In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Foreign Relations Law

28 Jun

The New York Times (along with much of the mainstream media) has "rediscovered" cyberwar of late (see here, here, here, and here).  Today's story revives longstanding differences between Russian government proposals to regulate cyberwarfare by treaty versus existing U.S. preferences to place the issue in more informal law enforcement cooperation networks: Russia favors an international treaty along the lines of those negotiated for...

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28 Jun

Moises Naim of Foreign Policy has an essay in the new issue called "Minilateralism: The magic number to get real international action." His piece has spawned reactions from the bloggers at FP.com. Naim's essay is the latest volley in a debate on "big" or "small" multilateral action should be; however, although he and other bloggers do a good job setting out the...

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27 Jun

A quick update on the OTP's efforts to include genocide charges in Bashir's arrest warrant.  Pre-Trial Chamber I has now granted leave to appeal the issue I've discussed before -- whether it misunderstood Article 58's "reasonable grounds" requirement when it rejected the genocide charges. It's a very defensive decision, almost certainly written by Judge Steiner, who is the only holdover from...

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21 Jun

Saree Makdisi, a professor of comparative literature at UCLA and an old friend from the literature program at Duke, has a superb editorial in today's Los Angeles Times about the media's -- and thus our -- use of language concerning Israel and Palestine.  Here's a taste: In the U.S., discussion of Palestinian politicians and political movements often relies on a spectrum...

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19 Jun

As most people probably know by now, the Washington Post, completely overburdened by liberals like Charles Krauthammer, Bill Kristol, George Will, Jim Hoagland, Michael Gerson, Robert Kagan, Fred Hiatt, David Broder, Richard Cohen, John Bolton, Joe Lieberman, and Douglas Feith, has fired Dan Froomkin, author of the wonderful blog White House Watch.  Froomkin has yet to say anything about his firing, other than that...

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16 Jun

In the latest chapter of its attempt to consolidate its power over Georgia regarding the South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Russia has vetoed the continuation of the UN mission in the region. According to the AP: Russia has exercised its veto power in the U.N. Security Council and brought an end to the nearly 16-year-old U.N. observer mission in Georgia and breakaway...

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16 Jun

Scott Horton has a typically must-read post today at Harpers.com on Jose Padilla's lawsuit against John Yoo, which, happily, just survived a motion to dismiss and appears to be headed to trial.  Scott takes apart the state-secrets defense advanced by both Yoo and -- predictably -- the secrecy-obsessed Obama administration.  Here's a taste: In seeking dismissal, Yoo argued that the case...

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14 Jun

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...

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09 Jun

The Public Editor of The New York Times has a nice piece today criticizing the newspaper's "seriously flawed and greatly overplayed" front-page article “1 in 7 Detainees Rejoined Jihad, Pentagon Finds.”  Others have thoroughly debunked similar Pentagon reports -- see here, for example.  I just want to call attention to the following paragraph from the Public Editor's article, which is...

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30 May

Ever since President Obama’s speech last week setting forth the general outlines by which he’ll resolve the mess at Guantanamo Bay, I’ve been trying to get my head around what the Administration will put into the legislation the President has suggested he’s going to work with Congress to get. Parts of that bill are maybe easier to see. For...

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29 May

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...

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20 May

Seed Magazine has an interesting roundtable discussion about whether or not conflicts over fresh water are a significant threat to international stability (and whether water shortages are even a cause of war).  The introduction to the discussion notes the case being made that water shortages have been and will increasigly be a source of violent conflict: In 2007 an 18-month study of...

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