particularly for indigenous peoples and it has addressed several indigenous land claims under the norm. Still, as Kymlicka submits, “[c]onflicts involving ethno-national groups such as the Kurds, Kashmiris, and Palestinians pose a much greater threat to regional peace and security than the struggles of pastoralists or forest dwellers, yet […] the UN has no guidelines for addressing the[m]” (p. 390). Given the content of Article 27 ICCPR and the above-mentioned developments regarding (collective) land rights, the interplay of land...
21 Aug Covid-19 and the Right to Water: The Impact of Handwashing Guidance in Atolls with Limited Running Water
...access to clean washing water (far less potable water) remains a challenge. Covid-19 has exposed existing fault lines in ways that shine a light on the implications of inadequate water supplies. Atolls, Handwashing and Climate Change What has gone relatively unexamined is the impact of climate change on access to water and the additional vulnerability that countries already exposed to its effects are now facing in light of Covid-19. Any positive progressive realisation of access to water, although taking into account the particular circumstances that states might face economically, must...01 Nov Joe Biden, Cyberspace, and International Law
...can’t judge the intentions of another country by looking at its force — like by looking at its force posture. So it’s a challenge to identify effective, confidence-building measures in cyberspace. We’ve got to find a way. For example, the United States is working closely with Russia to reach an agreement that would establish links between our computer emergency response teams and our nuclear risk reduction centers to build cooperation and to set up lines of communication in the event of an alarming incident. . . . The tactic of...
16 Feb UK Okpabi et al v Shell: UK Supreme Court Reaffirms Parent Companies May Owe a Duty of Care Towards Communities Impacted by their Subsidiaries in Third Countries
...Okpabi, and more than 42,000 individuals from the communities of Ogale and Bille in the Niger Delta, alleging that oil spills from the respondents’ pipelines caused severe environmental damage, affecting their land, livelihoods, water sources and health. They sued Royal Dutch Shell plc (Shell), UK-based parent company, and its Nigerian subsidiary SPDC, which operates the joint venture between Shell and the state-owned oil company. But the responsibility of Shell, and the jurisdiction of UK courts over the case, was contested by their legal counsel. Both the High Court and the...09 Mar Jenni Millbank Reflects on Panel 3 and Responds to Guglielmo Verdirame
...can be definitively drawn between integral and marginal conduct associated with sexuality. Sexual orientation is expressed—and revealed—in hundreds, if not thousands, of subtle and obvious ways through appearance, speech, behavior, dress and mannerisms. Moreover, lines between what is “integral” and what is “marginal” conduct associated with sexual minorities in another culture prospectively drawn by Western decision makers have often failed to properly encompass accepted human rights standards, as the lower level decisions in HJ and HT amply demonstrate. Over a decade of my own research on sexuality-based refugee status determination...18 Oct US Delegation to Dubai Internet Negotiations To Be Larded With (Dominated By?) Industry Reps
...be talkshop, in which included non-state representatives get the extra status that comes with inclusion on an official delegation and some access to state representatives. That would be a bump for lesser known entities like “dotGay LLC” (also on the delegation). But the real dealmaking remains an exclusively intergovernmental undertaking. The other would be along the lines of corporate sponsorship of Olympic competitors. That would be much more robust kind of involvement – the state provides the nameplate but nonstate actors are more like partners than hangers-on. Ultimately it may...
09 Aug Doing Justice to History Symposium: Doing Justice Through History
...the MRTA armed groups as an armed conflict under international humanitarian law, and 2) it decided to study the history of the conflict in the context of Peru’s history of structural inequality. Thus, the TRC concluded that the Peruvian armed conflict had had a two-tiered explanation: the most immediate cause, it said, was the decision of the Shining Path (and only the Shining Path) to launch an assault on Peruvian democracy. At the more structural level, however, the Shining Path sought to “exploit old historical fault lines, that are transversal...02 Apr HILJ Online Symposium: Greg Shill Responds to Christopher Whytock
...judgments. Instead, the problem—as I argue there and in Part III.A—is a federal statute and uniform act (28 U.S.C. § 1963 and the Uniform Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Act, which is law in 47 states) that effectively dictate the same result. Both laws establish a registration procedure that streamlines the enforcement of judgments across district and state lines: the plaintiff records the judgment with the court clerk and then proceeds to enforce, subject only to sharply limited defenses (e.g., defective process). Given that Part III.B.1 argues that states are not...05 Feb AJIL Symposium: Is the Vienna Convention Hostile to Drafting History? A Response to Julian Davis Mortenson, Part 2
...as internally inconsistent. This contention, however, builds on a misunderstanding of the role of the international legal scholar. Treaty interpretation is an activity that engages many different kinds of agents, including, for example, international legal scholars, judiciaries, state organs and representatives, and state counsels. Not all agents are subject to the same societal constraints, of course. Depending on the capacity of a treaty interpreter, consequently, different lines of action are typically expected. So, for example, is a person acting as state counsel expected to choose the line of action that...