Search: extraterritorial sanctions

...proposition that the Rome Statute obligates state parties to enact universal jurisdiction for ICC crimes Step 2: the decision to code a state as having enacted universal jurisdiction if it (a) is a party to the Rome Statute and (b) its domestic law provides for jurisdiction over crimes obligated by international treaty As I explained in my original post, Step 1 is flawed. The Rome Statute does not include universal jurisdiction, and has no obligation whatsoever for state parties to provide (extraterritorial) jurisdiction for ICC crimes. I suspect that the...

...part of Volume 35(2), the National Law School of India Review (‘NLSIR’) is releasing a Special Issue focusing on the interactions of TWAIL with ideas of jurisdiction, extraterritoriality, statehood, and sovereignty. The vision behind the Issue owes its origins to Prof. B.S. Chimni’s path-breaking article titled “The International Law of Jurisdiction: A TWAIL Perspective”. In his work, Prof. Chimni highlights the need to critically (re)view the categories of ‘territory’ and ‘extraterritorial. Prof. B.S. Chimni will provide an Afterword, with general reflections and takeaways from the Special Issue. Keeping with our...

...to address in the early stages of this draft. Looking forward A treaty that would link B&HR would provide a more coherent and less fragmented international law, stipulating that human rights would take part of the law that regulates businesses. A treaty could clarify the precise content of states’ duty to protect human rights by being explicit in the extraterritorial reach of this duty, in order to dissipate any confusion. It would define clear legal obligations of corporations with respect to human rights, and could address how multi-national corporations can...

Philip Alston has posted an important new essay on targeted killing on SSRN. Here is the abstract of the essay, which is forthcoming in the Harvard National Security Journal: This Article focuses on the accountability of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in relation to targeted killings, under both United States law and international law. As the CIA, often in conjunction with Department of Defense (DOD) Special Operations forces, becomes more and more deeply involved in carrying out extraterritorial targeted killings both through kill/capture missions and drone-based missile strikes in a...

...state torts for wrongful death, battery, and false imprisonment are the basis for causes of action for international human rights litigation, then state choice of law rules are going to become the rage for human rights practitioners. We should all start reading the conflict of laws treatises of Patrick Borchers and Symeon Symeonides again, and start considering the constitutional and international law limits of the extraterritorial application of common law torts. Fortunately, some incredibly productive young guns like Chris Whytock, Trey Childress, and Anthony Colangelo are filling the gap. My...

...a decision of the High Court of England and Wales that has already received a good bit of attention. The reason I limit the question to “in armed conflict” is that outside of armed conflict, the source of detention power is clear. There, it’s domestic law as constrained by international human rights law that provides the answer. A single important asterisk is made necessary here because a very few recalcitrant states, like the US, deny that human rights law applies to their extraterritorial conduct. The reason I limit the question...

...I called the “war on drugs” in a previous post. But the indictment of the entire rebel leadership takes this “war” to a new level. First of all, it further demonstrates the remarkable extraterritorial scope of U.S. statutes criminalizing drug trafficking. Second, the indictment criminalizes (for drug law purposes) the entire Colombian civil war. In theory, if the Colombians capture a FARC leader in their civil war, they can now extradite him to the U.S. to stand trial for drug crimes, rather than charging him with human rights abuses or...

...possible readings of an exchange between Justice Scalia and the US Solicitor General on whether the Court should give deference to the views of the State Department. During our special Kiobel Roundtable, Curtis Bradley argued that the presumption against extraterritorial application is a better fit than the stronger presumption against extraterritoriality to limit the scope of the ATS. In his post, William Dodge also pointed out that suggestions by respondents to apply the presumption against extraterritoriality did not appear to gain traction with the justices. He also touched on the...

Mitt Romney is holding a fundraiser this evening in London. (Here’s a nice scene-setter.) Almost quaint how he promises not to criticize Obama while abroad, in the tradition of politics stoppping at the water’s edge (as if physical location still mattered in the context of completely transnationalized media). Three quick thoughts: 1. This kind of extraterritorial campaigning is becoming routine. Lots of US citizens live abroad (estimates of as many as seven million), they can vote come November, and (way more importantly) they have a lot of money. For Romney’s...

...highly critical opinion began by observing that the Second Circuit had made a forty-year-long blunder in characterizing Rule 10b-5’s extraterritorial reach as jurisdictional, when in fact it pertained to the merits. (The parties did not dispute the merits characterization, but they had not briefed it.) A remand was nonetheless inappropriate, Justice Scalia explained, because this “threshold error” had not been integral to the reasoning of the courts below. Justice Scalia went on to excoriate the Second Circuit for constructing a jurisprudence that ignored the presumption against extraterritoriality. In addition, he...

...than what is already available from non-US providers, so for years global platforms like Google Earth displayed only low-resolution imagery of the area. This is a remarkable example of the extraterritorial reach of a US legislation that with a domestic statute could effectively project one state’s security interests into the global infrastructure of witness Earth from above. This exceptional censorship regime hid evidence of expanding settlements, leveled villages, and military deployments, hindering both science and human rights monitoring for decades.​ The accountability costs were real. Through the Second Intifada and...

...since been seized of this conflict, one of a growing number of instances over the past two decades which have given rise to extraterritorial jurisdiction. The Leading Grand Chamber judgments of Chiragov and Others v. Armenia (no. 13216/05) and Sargsyan v. Azerbaijan (no. 40167/06) from 2015 which concern the 1992 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict remain under enhanced supervision by the Committee of Ministers, classified as a “Complex Problem” due to the unresolved political conflict. It was therefore inconceivable that the Interim Measures could have succeeded where the Grand Chamber and the Committee...