Search: extraterritorial sanctions

[ Pouria Askary is an assistant professor of international law at Allameh Tabataba’i University, and Katayoun Hosseinnejad is a university lecturer of international law in Iran.] As discussed by many scholars and commentators (see e.g. here, here and here) the extraterritorial operation by the US armed forces on 3 January 2020 at Baghdad international airport which led to the assassination of Major General Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force of Iran, was a flagrant violation of the peremptory norm on prohibition of the use of force enshrined in Article...

...criteria for statehood (Montevideo Convention, 1933), which requires (a) permanent population; (b) a defined territory; (c) government; and (d) the capacity to enter into relations with other states. Yet, it has been recognized (ICRC Commentary of 2016) that NIACs can involve extraterritorial aspects, when a foreign State – District 13 – joins one party to the conflict – the rebel groups from the other Districts, rendering the conflict non-international in nature, as long as the State does not exercise effective control of the groups, which is not the case. Having...

...on extraterritoriality. Now the conservatives point to U.S. law – the judge-made presumption against extraterritoriality – and liberals point to the international status of the offenses. It is like a game of Twister. Neither position is fully correct. There may be a place for extraterritoriality in ATS cases, but in a much narrower class of cases then where it is currently applied. The following two posts will draw on much of my prior work, and I hope the reader forgives me not recapitulating the entire argument of those articles here....

In reading Kal’s description of territoriality’s ebb and flow, I was particularly interested in the evolution in judicial thinking with regard to constitutional scope or domain. His description of the path from In re Ross, which stated emphatically that the Constitution does not follow the flag, to Reid and Boumediene, which give some extra-territorial force to the Bill of Rights and other constitutional guarantees, is excellent. The evolution has obviously been gradual, even glacial. Within this narrative, there are some fascinating examples of courts dramatically pushing constitutional boundaries outward, including...

...populated space on its own territory, the state may lack control over these parts. Practice of human rights bodies suggests though that siege scenarios are unlikely to translate into reduced state obligations vis-à-vis the besieged population when undertaking military actions. Extraterritorial jurisdiction also appears to exist. Secondly, it is controversial whether human rights obligations for armed groups exist or not. Finally, there is the difficulty to determine the actual content of the right to food applicable during armed conflict. Obviously, the obligations to respect, protect and fulfill the right to...

...CRC, the authorities must also seek international cooperation and assistance to boost their scarce resources to fulfill the right to health. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has made clear that States must coordinate with each other in the allocation of responsibilities, including by cooperating to provide “humanitarian assistance in times of emergency” and “contribut[ing] … to the maximum of its capacities.” The obligations under the ICESCR and the CRC are set out at greater length in the Maastricht Principles on Extraterritorial State Obligations in the Area of...

...greater fidelity to traditional understandings of international law. (Harold Koh, the former Legal Advisor to the U.S. Department of State, made similar pleas around transparency during his May 7 speech at Oxford.) These are all critical points that Congress and others should be hearing, but I would like to shift the focus—away from U.S. responsibilities and on to the responsibilities of the States that consent to the use lethal force on their territories. This is part of the “drone” discussion (or, to be more accurate, the “extraterritorial use of lethal...

...for Extraterritorial Self-Defense,” Ashley Deeks (Columbia Law School, incoming Associate Professor of Law, University of Virginia School of Law) offers the first sustained descriptive and normative analysis of the “unwilling or unable” test in international law. Descriptively, it explains how the “unwilling or unable” test arises in international law as part of a state’s inquiry into whether it is necessary to use force in response to an armed attack. It identifies the test’s deep roots in neutrality law while simultaneously illustrating the lack of guidance about what inquiries a victim...

...right to use force in self-defense more easily. First, the nature of the potential attacker: Although state practice in the aftermath of international armed conflict suggests no change from the traditional conception of armed attack when two states are involved, consider how the aftermath of an extraterritorial conflict against a non-state group, particularly a terrorist group, might contribute to driving down the threshold for an armed attack. After the state has suffered an armed attack and used force in self-defense against the non-state group already, leading to the armed conflict...

...indicated, the same Ninth Circuit majority also held in Sarei that the adjudication of transitory torts under the Alien Tort Statute does not violate a statutory presumption against extraterritoriality (slip op. at 19334-39) (or, I might add, international law constraints on the extraterritorial application of U.S. law, since the conduct-regulating norms being applied under the ATS come from international law). In addition, in response to an argument raised by the dissent, the majority found that claims relating to violations of international norms that meet the test of universal acceptance set...

...process. Debate around the redundancy of the right to development in light of the existing human rights framework exists and is periodically reanimated. Mainstream criticism of the right to development revolves around the liberal implications of a right seemingly legitimising economic development to the detriment of social and environmental factors, or misconstrues the right to development as merely ‘a synthesis of more traditional human rights’ (p. 481). More recently, critiques have contended that the redundancy of the right to development stems from the emerging recognition of the extraterritorial applicability of...

...this case raises unusual issues of dual sovereignty and double jeopardy. The only reason that Yakoob is subject to the double jeopardy problem is because the United States has imposed extraterritorial criminal penalties for crimes committed by Canadians in Canada. It’s much harder to argue that both Canada and the United States have dual sovereignty claims, or at a minimum that the United States’ claim to sovereignty is equal to that of Canada’s. Can someone more conversant in the area help me out? Is anyone aware of a similar case...