The Nation has just published an extensive article documenting the "secret war" Blackwater employees have been conducting in Pakistan. The opening grafs: At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which...
As I note in my post above, Change.org has launched an ambitious new blog, War and Peace. A sampling of recent posts, to give readers a taste of what the blog -- which obviously has a broad mandate! -- covers: "IRA Splinter Faction Nostalgic for the Old Belfast"; "Hey, Russian Media, There Is No 'Number War' in Bosnia-Herzegovina"; "Is the...
Give the Trial Chamber credit, it has at least has stopped pretending that its decisions make any legal sense whatsoever: It said on Monday that Karadzic's appeal request was too vague and premature because at the time of his application, no counsel had been appointed to him. "Granting the application now, and then potentially again on 1 March, 2010 ...
My former colleague, current friend, and somewhat-regular OJ contributor Dan Bodansky has published The Art and Craft of International Environmental Law. Here is Harvard University Press's description of the book: International environmental law is often closer to home than we know, affecting the food we eat, the products we buy, and even the air we breathe. Drawing on more than two...
It is becoming increasingly clear that the Registry made no attempt to comply with the Appeals Chamber's decision in Seselj. I have now learned that the Registry arranged for Dr. Karadzic to meet with five defence barristers, including Mr. Harvey. Dr. Karadzic was then given a deadline to choose one. Instead, citing Seselj, Dr. Karadzic asked for a copy of...
When I critique the US's refusal to join the ICC in my international criminal law class, I make sure to emphasize not only that the US has traditionally played a very positive role in ICL -- from Nuremberg to the SCSL -- but also that the Rome Statute would be considerably worse but for the input of the American representatives...
The ICTY has appointed Richard Harvey, a barrister with Garden Court Chambers in London, to serve as Dr. Karadzic's stand-by counsel. There is no question that Mr. Harvey is more than qualified for the position: in addition to defending a number of individuals accused of terrorism-related offences in the UK, Mr. Harvey has served as the lead counsel in one...
I haven't irritated OJ purists by blogging about (international) sports for a while, so I think it's only appropriate to point out that, for the second time in two years, the French have stayed alive in a World Cup only by the grace of pathetic officiating. The most recent outrage comes courtesy of soccer (being American, I refuse to call...
The following is a guest post by Lt. Col. Chris Jenks, the Chief of the International Law Branch in the Office of the Judge Advocate General. Lt. Col. Jenks is posting in his personal capacity. A Canadian Court recently sentenced Désiré Munyaneza, a former Rwandan Army officer, to life imprisonment with eligibility for parole following his conviction in May for...
Another day, another attempt by the Registry to undermine the fairness of Dr. Karadzic's trial. Rule 3.3 of the Registry's Remuneration Scheme for Persons Assisting Indigent Self-Represented Accused provides that a self-representing defendant's legal team is entitled to be paid for "a maximum of 150 out-of-court preparation hours...
Tommy Crocker, who teaches constitutional law and criminal procedure at the University of South Carolina School of Law, will be guest-blogging with us for the next two weeks. Tommy writes on a variety of issues, including torture and the First Amendment. His work has appeared the UCLA Law Review, the Texas Law Review, Fordham Law Review, and the peer-reviewed Law...
Both Martin Holterman and Sasha Greenawalt have questioned my repeated -- and quite deliberate -- insistence that "no competent barrister will accept appointment as stand-by counsel under these circumstances," and that any barrister who does accept the appointment will thus "be interested in one thing and one thing only: the free publicity that comes with it." Martin's comment is the...
