The UN's new temporary quarters, during renovations, are not too popular with the staff. For the next four years, the United Nations' nerve center, including Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's office, will be situated in a squat, three-story, corrugated steel building on the U.N.'s north lawn that looks like a cross between a suburban big-box store and a high-security lockup facility. Bantánamo, a nickname embraced...
Last Thursday, February 4, the Lieber Society of the ASIL (the laws of war interest section) sponsored a program at ASIL's Tillar House in DC to discuss the draft model manual on air and missile warfare that has been slowly evolving through the "Alabama process" and the International Humanitarian Law Research Initiative based at Harvard University. Claude Bruderlein, director of...
We are delighted to introduce the inaugural online symposium issue of the Melbourne Journal of International Law ('MJIL') hosted by Opinio Juris. We would like to thank Opinio Juris, and Kevin Jon Heller in particular, for inviting us to participate in this partnership. We hope that this partnership contributes to the global reach of Opinio Juris by providing an Asia-Pacific...
The Administration and Personnel Division at the International Court of Justice has asked us to inform our readers that the Court is looking to hire new clerks. According to the announcement, the General Assembly has assigned the Court six additional clerkship positions, permitting each judge to have a full-time clerk of his or her own. The vacancy announcement can be...
I am delighted to announce that Opinio Juris has formed a partnership with the Melbourne Journal of International Law, one of the leading non-US journals in the field. Twice a year, beginning tomorrow, we will be hosting the same kind of symposia that we have been holding the past couple of years for the Yale Journal of International Law and...
Last week, the U.S. and Canada reached an agreement to permit Canadian firms to bid on projects funded by U.S. stimulus money based on the legislation enacted last year. The confusing part is just how exactly this will occur. According to CTV, Canadian firms will be exempted from "Buy American" restrictions under seven of the stimulus programs, in 37 U.S. states...
Eight Oscar nominations and accolades at the Museum of Tolerance -- not a bad week for Mr. Tarantino: Last night at a special community screening at The Simon Wiesenthal Center Museum of Tolerance, internationally renowned rabbi Marvin Hier addressed the film’s growing cultural significance among a panel that included Tarantino, ‘Basterds’ producer Lawrence Bender, actor Eli Roth ...
Apparently, the Obama Administration has decided it will not seek ratification of the ICC Rome Statute. There is still no official policy, as far as I know, but this is the latest from Assistant Secretary of State for War Crimes Stephen Rapp. This is not exactly a surprise, but it shows just how far the U.S. is from the Rome...
Here's a wonderful story from my friend and former student Jeff Cook on the wonderful work he is doing in Cambodia with International Justice Mission to fight child prostitution. Jeff Cook is a former law clerk to Judge Urbina in Washington, D.C. and a former associate at O'Melveny & Myers. Here is Jeff's account of the conviction of...
The NY Times Opinionator has a nice roundup of lefty-blog reaction to the Obama Administration's claim of the legal authority to kill and assassinate U.S. citizens abroad (and its admission to having already done so). Most lefty-blogs seem unconcerned about this policy, with the notable exception of Glenn Greenawald. From a legal perspective, the relative lack of outrage among the...
We are very grateful to Professors Ginsburg, Vandenbergh, Cohen, and Wiener for engaging in this dialogue with us. The value of discussing these issues with such leading scholars in the field cannot be overstated. Professor Ginsburg’s very helpful comments push us to focus on two main points: (1) the U.S. has similar internal dynamics that make committing to a climate change...
[Jonathan B. Wiener is the Perkins Professor of Law and Environmental Policy at Duke University; Eli Goldston Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School; and a University Fellow at Resources for the Future] In their paper on the "Two Chinas" and climate change policy, Professors Abebe and Masur raise an important point about how China's internal politics may affect its international relations....
