On June 24, 2023, members of the Wagner mercenary group staged an armed revolt against Russian President Vladimir Putin and began an advance on Moscow that ended suddenly, after intervention and mediation by Belarusian President Lukashenko, on the same day. In this post, I present, analyse and systematise the statements and reactions of fifty-nine states. Before we start, let me...
[Pallavi Arora is a Legal Consultant (at the level of Assistant Professor) at the Centre for WTO Studies, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade in New Delhi. She advises India's Ministry of Commerce and Industry on matters related to international trade and investment law.] Recently, the European Commission (hereinafter “Commission”) tabled its new pharmaceutical strategy aimed at balancing access and innovation through...
[Emilia Truluck is a Legal Fellow at REDRESS, focusing on justice and accountability mechanisms in North Africa.] Earlier this month the victims’ legal representative presented her opening statements in the ground-breaking trial at the International Criminal Court against former Janjaweed commander Ali Muhammad Ali Abd Al-Rahman, also known as Ali Kushayb. Ali Kushayb is charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes in West Darfur. He is alleged...
[Kurt Mundorff is author of A Cultural Interpretation of the Genocide Convention and is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the University of Tennessee Knoxville Department of Political Science.] As Russia’s invasion of Ukraine moved westward, so too did Russian officials who began removing Ukrainian children and transferring them to Russia, often parading the children on television as proof of their...
[Moritz Koenig obtained his PhD in law from SOAS, University of London and is currently working on a research project on the history of Dutch colonial law schools.] It has often been argued that international law and international legal scholarship are incapable of reforming themselves. David Kennedy has argued that supposed renewal in legal argument is usually simply a recycling of old ideas and...
On the morning of June 6th, 2023, Ukraine accused Russia of destroying the Kakhovka Dam in the Dnieper River. A few hours later, during the afternoon on the same day, Russia blamed Ukraine for the destruction. Since then, I searched and collected statements by forty-nine other states addressing the destruction. This post analyses and systematises these forty-nine reactions in order to offer a clearer outlook...
[Matthew Gillett is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) at the University of Essex Law School and a United Nations Special Mandate holder (Vice-Chair of Working Group on Arbitrary Detention), who previously prosecuted cases before the international courts. The views herein are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect those of any other person or organization. The author was...
[Matthew Gillett is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) at the University of Essex Law School and a United Nations Special Mandate holder (Vice-Chair of Working Group on Arbitrary Detention), who previously prosecuted cases before the international courts. The views herein are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect those of any other person or organization. The author was...
[Dylan Jesse Andrian studies law at Universitas Gadjah Mada and Maastricht University and has drafted legal opinions for Amnesty International and the Indonesian National Human Rights Commission (KOMNAS HAM). He is an associate editor at Maastricht University’s student law journal and has contributed to the Annotated Leading Cases of International Criminal Tribunals.] The International Court of Justice’s (“ICJ”) 2023 Preliminary Judgment on Venezuela’s Objection to Admissibility in the...
[Dr Claire Lougarre is a Lecturer in Law at Ulster University, School of Law. Her primary research expertise lies at the intersection of human rights law and health, with a particular interest in the right to health, as well as in sexual and reproductive health & rights.] Introduction According to Article 3(5) of the Treaty on European Union (TEU), the European Union...
[Stephen A. Lamony is an international lawyer.] Last March, the Pre-Trial Chamber II of the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin. The arrest warrant has sparked a worldwide discussion on international cooperation with the ICC; mainly whether South Africa will arrest Putin if he visits the country for the 15th BRICS Summit. The South African Government is facing...
[Sami Jaber is a Public International Law LLM student at Leiden University whose thesis explores the forgotten right to the continuous improvement of living standards and its potential as a signal of human rights violations.] Attempts to enshrine the right to development have been ongoing for over 40 years. While a lack of sufficient political will from developed nations is undoubtedly largely to...