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Search: self-defense

21 May

...that China has interfered with the Philippines’ right to navigation and other rights in areas within and beyond 200 nautical miles of the Philippines cannot be made without engaging in sea boundary delimitations. I have to admit I am not very persuaded by this analysis. In Prof. Talmon’s defense, the essay is very short and not an attempt to provide a deep legal analysis of the problem. But the idea that any challenge to the nine-dash line is excluded from UNCLOS arbitration is hardly obvious to me, since the basis...
21.05.13 | |

31 Jul

...scienter is established. Where there is no occasion for secrecy, as with reports relating to national defense, published by authority of Congress or the military departments, there can, of course, in all likelihood, be no reasonable intent to give an advantage to a foreign government. Notice: the Gorin Court did not limit “bad faith” to obtaining national-defense information with the “intent” to injure the United States; it also considered bad faith obtaining national-defense information while having “reason to believe” that the information could be used to injure the US. Those...
31.07.13 | |

31 Mar

...NATO’s repeated confirmation that it will maintain in place its ‘Open Door’ policy. However, if Ukraine itself declares that it will not seek NATO membership, NATO could record its understanding of this commitment. Assurances by NATO Members: Second, key NATO members could offer assurances that Ukraine will not obtain membership. This could occur, for instance in the shape of the US side letter to an angreement, provided Ukraine first declares itself that it will not seek membership. Self-Limitation: Ukraine itself would rule out NATO membership. If so, the question arises...
31.03.22 | |

21 Feb

...the paper alleged, was angry at the Serbs for having overrun the UN protected Bosnian “safe area” of Srebrenica the previous month and wanted them punished. [snip] Gotovina has pled not guilty to the war crimes charges levied by the Hague tribunal. News reports have indicated that Gotovina’s lawyers may be planning to rest his defense on the American participation in the offensive. Because these allegations come courtesy of Gotovina’s defense team, it’s easy to dismiss them as self-serving. They’re given credence, however, by the fact that — according to...
21.02.06 | |

04 Jun

...may not have given an accurate or thorough explanation for a variety of reasons, including a simple misunderstanding of the law. In prior discussions with Marko, we debated the import of a state's claim of self-defense. My point then was that a state may say it is exercising its right of self-defense against a non-state actor without thoroughly explaining why that justifies the breach of territorial sovereignty of the state where that actor is located. That does not mean that self-defense rather than necessity or something other legal doctrine is...
04.06.10 | |

13 Jun

Former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has an op-ed in the WSJ announcing his opposition to US ratification of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. The op-ed is probably meant to soften the force of an earlier WSJ op-ed by former Republican Secretaries of State calling for US ratification. He is also testifying on Thursday at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. Rumsfeld’s opposition may make a difference since the question of ratification is really a debate within conservative and Republican circles (Democrats appear to be...
13.06.12 | |

11 Jul

...molesters, people with infectious diseases, and the like — but who have not committed crimes. Congress should draw the national security court’s judges from a pool of current federal judges, the same process used for the special court we already have to issue intelligence warrants. The court would have a permanent staff of elite defense lawyers with special security clearances as part of its permanent staff. Defense lawyers trained in the nuances of taking apart interrogation statements, particularly translated statements, are crucial because often the legal proceedings will involve little...
11.07.07 | |

26 Sep

...unilateral authority to withdraw the U.S. from treaties which specify terms for withdrawal and which don’t require further alterations or changes to domestic U.S. law. Defense Treaties/Military Alliances This suggests that a President Trump could terminate NATO and the US-Japan Defense Treaty pursuant to those treaties’ withdrawal provisions. Interestingly, the NATO Treaty Article 13 specifies that “Any Party” can terminate their membership with one year’s notice. That notice must be sent to the U.S. Government. So I guess a President Trump could give himself a one year’s notice? Because the...
26.09.16 | |

02 Mar

— should perhaps factor into a lesser-humanitarian-evil principle or criminal defense.) Might an unintended consequence of Professor Blum’s proposal, designed to provide military operators and planners with more humanitarian-protective flexibility, be to further shift the locus of debates about the interpretation of IHL and resolution of its most difficult dilemmas from State practice to international criminal tribunals? There are probably some very good reasons for using a criminal law defense as a mechanism for adapting IHL in the way Professor Blum proposes, including that it helps ensure that a new...
02.03.10 | |

19 Oct

...Stafford also stated in the email that “The interrogator said I told my clients to kill themselves, and word was passed to the three men who did commit suicide.” Smith says flatly that he has no connection at all to the suicides, and he say the Defense Department, in charge of Guantanamo, may be trying to shift blame to him. It’s not only Smith’s ability to represent Gharani that has been destroyed: In the course of the investigation, the Navy has seized more than a thousand pages of documents from...
19.10.06 | |

22 Nov

...of such elements in the exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defense recognized in Article 51 of the Charter”. It is clear from the foregoing that resolution 377 (V) anticipates that military elements mentioned above could be mobilized for purposes beyond the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense on the recommendation of the General Assembly. The subsequent practice of the General Assembly also affirms the robustness of its prerogatives in respect for the maintenance of international peace and security under the “Uniting for Peace” resolution. By way...
22.11.18 | |

07 Jan

...is attributable to defense challenges, it does seem appropriate to consider whether a General Court-Martial would have in fact been more efficient. The second justification that no longer seems meaningful was the purported need for a “quasi-secret” process to protect evidence and participants. Considering the Department of Defense has willingly provided information about the legal and lay participants in the process, there seems little difference on this point between the Military Commission and the Court-Martial. As for the protection of evidence, the concern was essentially hollow from the outset, as...
07.01.06 | |