Search: self-defense

...merely listing acts that might constitute aggression without defining when those acts are unlawful. The definition does not address how claims of self-defense or humanitarian necessity affect the categorization of the use of force as aggression. This is another profoundly misleading statement. The proposed definition does, of course, permit states to use armed force in self-defense — it specifically limits “acts of aggression” to acts that constitute “a manifest violation of the Charter of the United Nations,” and Article 51 of the Charter specifically provides that states have the right...

...an understanding that the failure to provide legal justification for any controversial action is a good way to lay the groundwork for public rejection. (To take one historical example, President Nixon’s failure to supply a legal justification for the bombing of Cambodia surely contributed to widespread condemnation of the decision notwithstanding a tenable self-defense claim.) But that’s all about domestic legality. Bush continues to refuse to bow down before the altar of international law. I count six instances in the speech of the phrase “our laws.” There is one mention...

...which self-defense and protection of U.S. nationals have been the most commonly invoked; and (ii) the operation cannot be anticipated to be “sufficiently extensive in ‘nature, scope, and duration’ to constitute a ‘war’ requiring prior specific congressional approval under the Declaration of War Clause,” a standard that generally will be satisfied “only by prolonged and substantial military engagements, typically involving exposure of U.S. military personnel to significant risk over a substantial period” (quoting from the Libya opinion). Largely for reasons explained by my colleague and Dean, Bill Treanor, I am...

entitled to act in self-defence against “bad dudes” no matter when — or even if — those “bad dudes” might launch an armed attack against the US. This isn’t even the Bush administration’s “anticipatory self-defence.” This is, for lack of a better expression, “hypothetical self-defence.” Apparently, the US government believes it is entitled to use force against a non-state actor anywhere in the world as long as it can imagine a future state of affairs in which that actor would attack it. The mind — and international law — reels....

...the relevant law. Any other interpretation of the defense — most relevantly, that relying on an official statement made by the appropriate public officer or body is per se reasonable — renders the word “reasonable” completely superfluous. Reliance itself would be enough to invoke the defense. Differently put, the reasonableness requirement in entrapment by estoppel only makes sense if we leave open the possibility — however slight — that reliance on official advice can be unreasonable no matter how authoritative the public officer or body that issues it. Lederman, however,...

...deny the power of Congress to legislate over Indian affairs or to curtail the scope of Indian self-government. But the Court declared that Congress had not done so in any clear fashion and thus found no congressional intent to limit Indian self-government. The Court stated that the tribes retained their right of "self-government [and] the maintenance of order and peace among their own members." Unless this power is limited by explicit legislation or surrendered by the tribe, Indian tribes retain exclusive judicial jurisdiction over reservation Indian affairs. Thus today most...

...one person alone but from the rule of law itself. There are only two conditions in which a war is legal under international law: when force is authorized by the United Nations Security Council or when the use of force is an act of national self-defense and survival. The U.N. Charter, based on the Nuremberg Principles, prohibits war "as an instrument of policy." And the war in Iraq is just that — a war of choice. There is a common tendency among lawyers and military commanders to sneer at international...

...limits. [This is a tangent; feel free to ignore it.] Peter Orlowicz Don't affirmative defenses like self-defense or duress act to defeat criminal liability even when the mens rea for a given offense is present? Perhaps we don't want to extend those affirmative defenses for torture in particular, but to say "it is a basic principle of criminal law that the motive behind a crime is irrelevant to the defendant’s guilt" seems to oversimplify. B. Don Taylor III "...to say “it is a basic principle of criminal law that the...

[Maya Nirula is a dual-qualified international human rights lawyer with multi-jurisdictional experience consulting and litigating on issues of business and human rights] Introduction  This is the first of a two-part series, the Role of Business in War. Part I: The Old Offense will evaluate the interaction between International Humanitarian Law (IHL), International Human Rights Law (IHRL), and International Criminal law (ICL) in governing gross human rights abuses and corporate complicity. Part II: A Different Defense will examine a potential new defense to such complicity through the integration of IHL and ICL...

...this stage. Then, the ICJ opined that it has treated the clean hands doctrine as a defense of merits with “utmost caution”. More importantly, the ICJ then analyzed the conditions where the clean hands doctrine could be applicable, as argued by the US in their counter-memorial. It is critical that we pause here first. This is the first time that the ICJ has delved into a substantial analysis of the clean hands doctrine as a defense on merits, and has taken into account the various considerations that attract its application....

...of the laws of war. Further, it is an international armed conflict b/c U.S. military are dropping bombs on an insurgent (ISIS) and our presence has internationalized the armed conflict. The reason why the President does not need congressional approval is not b/c of a nonsense claim that we are not at "war," but b/c the President has constitutional authority to engage in measures of self-defense and collective self-defense -- e.g., http://ssrn.com/abstract=2061835 I suppose that the best argument for U.S. use of force in Syria against ISIS would be that...

...international legal problems—even the most intractable ones—must be balanced with a regard for common interests and fundamental principles. Chief among these is the right to self-determination. Unlike in bygone eras, international law no longer conceives of territories as mere pieces of property to be traded or conquered. Today, human beings are properly held to be at the center of international law. The self-determination of peoples is embraced in Article 1(2) of the UN Charter, which proclaims that a major purpose of the United Nations is to “develop friendly relations among...