Maybe it's too soon after finals for some of you, but for those still willing to undergo examination, the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs has a short on-line quiz on international humanitarian law (IHL). You can access it here. It's issued in concert with a major conference the Center is hosting later this week on Hamas, the Gaza War, and Accountability...
I'm not a comparative constitutional-law scholar, but I find it interesting that, pursuant to Section 44(iii) of the Constitution of Australia, no one can serve in Parliament who "[i]s an undischarged bankrupt or insolvent." The solvency requirement harkens back to the bad old days of U.S. history, when most States prohibited individuals who did not own property from voting. But...
President Obama’s speech in Cairo was nothing short of remarkable. The issue of interfaith dialogue is dear to my heart, and his speech deserves to be studied and discussed far and wide. I cannot think of a more important message about the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world in American history. If you have...
In various posts on OJ about Predator drones, targeted killing, and such topics, I've made reference to a book chapter I've been drafting for Benjamin Wittes's forthcoming edited volume of policy essays, Legislating the War on Terror: An Agenda for Reform (Brookings Institution Press 2009). I'm pleased to say that my chapter, Targeted Killing in US Counterterrorism Strategy and Law,...
Last month, the Obama Administration informed the Senate of its treaty priorities via a letter from the State Department (you can access it here). The letter lists 17 treaties for which the Administration seeks Senate advice and consent "at this time," including (as predicted here and here) CTBT, CEDAW, and UNCLOS. It also lists 12 treaties "on which...
This post was written by Gabriel Swain, a Research Associate at the University of Kent's School of Social Policy, Sociology, and Social Research. I think the project's reports will be of great interest to our readers. Since its birth in the 1950s, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has functioned, through implementation of the rights guaranteed by the European Convention...
Karen DeYoung has a very interesting account of the on-going Predator drone campaign in Pakistan, on the front page of the Monday, June 1, 2009 Washington Post, "Al Qaeda Seen as Shaken in Pakistan." The story is sourced to US intelligence and military officials, as well as some Pakistani officials, and recounts how the Pakistani army's campaign to retake the Swat...
Jack Goldsmith observes in a Washington Post op-ed that when one avenue of national security closes, another is opened up, sometimes with worse collateral consequences for third parties. As he says: Demands to raise legal standards for terrorist suspects in one arena often lead to compensating tactics in another arena that leave suspects (and, sometimes, innocent civilians) worse off. I think this...
I want to believe in the Human Rights Council, and I hope its new members -- including the US -- will improve things. But the HRC's "response" to the conflict in Sri Lanka is simply appalling. Here are a couple of paragraphs from the resolution the Council passed praising the Sri Lankan government, which reads like something out...
Former State Department Legal Advisor John Bellinger, who is now at Arnold & Porter and also an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, has an interesting op-ed in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal. The U.S. government can and should be a strong voice for redress of human-rights abuses around the world. But these lawsuits, which are being brought under...
Today's New York Times leads with the story of Pentagon plans to form a new cybercommand: The Pentagon plans to create a new military command for cyberspace, administration officials said Thursday, stepping up preparations by the armed forces to conduct both offensive and defensive computer warfare. The military command would complement a civilian effort to be announced by President Obama on...
Disclosure: I am one of Dr. Karadzic's legal associates. This post is offered with his consent. The defense team has just filed its definitive motion arguing that the Karadzic-Holbrooke cooperation agreement -- in which Holbrooke promised Dr. Karadzic that he would not be prosecuted at the ICTY if he cooperated with the international community's efforts to bring peace to the Balkans...
