Like many of you over a certain age, I have been thinking a lot about where I was when the Berlin Wall fell: driving with a friend from Montreal to my parents house in New Jersey, listening to dispatches from Berlin over the radio. My father was glued to the television set when we finally pulled in sometime in...
It's a great day to be teaching the powers of the Security Council to my international law class! President Obama presided this morning over the Security Council meeting on non-proliferation, securing a 15-0 vote for UNSC resolution 1887, which aims to bolster the nuclear non-proliferation regime through strengthening the NPT, enforcing existing resolutions on North Korea and Iran, and...
On the eve of President Obama taking the chair at the Security Council, David Bosco takes on a few of the common assumptions about the Council over at Foreign Policy. I largely agree with Bosco's quick (and yes, Ken, "breezy" - it seems to be a quality FP is promoting these days!) take on the central themes: (1) the Council...
My sympathies are with those who have to drive anywhere in Manhattan this week as the General Assembly gets underway. In past years I have experienced the privilege of being inside the security cordon and also the inconvenience of being outside it. But now we can all experience being inside the main public events through the UN Webcast! The...
Paula Schriefer of Freedom House makes a compelling argument about the central failings of the UN Human Rights Council and how they can be overcome in this piece over at Foreign Policy. It is not, as many argue, the mere presence of bad actors on the Council or the ability of those states and their friends to run the place...
Two former U.S. military commanders took on the former VP for his ongoing support of torture in this scathing op-ed in last week's Miami Herald. Generals Krulak and Hoar took this unusual step because they felt "duty-bound" to "repudiate his [Cheney's] dangerous ideas." Hat tip to Tom Ricks, who calls it "the best article I read on the 8th...
Charlie Savage has a piece in today's NY Times on the OLC's recent memo advising the State Department that it may ignore congressional constraints attached to the 2009 foreign appropriations bill that purport to prohibit U.S. diplomats from attending meetings led by officials from states designated as state sponsors of terrorism on the ground that such constraints unconstitutionally limit...
The U.S. officially took its seat at the UN Human Rights Council on Monday. Yes, it will be joining a deeply flawed institution that, under its prior form as the HR Commission included in its membership Zimbabwe and Sudan* --hardly paragons of human rights compliance. But it is better for the U.S. to be inside the institution, working to bring...
I normally wouldn't post on a document supplement to a casebook, but the publication of Selected International Human Rights Instruments and Bibliography for Research on International Human Rights Law, by David Weissbrodt, Fionnuala Ni Aolain, Mary Rumsey, Marci Hoffman and Joan Fitzpatrick (4th Ed. 2009 Lexis/Nexis 2009) is worth a shout out. It is by far the most up-to-date course...
I am a big fan of Laura Rozen's work over at The Cable blog on foreignpolicy.com. She posted a piece late Monday, "Getting to Yes on Middle East Peace Talks," which offers a brief but fascinating peek into the art and science of mediating protracted conflicts -- a topic I have written about here and here....
The success of a UN Secretary General is largely dependent on two things: (1) the charisma and personal drive of the office holder; and (2) his (to date, they have all been men) ability to lead and work well with the Secretariat. On both dimensions, recent evidence suggests Ban Ki-moon appears to be in real trouble. Unless...
I just learned the sad news of the passing of Professor John Barton of my alma mater, Stanford Law School. The Stanford Law press release can be found here. John was a dedicated and learned scholar, a wonderful mentor and a delightful man to be around. He will be greatly missed. I was fortunate to get to know John during my first year...
