In association with the International Commission of Jurists

General

16 Feb

Professor Stephen Krasner, of Stanford's Poli-Sci Dept, has been appointed the new Director of Policy Planning for the State Department. Prof. Krasner is a well-respected scholar of international relations (his most recent book is Sovereignty: Organized Hypocrisy and an excerpt is published here) who will bring even more academic credibility to the post than usual, which has traditionally been held...

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16 Feb

Today marks the entry into force of the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, one of the most ambitious international environmental treaties in world history. Whatever I might think of the merits of this project, the creation of a worldwide system of greenhouse gas emission regulation certainly is worthy of my interest as a scholar...

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15 Feb

In a brief essay on Slate, David Luban argues that the OLC lawyers who drafted the infamous "torture memos" (discussed in earlier posts, here, here and here) have something in common with Lynne Stewart, who was convicted last week of material support for her client, Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, the Egyptian cleric serving a life sentence for his role in...

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15 Feb

The General Assembly and Security Council approved the selection of Ronny Abraham to become a member of the International Court of Justice today. M. Abraham replaces Justice and former President of the Court Gilbert Guillaume, who resigned last Friday, and will serve out the rest of Guilliame's term, which expires in 2009. M. Abraham, a widely-respected French international lawyer, takes...

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15 Feb

As you can see, we have been having some technical difficulties. We hope to be back in business as soon as possible. Thanks for your patience....

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15 Feb

Bob Jacobson, a partner in New Rule Sets Project, LLC (the consulting firm started by Tom Barnett) and the Managing Editor of "Rule Set Reset," a journal that expands on the ideas of The Pentagon's New Map, has written reacting to my post comparing and contrasting the idea of "rule sets" to the lawyer's conception of international law. Bob writes...

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15 Feb

Gregg Easterbrook, no patsy for the Bush Administration, has a terrific column in this week's New Republic Online ($) pointing out that amid all the hoopla tomorrow over the entry into force of the Kyoto Protocol, the Bush EPA has quietly stitched together an international plan to reduce potential global warming gases in roughly the same amounts as Kyoto. According...

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14 Feb

While the NYT and Samantha Power have been fretting about the U.S. opposition to an ICC referral for Sudan, the U.S. (apparently listening to the wise counsel of Peggy and/or Hillary Clinton) has moved ahead with a draft Security Council Resolution calling for a 10,000-man peacekeeping force for Sudan as well as various other measures. This will not solve everything...

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14 Feb

Japan announced today that it would allow fishing expeditions to Okinotorishima, an obscure island 1000 miles southeast of Japan. For Law of the Sea aficionados, this sets up a pending battle over the size of Japan's "exclusive economic zone" because if Okinotorishima is merely some "rocks" (as China says), Japan's EEZ is substantially smaller than it currently claims. Countries have...

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14 Feb

As further reports of UN peacekeeper atrocities continue to flow out of the D.R. Congo, an interesting legal puzzle arises: Can those peacekeepers be prosecuted for war crimes by the ICC? The answer is probably yes, no thanks to the U.S., which has been introducing annual resolutions in the Security Council granting immunity to UN peacekeepers since 2002, but which...

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