Search: self-defense
02 Mar Russia’s Intervention in Ukraine: Legal Rhetoric and Military Tactics
...think anything that has occurred in Ukraine rises to the point of Russia have a claim to Article 51 self-defense, but at this point, this isn’t about adjudicating claims, the Russian strategy is about misdirection and wrapping what it does do in a mantle of (seeming) legality. Well, not so much a mantle as a fig leaf. Consequently, given the centrality of the norm of non-intervention, the self-defense argument sounds weak to my ears. But consider how the situation in Ukraine is being reported by the Russian-government funded news source,...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...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...
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)....
23 Dec The Illegality of the Israeli Occupation of the Palestinian West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and Gaza: What the International Court of Justice Will Have to Determine in its Advisory Opinion for the United Nations General Assembly
...Israel had a right of self-defence in 1967 that justified, legally, the introduction of the occupation then, this justification has not persisted, nor has an alternative legal justification arisen. There has been no actual or imminent armed attack justifying, as necessary and proportionate, the occupation as a means of self-defence. And the doctrine of preventative self-defence, justifying the occupation as a means of stopping a threat from emerging, has no basis in international law. Neither United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, nor the so-called Oslo Accords, provide an alternative legal...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,...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...