In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Search: drones

28 Oct

...killing people in violation of international law through its use of unmanned drones on the Afghan border, a U.N. rights investigator said on Tuesday. Philip Alston, a U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, also said the U.S. refusal to respond to U.N. concerns that the use of pilotless drones might result in illegal executions was an “untenable” position. Alston, who is appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council, said his concern over drones, or predators, had grown in the past few months as the U.S. military prominently...
28.10.09 | |

27 Mar

...I have seen in print (though I have been informally told) that Pakistani officials want the US to broaden the campaign beyond AQ and Taleban. Will there ever be a legal issue of whether such widening of targets goes beyond the AUMF? Probably not, at least not in the current Democratic president-Democratic Congress, but it is a question. President Obama campaigned on increased use of targeted killing via drones, and his administration thinks this has been an effective policy: President Barack Obama concluded that the drones have been an effective...
27.03.09 | |

06 Apr

...Ukraine offensive. Of the items that Russia reportedly requested from China, the surface-to-air missiles, and perhaps other conventional weapons, would fall squarely within the scope of the ATT, as would parts or components of conventional weapons.  The use of Chinese drones by Russia is already commonplace in the Ukraine conflict according to Financial Times analysis. It is unclear whether these would be military drones with lethal capacity that are subject to export regulation, or may be simple commercial drones that fall outside the scope of the ATT. China’s Accession to...
06.04.22 | |

13 Sep

are the last kinetic step in what is a massive intelligence operation — “intelligence-driven uses of force,” as I’ve been calling them. Drones in their surveillance role are part of that intelligence gathering, but in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the effectiveness of the drones program of targeted killing depends enormously on the CIA’s ground level intelligence gathering, a network that has taken years of effort to get underway, and which — among other things — angers Pakistan because it has allowed the US to determine its own targets without having to...
13.09.11 | |

22 Oct

...not immune from attack will not remotely be up for discussion, whether on an armed conflict view or an independent self-defense view of targeted killing and drone strikes. I am (still) completing a new essay on the operational roles of drones, a roster of strategic uses, one that leaves aside the legal issues in favor of trying to get an analytic handle on the increasingly variegated uses of drones and targeted killing. It seems to me important for legal analysis because the variations are sufficiently great at this stage that...
22.10.10 | |

19 Jul

Though I am generally upbeat about the use of drones in military applications, one must recognize design flaws: The Navy’s latest multi-million pound drone has the unfortunate feature of starting to self-destruct if the pilot accidentally presses the space bar on his keyboard …. The Navy are planning to buy hundreds of drones of the MQ-8B Fire Scout, one of which helicopter almost exploded after the drone’s operator accidentally pressed the space bar with a wire from his headset – which launches the self destruct mechanism on the vehicle....
19.07.11 | |

22 Jan

...2nd para. quoted. And drones are just a platform on which certain weaponry can be placed -- and drones may come in increasingly smaller sizes -- like model airplanes, dragonflies. AGW Jordan, I think a good start would be getting the administration to explain how they determine who is a 'militant' (none of this military aged male rubbish), and the legal basis for killing American citizens (or indeed, anyone) outside a zone of armed conflict. I do agree with you though that there is no need for a 'code of...
22.01.13 | |

02 Aug

Mihai Martoiu Ticu The problem is still that those targeted with drones/robots cannot go to any (international) court and sue US. And the danger lies not only in drones/robots, but other developments as well. CIA invests in technology that monitors the web in real time — and says it uses that information to predict the future. The information one gathers is too great and that means that there are not enough humans to process it and make decisions. More and more of the decision-making will be left to computers. Computers...
02.08.10 | |

21 Feb

...with. But if weaponized drones really do become prevalent in conflicts, such drones can be mass produced, and they are all virtually identical, it seems we have lost one of our comparative advantages. The end result of such a conflict might end up coming down to manufacturing capacity (i.e., which state can produce drones faster). Ok, enough speculative fiction for now. John C. Dehn Chris, Very interesting posts of late! My initial take is that the basic principles of international humanitarian law (IHL) will remain and are timeless. Think of...
21.02.12 | |

08 May

...question should be: “How to End the Forever War?” Our Approach should be what I would call: “Translate, not Black Hole.” And our three-part answer should be: “(1) Disengage from Afghanistan, (2) Close Guantanamo, and (3) Discipline Drones.” This speech is a sort of book-end with former Department of Defense General Counsel Jeh Johnson’s recent speech (also at the Oxford Union) that mentioned there will come a time when we transition from looking at this as an armed conflict against an organized enemy to a counter-terrorism effort against individuals. Koh’s...
08.05.13 | |

27 Oct

...community, however. Within important parts of the international law community, on the other hand, many of these same practices are seen as contentious and illegal from a law and policy standpoint. Pretty much every aspect of US “counterterrorism-on-offense” is challenged by important parts of the international law community, particularly its advocacy and activist wings. There might be some modest countertrends in the international community, I suppose, particularly when it comes to actual practices. French drones to Mali, for example, or Germany perhaps acquiring weaponized drones. Perhaps just the simple fact...
27.10.12 | |

14 Apr

...Anwar al-Awlaki for death, I went back to Koh’s explanation for why the drone strikes are legal. It seems to me that his arguments could possibly double as a justification of the government’s authority to kill al-Awlaki without due process. Serwer then walks back through the text of Legal Adviser Koh’s speech, applying the language about drones to the targeting of Anwar al-Awlaki. He concludes that it could be seen as a justification for that as well. I think that’s right, and a good observation. Of course, I think also...
14.04.10 | |