In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Trade & Economic Law

08 Dec

According to Enough!, the OTP is investigating the actions of M23 and "other parties" in the DRC: In the aftermath of the March 23 Movement, or M23, seizure of Goma, the International Criminal Court, or ICC,Chief Prosecutor Fatoua Bensouda announced that her office is investigating "allegations of ICC crimes by members and leaders of M23, and by other parties taking advantage of the chaos...

|
01 Dec

A number of commentators have challenged my claim that Articles 11(2) and 12(3) of the Rome Statute would permit Palestine to accept the ICC's jurisdiction retroactively, whether as a member-state or on an ad hoc basis. Here, for example, is what my friend Jennifer Trahan wrote yesterday at IntLawGrrls: Even if an entity becomes a "state," should there be jurisdiction that...

|
27 Nov

I haven't blogged about Chevron lately, because there has not been much news to report. But I want to mention an excellent article discussing plaintiffs' efforts to force Chevron to pay at least part of the judgment. The article is written by a financial analyst associated with the investment website Seeking Alpha, so it has no particular ideological...

|
15 Oct

Argentina is, to put it bluntly, one of the world’s greatest sovereign deadbeats, defaulting on its sovereign bonds more than once as well as bearing the distinction of being the world’s number one respondent in ICSID arbitration claims (or at least close to number one).  Last week, the ongoing struggle between foreign creditors and Argentina found a new flashpoint as...

|
10 Sep

Mark Kersten has the scoop at Justice in Conflict: So why, then, did Mauritania do it or, perhaps more accurately, how did Libya convince Mauritania to change its tune? Having reached out to various contacts to see whether anyone knew what had changed Mauritania’s mind, a number of individuals quickly responded that there was only one possible motivation: money. While certainly not...

|
20 Aug

Fresh off the failure of the Arms Trade Treaty -- aka The UN's Secret Plan to Disarm the Defenders of Freedom and Enslave Mankind -- Google has released an amazing new tool that maps global flows of light weapons and ammunition.  Here is how the Huffington Post describes the tool: The Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), a Norwegian initiative focused on...

|
14 Aug

It's been a slow blogging week, so I think I can get away with a completely self-serving post about the awesomeness of Melbourne.  And yes, Melbourne is awesome.  The Economist Intelligence Unit's Global Livability Survey says so -- again: 1. Melbourne 2. Vienna 3. Vancouver 4. Toronto 5. Calgary 5. Adelaide 7. Sydney 8. Helsinki 9. Perth 10. Auckland The survey assesses 140 cities on factors in five categories: stability, healthcare,...

|
25 Jul

Although clearly a step up from its genocidal predecessor, Kagame's government in Rwanda is anything but progressive. According to the State Department, the government is responsible for -- inter alia -- illegal detention, torture, enforced disappearance, attempted assassinations of political opponents, restrictions on the freedom of speech and press, violence toward journalists and human rights advocates, discrimination against women/children/gays and...

|
20 Jul

As part of my research on international corruption in a forthcoming article in the Ohio State Law Journal, I came across some interesting studies on the relationship between corruption and democracies. One would think that democratic regimes are less corrupt than autocratic regimes because in democracies public officials are subject to political accountability. But the evidence suggests otherwise....

|
02 Jul

At one time in the mid-1990s, it seemed like a week couldn't go by without some large gathering of States seeking to hammer out the terms of a new multilateral treaty with aspirations for universal membership.  Such treaty negotiations have become a rarer phenomenon today with most meetings now emphasizing implementation of, and compliance with, existing treaties.  And where new...

|