In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Search: self-defense

20 Mar

...sovereign equals, elevating the status of the non-state actor in order to elevate the status of the agreement itself. But with Crimean separation being widely condemned, the reverse would seem to be the case here: a collective decision to shun one of the parties has the effect of denying it legal capacity to enter into a treaty. Some argue that an internationally acknowledged self-determination unit (e.g., Palestine) may conclude a treaty notwithstanding the state-centric definition in Article 2 of the Vienna Convention. This argument relies on Article 3 of the...
20.03.14 | |

21 Mar

...affecting U.S. neutral shipping. The Sabbatino decision rested on just this concern, applying it, self-consciously, even to U.S. courts. In any case, international law has flourished in many countries even without any form of judicial enforcement. Both here and abroad, domestic courts have rarely played a dominant role in enforcing international law obligations. (The sui generis case of the EU is an exception, of course, but an exception made possible, among other things, only because of the shadow cast by the ECJ’s compulsory jurisdiction.) In this nation, as in many...
21.03.08 | |

03 Aug

...coming out of their homes on days, keeping with their self-identified gender. The survey additionally indicated the transgender community experienced gender-based discrimination irrespective of whether they carried a national identity of their gender or not. The prevalence of discrimination has been accosted by Panama Ombudsmen Office as well. The Inter-American Court on Nov 24th 2017 pronounced the “American Convention on Human Rights (ACHR)” obliges states to guarantee the right to alteration of public records— name, sex/gender marker, image—to reflect an individual’s self-perceived gender identity based wholly on the informed and...
03.08.20 | |

15 Jun

closed doors this week in the Senate. Because, from all indications, Carl Levin’s Senate Armed Services Committee is conducting its multi-day committee mark-up of the FY 2012 National Defense Authorization Act - concluding late Thursday evening - entirely in “CLOSED” committee session. Jordan Response... The President already has constitutionally-based authority to engage in permissible self-defense under Article 51 of the U.N. Charter -- Obama's duty and competence faithfully to execute the laws, which (of course) include treaty-based and customary international law. Constitutional "principles" do not limit the President's competence to...
15.06.11 | |

06 Sep

to engage in permissible measures of self-defense, as even noted in the preamble to the AUMF! The President's authority is based in his/her obligation to faithfully execute the "Laws," which include international law as part of the laws of the United States (which, in turn, include the international law of self-defense). Members of the CIA can be acting on behalf of the Executive and the United States and carry out lawful measures of self-defense under international law. Such lawful measures would not be "unlawful" killings or murder. jens David Ohlin...
06.09.14 | |

20 Jun

...dummy: a feeling which suddenly becomes stronger at moments when the light catches the speaker's spectacles and turns them into blank discs which seem to have no eyes behind them. And this is not altogether fanciful. A speaker who uses that kind of phraseology has gone some distance toward turning himself into a machine. The appropriate noises are coming out of his larynx, but his brain is not involved as it would be if he were choosing his words for himself. If the speech he is making is one that...
20.06.07 | |

16 May

...by one belligerent does not free the other belligerent from those laws. What was Israel supposed to do? Only launch proportionate attacks or rely on less indiscriminate methods of self-defense. B A Dear Kevin, You state Israel was supposed to (a) either launch proportionate attacks or (b) rely on less indiscriminate methods of self-defense. What proportionate responses were available? I think the Israelis were already proportionate inasmuch as they did not counter attack immediately but waited months for "international pressure" to work to get Hamas to stop firing rockets. How...
16.05.10 | |

19 May

...immunity is a substantive defense, then there is indeed a tension between the attribution point and the 2001 Draft Articles on State Responsibility, article 58 of which expressly states that its rules on attribution are “without prejudice to any question of the individual responsibility under international law of any person acting on behalf of a State.” If immunity is a procedural defense, however, one that does not go at all to individual responsibility but instead to available fora, then the purported tension – or what Bill calls a flat contradiction...
19.05.13 | |

04 Nov

...advice establishes a possible affirmative defense known as entrapment by estoppel in a criminal proceeding. Even if one believes that the OLC's secret opinions are the kind of authoritative pronouncement that would establish the defense, the individual's reliance on that legal advice still must be reasonable. The defense is greatly disfavored even in US courts and is not recognized in the Rome Statute. Ben Milan, "a reliance on legal advice establishes a possible affirmative defense known as entrapment by estoppel in a criminal proceeding." From a purely academic point of...
04.11.10 | |

01 Nov

...start somewhere!" I actually find it more logical and believable to say that a Jew or an Arab have an intrinsic interest in boycotting Israel specifically over their respective ethnorreligious origins and Israeli policy, but of course this is not a compelling argument for anyone else (and it seems to me it isn't even a compelling argument for most Jews either). Guest KJH: "Israel’s policies toward Palestinians are murderous and discriminatory" Response: Tell us how Isreali policies are "murderous" ... Self-defense is "murderous"? Again, a prime example of an absurd...
01.11.15 | |

05 Dec

Patrick S. O'Donnell I absolutely agree with you that piracy is not equivalent to terrorism and therefore that pirates are not terrorists. However, one premise of the argument also severs the notion of terrorism from nation-states and that doesn't work either. As Robert Goodin makes clear in What's Wrong With Terrorism (2006), "states and state officials can practise terrorism, too. There is nothing in the concept itself to preclude that possibility. And there is much in the historical record to demonstrate that the possibility is a real one. States have...
05.12.08 | |

01 Aug

...acting under duress. Article 31 of the Rome Statute, Grounds for excluding criminal responsibility, para 1(c) stipulates that "The person acts reasonably to defend himself or herself or another person or, in the case of war crimes, property which is essential for the survival of the person or another person or property which is essential for accomplishing a military mission, against an imminent and unlawful use of force in a manner proportionate to the degree of danger to the person or the other person or property protected." Israel is infamous...
01.08.14 | |