Here is the text of the speech by new UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. There are a few good lines from the speech, such as the following: Member States need a dynamic and courageous Secretariat, not one that is passive and risk-averse. The time has come for a new day in relations between the Secretariat and Member States. The...
The D.C. District Court recently issued a very thoughtful opinion in the recent case of Agudas Chasidei Chabad of United States v. Russian Federation. The case concerns claims by the Jewish organization Chabad that Russia had expropriated an invaluable collection of Jewish religious books and manuscripts maintained since 1775 from the first Rebbe, Rabbi Schneur Zalman, (pictured at left)...
Israel's High Court of Justice has issued a ruling finding that Israeli military forces may engage in "targeted killings" of Palestinian terrorists consistent with the customary international law of war. A useful discussion of the background of this case can be found here. An English version of the decision can be found here. The decision is a long and...
Ethiopia's former dictator, Mengistu Haile Marian, has been convicted in absentia of genocide following a 12-year trial involving 72 defendants. All but one were found guilty; 34 defendants were present in court, while 25 were tried in absentia. Sentencing, which will almost certainly result in a death sentence for Mengistu, is set for December 28. Regardless, the exercise...
I have just posted a short essay on SSRN critiquing the ICTR's recent decision in Prosecutor v. Karemera et al. Here is the abstract: The Appeals Chamber of the ICTR recently held in Prosecutor v. Karemera et al. that the existence of a nationwide campaign of genocide in Rwanda in 1994 is a “fact of common knowledge” of which Trial...
Academic papers rarely get front-page coverage in the major media, but that's the treatment this study got earlier this week in the Financial Times. (I bet the authors are sorry, though, that the FT didn't link to the SSRN version.) Perhaps the most interesting claim (from a quick look) is that judges may be more biased than juries...
Judge Robertson dismissed Hamdan's peititon for a writ of habeas corpus on the grounds that the Military Commissions Act strips the court of jurisdiction over his case. I can't yet find the order online, but here is a taste: "The Military Commissions Act and the briefs of the parties present three questions: (1) As a matter of statutory interpretation and construction,...
The BBC has a good news clip on the scandalous Iranian Holocaust Conference. As reported, Iran is trying to break the Holocaust denial taboo and the video has blurbs from the likes of David Duke and Frederick Toben who are in Iran for the conference. Holocaust deniers are reported as saying that "President Ahmadinejad's government has given them...
The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has dismissed the lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of NAFTA Chapter 19 Panels on jurisdictional grounds. As we discussed earlier on this blog, the Coalition for Fair Lumber, a U.S. lumber trade group, had challenged NAFTA's system using "binational panels" to replace U.S. federal courts in the review of U.S. government anti-dumping and countervailing duty...
In 1965, as part of the Restatement Second, the American Law Institute published the original Restatement on the Foreign Relations Law of the United States. Twenty two years later in 1987, a new edition appeared – The Restatement (Third) on the Foreign Relations Law of the United States. Together, they've had an enormous influence on the courts;...
An incident of anti-immigrant sentiment, there have been some prominent calls over the last two years or so to scale back the near absolute rule of territorial birthright citizenship under which anyone born in the United States (save the children of diplomats) is extended citizenship at birth. In the last Congress several bills were introduced that would have limited...
Eric Muller, a UNC law professor and WWII historian who blogs at Is That Legal?, has posted an "open letter" to the Institute for Political and International Studies of the Foreign Ministry of Iran that recounts the fate of his great-uncle at the hands of the Nazis. It's a powerful, moving letter (with amazing photos). The letter is...
