Search: self-defense

06 Sep Letter to the Editors of the Journal of the History of International Law

...order to argue in a fairly straightforward manner that the almost complete physical and cultural destruction of Native Americans was an act of self-defence and self-preservation. We are particularly astounded because this has been a standard trope to justify imperial violence, domination, and expansionism for centuries. From the 1857 Indian Rebellion to ‘Jewish financial terrorism’ the white racist imaginary is structured around supposed existential threats to which it is responding ‘defensively’. Nowadays, arguments about ‘white genocide’, ‘anti-white racism’ and the ‘white pride and self-preservation’ are at the centre of the...

02 Aug Assessing the Legal Issues of the Moldovan Separatist Conflict

...history helped us tease out the state practice concerning the underlying law. We found there has been a consistent view that there is no general right to secession—or “external self-determination”—under international law. Attempted secessions are largely viewed as domestic affairs that need to be resolved by the state itself. As a matter of international law, a successful claim for external self-determination must at least show that: (a) the secessionists are a “people;” (b) the state from which they are attempting to secede seriously violates their human rights; and (c) there...

27 Jun An Important Maori Land Settlement — But Where’s the Treaty Itself?

...laws’. The principle of self-management (the rangatiratanga principle) Article 2 guarantees to Māori hapū (tribes) the control and enjoyment of those resources and taonga that it is their wish to retain. The preservation of a resource base, restoration of tribal self-management, and the active protection of taonga, both material and cultural, are necessary elements of the Crown’s policy of recognising rangatiratanga. The Government also recognised the Court of Appeal’s description of active protection, but identified the key concept of this principle as a right for iwi to organise as iwi...

01 Sep Human Rights Watch has some explaining to do

lawyers two days to prepare arguments on diplomatic immunity. The defense, which asked for an eight-day extension, contends that the officials should be shielded from prosecution because they were democratically elected by the Palestinians. Prosecutors counter that the suspects should not receive immunity because they are members of Hamas, which Israel considers a terrorist group. Dweik was detained early this month after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) surrounded his home in the West Bank. About 30 Palestinian lawmakers, including a third of the Palestinian Authority's cabinet, have been captured since...