Author: Kevin Jon Heller

The New York Times is reporting that Moreno-Ocampo has offered Spain's Judge Garzon a temporary position as one of his advisors: Spain’s well-known investigating magistrate, Baltasar Garzón who is being prosecuted in a case filed by far-right Spanish groups, has been offered a temporary post as an external adviser to the prosecutor at the International Criminal Court in...

Roger blogged below about how Kagan called in 1995 for substantive questioning of Supreme Court nominees.  Just in time to avoid being asked such questions herself, she's changed her mind: The White House Monday said that Supreme Court nominee won’t follow her own advice from 1995 in answering questions on specific legal cases or issues, supporting Kagan’s flip flop...

There's hypocrisy, and then there's Omar al-Bashir: Sudan's justice minister has asked Interpol to arrest the leader of Darfur's most powerful rebel group, state media said on Monday, a step likely to dash hopes of progress in a faltering peace process. [snip] The Sudanese Media Centre quoted Abdel Basit Sabderat as saying the rebel Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) leader,...

That is what Mike Allen is reporting at Politico.  If he's right, our next Supreme Court Justice will likely be the woman who recently argued this (h/t: my friend Steve Vladeck): [W]ith regard to the material support statute, there are substantial (pending) issues with regard to its scope, given that the Ninth Circuit invalidated the "service," "training," and "expert...

Michael Kearney at the University of York has written a long and interesting response to Julian's post, which I have posted below to make sure people see it.  I'm far from expert about the law of statehood, so I'm reluctant to comment on the international-law debate.  I continue to believe, though, that accepting the Palestinian declaration would be disastrous for...

Julian entitled a post last week "The ICC Begins to Fade in Importance in Sudan."  Julian might want to have a talk with Bashir about that: On the international summit circuit, no one can clear a room more quickly than Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir. Leaders have maneuvered to stay out of photographs with him, dashed ...

David Bernstein calls me out today for "blogging not a word" about The New Republic's recent attack on Human Rights Watch's coverage of Israel.  He also claims that "HRW has not responded" and that "it’s almost as if 'headquarters' has sent out word to ignore the TNR piece in the hopes it will go away."  I'll oblige Bernstein with a...

Whoops, spoke too soon about the WSJ's anti-ICC editorial.  It does indeed contain a lie -- and its a doozy: What’s more, no amount of reform of the founding treaty will change the ICC’s inherent flaw. The ICC is a child of the doctrine of “universal jurisdiction,” which holds that courts can adjudicate crimes committed anywhere in the...