In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Author: Kevin Jon Heller

26 Feb

According to VOA News, the Ukrainian Parliament would like the ICC to investigate recently-deposed President Yanukovych: Ukraine’s parliament voted on Tuesday to send fugitive President Viktor Yanukovych to be tried for ‘serious crimes’ by the International Criminal Court once he has been captured. A resolution, overwhelmingly supported by the assembly, linked Yanukovych, who was ousted on Saturday and is now on the...

|
25 Feb

Opinio Juris readers who are based in London may be interested in coming to a lecture I'll be giving for the ILA at University College London next week. Here is the relevant information: International Law Association (British Branch) Lecture What is an international crime? Wednesday 5 March 2014, 6-7pm Speaker: Professor Kevin Jon Heller (Prof. of Criminal Law, SOAS) Chair: Dr Kimberley Trapp (UCL) Venue: UCL Faculty of Laws Admission: Free...

|
24 Feb

Reprieve, the excellent British human-rights organisation, has submitted a communication to the ICC asking it to investigate NATO personnel involved in CIA drone strikes in Pakistan. Here is Reprieve's press release: Drone victims are today lodging a complaint with the International Criminal Court (ICC) accusing NATO member states of war crimes over their role in facilitating the US’s covert drone programme in Pakistan. It...

|
18 Feb

I rarely get excited about a new book before I've read it -- but I'm excited about this one, Mark Lewis's The Birth of the New Justice: The Internationalization of Crime and Punishment, 1919-1950. Here is OUP's description: The Birth of the New Justice is a history of the attempts to instate ad hoc and permanent international criminal courts and new international...

|
13 Feb

I'm currently in Belgium, teaching an intensive course on international criminal law at Katholieke University Leuven. So I was struck by Eugene Kontorovich's most recent post at the Volokh Conspiracy, in which he uses a new Belgian law permitting euthanasia for minors to criticize the Supreme Court's abolition of the juvenile death penalty in Roper v. Simmons. Here is the crux of...

|
12 Feb

Although the ICTY's recent high-profile acquittals have been getting all the attention, it's worth noting that the ICTR Appeals Chamber has just acquitted two high-ranking defendants, Augustin Ndindiliyimana, the former chief of staff of the Rwandan paramilitary police, and François-Xavier Nzuwonemeye, the former commander of a military reconnaissance battalion, on the ground that the Trial Chamber erred in concluding that they...

|
09 Feb

Sergey Vasiliev, an excellent young ICL scholar, has posted at the Center for International Criminal Justice a superb -- and very long -- analysis of the relationship between Perisic and Sainovic entitled "Consistency of Jurisprudence, Finality of Acquittals, and Ne Bis in Idem." I agree with almost everything Sergey says, although I don't think we should consider the Perisic AC's...

|
07 Feb

It's an excellent post, well worth reading in its entirety. I just want to flag two particularly important points. The first concerns whether, in light of Šainović, Perišić can really be considered fundamentally flawed. Schabas compellingly argues no: But the Prosecutor is not claiming that any ‘new fact’ has been discovered. Rather, the Prosecutor is arguing that the law has changed as...

|
03 Feb

President Obama has issued the following memorandum concerning US participation in the UN's Mali stabilisation mission: By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and consistent with section 2005 of the American Servicemembers' Protection Act of 2002 (22 U.S.C. 7424), concerning the participation of members of the Armed Forces...

|
01 Feb

I was very sad to learn that Maximilian Schell died today at age 83. Schell was sensational as the defence attorney, Hans Rolfe, in Judgment at Nuremberg -- it was only his second role in a Hollywood movie, and he won an Academy Award for it. An original poster of the film hangs above the desk in my office; I...

|