In association with the International Commission of Jurists

General

07 Dec

In the NYTimes.com's Room for Debate forum, I offer reasons for supporting U.S. ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD).  Unlike most supporters (like a certain Comedy Central personality), I don't think the opponents are crazy nutcases. (For a more sensible, but less amusing take, take a look at co-blogger Peter Spiro's contribution to the...

|
07 Dec

Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez will miss Friday’s regional trade summit in Brazil, raising questions about his health. US warships are shifting in order to monitor the planned rocket launch by North Korea, while the US still urges Pyongyang to cancel this exercise. Violence has surged around Damascus as Syrian government forces shell rebel-controlled areas. The UN Special Envoy for Syria held discussions with...

|
06 Dec

Russia has heavily criticized the ICTY for its verdict last week acquitting three, calling the work of the Court careless and ineffective. Iran's media reports its military has claimed to have extracted data from the US drone it captured earlier in the week, proving the US was spying on Iran. A US drone strike killed three suspected al-Qaeda militants in Pakistan. Despite international...

|
05 Dec

[Jonathan Hafetz is an Associate Professor of Law at Seton Hall Law School and was previously a senior attorney at the ACLU’s National Security Project. He has served as counsel in numerous national security detention cases, including al-Marri v. Spagone.] The U.S. Senate last week approved an amendment to the FY 2013 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) introduced by Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA)...

|
05 Dec

A WTO Arbitrator has ruled that the reasonable period of time for the US to comply with the requirements in the US-COOL decision expires 10 months from the day the Panel and Appellate Body reports were adopted. Angry crowds surrounded the Presidential Palace in Cairo, Egypt, to protest President Morsi's recent decision to extend his own power, causing the President to leave the palace...

|
04 Dec

Story here on how the CRPD went down. The tally was 61-38, five votes short of the two-thirds necessary for approval. On the one hand, the defeat demonstrates sovereigntism's staying power. The anti-internationalist Right has been energized by a flight of treaties baring the putative menace of global governance -- the Law of the Sea, the Arms Trade Treaty, and the Convention...

|
04 Dec

The US has criticized Israel's decision to expand settlements in the E1 area, following the UNGA's decision to grant Palestine non-member state status. Five European countries (France, Denmark, Sweden, the UK and Spain) and the Australian government has also summoned the Israeli ambassador in protest. Despite the criticism, Israel plans to move ahead with the settlement construction. More analysis about the effect of...

|
03 Dec

The phenomenon of land grabbing involves powerful transnational economic actors, including corporations, national governments, sovereign wealth funds, and private equity funds, that have searched for empty lands in distant countries that can serve as sites for fuel and food production in the event of future price spikes. Typically, the foreign investors enter long-term leases with national governments for 25 or 50...

|
03 Dec

Syrian forces have pounded rebel-held areas of Damascus, trying to keep them away from the airport so flights can resume. After last Thursday's decision from the ICTY Appeals Chamber, acquitting former Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj and two others, Kosovo’s government has demanded an investigation into the actions of the lead prosecutor, Carla del Ponte, accusing her of abuse of power and filing unfounded...

|
02 Dec

Look much beyond the blogosphere and you’ll be hard pressed to find many headlines about Jeh Johnson’s important speech at Oxford last week. But important it was. Here are three more of the reasons why I think so. 1. It is difficult to overstate the depth of the scholarly consensus that existed (before last week) around the view that when Congress...

|