So, you're a state senator in the deep South. You love freedom, which is why you're a Republican. You know that Shariah (aka Shari'ah) is the enemy of freedom. You also know that, although Shariah currently plays no role in the law of your state, it will eventually supplant the Constitution (sometime in the next four decades, you estimate) unless...
Just a quick update to point out that Pennumbra, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review's online companion, has published the fourth and final installment of my debate with John Dehn on the targeted killing of Al-Aulaqi. You can find the entire debate, including my just-published Closing Argument, here. My thanks to Pennumbra for inviting me to participate, and to John for...
Moreno-Ocampo said the following today: The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court says information of attacks on civilians by forces loyal to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi suggests they could constitute a crime against humanity. Luis Moreno Ocampo says he has assembled a team to collect more information and has been in contact with Libyan officials and army...
Milan notes in a comment to my previous post that he is "troubled that the Security Council seems not to be referring 'situations' as much as certain crimes committed by certain actors." He is referring to paragraphs 4 and 6 of the SC Resolution: 4. Decides to refer the situation in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya since...
The referral is part of a larger set of sanctions against Libya. From the UN News Centre: The Security Council today voted unanimously to impose sanctions against the Libyan authorities, slapping the country with an arms embargo and freezing the assets of its leaders, while referring the ongoing violent repression of civilian demonstrators to the International Criminal Court (ICC). In its Resolution...
Here's something you don't see every day: A disciplinary hearing for the chief defence lawyer for former Liberian President Charles Taylor was adjourned indefinitely Friday after just seven minutes because one judge refused to attend. The hearing by the Special Court for Sierra Leone was to weigh possible punishment for British lawyer Courtenay Griffiths after he stormed out...
Yes, after nearly nine years of detention in Guantanamo, Noor Uthan Muhammed has pleaded guilty to two non-existent war crimes. As the ACLU notes in its post on the plea, although the court reporter faithfully translated each time he said "yes" to whether he understood what he was doing, the reporter did not translate the only full sentence Muhammed uttered:...
Even when Moreno-Ocampo wins, he loses. Pre-Trial Chamber II recently rejected a request by Mohammed Hussein Ali, one of the six Kenyans for whom the OTP has sought summonses, to submit "observations" on the investigation That was an easy call; nothing in the Rome Statute permits a suspect to participate in the investigative process so early. The Pre-Trial Chamber nevertheless...
As I discussed yesterday, an Ecuador Court has issued an $8.6 billion judgment against Chevron. I just got off a press conference call with plaintiff's chief lawyer in Ecuador, Pablo Fajardo. He stated that the plaintiffs will seek enforcement of the Lago Agrio judgment throughout the world as soon as the Ecuador appeals process is complete. (At...
Today an Ecuador court fined Chevron $8.6 billion for environmental damage. According to the Wall Street Journal, $5.4 billion of that is to restore polluted soil, $1.4 billion to create a health system for the community, $800 million to treat individuals injured by the pollution, $600 million to restore polluted waters, $200 million to restore native species, $150 million...
This must be that vibrant democracy Richard Cohen recently extolled in defense of denying democracy to Egyptians: The Knesset House Committee on Wednesday approved the composition of two parliamentary panels to investigate the funding sources of human rights organizations. Most of the opposition parties have decided to boycott the committees. The motion passed at the House Committee by a...
The stakes just became larger in the ongoing battle over alleged environmental damage in Ecuador. Chevron just filed a lawsuit in the Southern District of New York against Steven Donziger and forty-seven lawyers, experts, consultants and named plaintiffs alleging RICO, fraud, tortious interference with contract, trespass and unjust enrichment. The Complaint is available here. The Complaint alleges...
