Search: self-defense
22 Oct Progress on the Disclosure of Documents to Lubanga?
the defense with redactions. 3 of the 173 documents cannot be disclosed to the defense, directly or indirectly. And here is the breakdown of the NGO documents: None of the 55 documents can be disclosed to the defense in unredacted form. 53 of the 55 documents can be disclosed to the defense in redacted or summarized form. 2 of the 55 documents cannot be disclosed to the defense in any form. As this point, we have no way to know whether letting the Trial Chamber review all of the documents...08 Oct Guest Post: On ‘Humanitarian Intervention’, ‘Lawmaking’ Moments and What the ‘Law Ought to Be’–Counseling Caution Against a New ‘Affirmative Defense to Art. 2 (4)’ After Syria
...of chemical weapons. Koh argues in favor of a new ‘affirmative defense to Article 2 (4)’ of the United Nations Charter which would allow the ‘lawful threat of limited military intervention’ to counter ‘a deliberate large-scale chemical weapons attack’. He regards Syria as a ‘lawmaking moment’ that should be used to clarify ‘the contours of an emerging exception to a rigid rule’. This argument is based on a number of claims and assumptions that merit reconsideration. One may easily concur that the law on the use of force contains ‘grey...18 Mar Oral Argument in Heller and the English Roots of the Second Amendment
their defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.” Now do you think the term “suitable to their conditions” limited the number of people who had access to arms for self-defense? MR. GURA: It was in England, but that was criticized by the framers. St. George Tucker’s edition of Blackstone – JUSTICE STEVENS: So you think that the Second Amendment is a departure from the provision in the Declaration of Rights in England? MR. GURA: It’s quite clearly an expansion upon it. JUSTICE STEVENS: So that’s not really...02 Mar What Are the Best Legal Arguments For and Against Military Intervention in Libya?
Int'l L.J. 533, 545-47 (2002). How about collective self-defense at the request of a new regime in parts of Libya and/or self-determination assistance? See id. at 547-48. Jordan Response... of course, I meant "Arab" League -- can't always type correctly Kenneth Response... See resolution 688 (1991) and following no-fly zone over Iraq to protect Kurds and Southern Iraq against Saddam Hussein, because of ensuing humanitarian situation. Perhaps no firm legal basis, but considered legitimate with some legal backing. Jordan Response... Yes, that was an implied authorization for the no fly...
05 Sep Iran’s Threat of Retaliation
...Lebanon, suggests an increased likelihood of military action, thereby heightening the overall threat. Threats in Self-Defense As the International Court of Justice (ICJ) prominently established in the Nuclear Weapons Advisory Opinion, ‘if the use of force itself in a given case is illegal […] the threat to use such force will likewise be illegal’. On the other hand, ‘if it [the threat] is to be lawful, the declared readiness of a State to use force must be a use of force that is in conformity with the Charter’ (para. 47)....25 Mar Medellin: My Early Thoughts
...analysis, which seems fairly sensible and reasonable. It is not overreaching, since it makes clear that there are indeed treaties that are self-executing, and international court judgments that could be self-executing (just not these ones). The most important part of the Court’s opinion deals with self-execution, since its analysis there is the key the rest of the decision. And I don’t think it creates a “presumption” against self-execution, even against self-executing international court judgments (even though it perhaps ought to). But that is a subject of deep complexity, which I...22 Feb Israel Does Not Have a Sovereign Claim to the West Bank: A Response to IJL’s Legal Opinion
...violated the self-determination of Palestinian people: “[t]he weak point of our position of course”, he said in 1919, “is that in the case of Palestine we deliberately and rightly decline to accept the principle of self-determination” (Quigley, p. 75). Much has been written about the purported illegality of the Mandate of Palestine, given how its Balfour commitments directly contradicted Article 22 of the Covenant, denying the mandated population self-determination and betraying the Covenant’s obligation to administer the territory for the “well-being and development” of its inhabitants. In 2007, James Crawford...03 Feb Medellín, the Alien Tort Statute, and the Domestic Status of International Law
...treaty-based claims are also raised. Treaty-based claims will not succeed, however, unless the treaty is self-executing and the plaintiff has a cause of action. By endorsing a broad notion of non-self-execution and by endorsing the presumption that treaties do not create domestic rights of action even when treaties “directly benefit[] private persons,” Medellin restricted prospects for treaty-based claims under the ATS. Medellin also undermines the more common CIL-based claims. In Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain, plaintiff Alvarez cited the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights as evidence that CIL prohibits the...
06 Sep The Occupation is Illegal. Now What?
...involve temporary denial of some aspects of self-determination, “the Court intended to make clear that it is the particular features of Israel’s prolonged occupation that analogize it to a situation of alien subjugation and foreign domination which implicate the right to self-determination as a peremptory norm.” (Judge Cleveland, Separate Opinion, para. 33). While the court mentioned peremptory norms only once, it mentioned obligations erga omnes – i.e. the concern of all States – that Israel had violated numerous times. These are: “the obligation to respect the right of the Palestinian...24 Sep Guest Post: What do Russian Lawyers Say about Crimea?
...independence in 1991 were incompatible with the jus cogens rule of self-determination. If yes, then in her opinion, international recognition of Ukraine’s borders could not remedy that defect. While a sensible attempt to rationalize her Russian colleagues’ sentiments, I wonder how far this argument would bring them. First, it is not obvious that self-determination of the Crimea’s “nation” (if at all existent) would require Russia and Ukraine to permit them to choose their new homeland upon the breakdown of the USSR, as opposed to granting Crimea autonomy within Ukraine. Second,...