Search: kony 2012
07 May Reassuring the Inviolability of Diplomatic Premises: Worrying Trends from Ecuador to Syria
...two decades in prosecuting the “War on Terror” against non-state actors. In the 2014 air campaign against ISIL, the United States endorsed the “unwilling or unable” doctrine of self-defence, in which action against a non-state threat is permissible so long as the state in which the non-state actor resides is either “unwilling” or “unable” to suppress the threat without external intervention. In 2012, Sir Daniel Bethlehem encapsulated these operational standards in a series of principles that has come to be known as the “Bethlehem Doctrine.” It states that the imminence...05 Nov Guest Post: The Italian version of Medellin v. Texas? Or, a new hope after Kiobel?
...not lie when crimes of such gravity were concerned, had no choice but to bend its head (see, e.g., its decision no. 32139 of 2012, also here, and no. 4284 of 2013). The story seemed settled and closed. On October 22, 2014, however, the Italian Corte costituzionale wrote a new and surprising chapter with its decision no. 238. Upon referral by the Tribunale di Firenze, and faced again with claims against Germany by victims of Nazi’s crimes committed during WWII, the Constitutional court found that the ICJ holding in Germany...
26 Oct Is Immunity for Killing Two Indian Fishermen Justified? Curious Case of “Enrica Lexie”
[ Atul Alexander is an Assistant Professor of Law at the The WB National University of Juridical Sciences.] On 2nd July 2020, the Permanent of Court of Arbitration (PCA) had put out a six-page Award (extracts for advanced publication) on the 2012 Enrica Lexie incident. To put it in perspective the Enrica Lexie case arose in the backdrop of two Italian tankers flying the Italian flag, 20.5 nautical miles from the coast of Kerala, opened fired at a fishing boat named St. Antony on the mistaking it as a pirate...31 Dec President’s Signing Statement on National Defense Authorization Act
...the “National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012.” I have signed the Act chiefly because it authorizes funding for the defense of the United States and its interests abroad, crucial services for service members and their families, and vital national security programs that must be renewed. In hundreds of separate sections totaling over 500 pages, the Act also contains critical Administration initiatives to control the spiraling health care costs of the Department of Defense (DoD), to develop counterterrorism initiatives abroad, to build the security capacity of key partners, to...28 Jun ILO Tribunal Finds Against ICC in the Libya Detention Debacle
This is a major development, one that I hope does not get lost in the welter of commentary on the Bemba acquittal. If you recall, in June 2012 the Libyan government detained four ICC officials who were in Zintan on official Court business: Melinda Taylor from the Office of Public Counsel for the Defence (OPCD), who had been provisionally appointed Saif Gaddafi’s defence counsel; two officials from the Registry; and a translator, Helene Assaf. Libya charged all four with various criminal offences and ultimately detained them for 27 days. About...
03 May Forget the Security Council: The General Assembly Can Admit Palestine
...admission. The Article 4(1) requirement of statehood would not be an obstacle for Palestine. In 2012, 138 states voted in the General Assembly to say that Palestine is a state, while only nine voted against. The Charter has no procedure to override a General Assembly resolution to admit a state. A favorable vote in the General Assembly would make Palestine a member state. [The author’s analysis is based on his article Who Admits New Members to the United Nations (Think Twice before You Answer , George Washington International Law Review,...19 Dec Bali High?
[Dan Bodansky is the Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Emily and Ernest Woodruff Chair in International Law at the University of Georgia Law School and a leading expert on climate change regulation. He participated in the Bali meeting and contributed this report to Opinio Juris.] Only in the context of the climate negotiations could Bali be considered a “breakthrough,” as the press is reporting. In the past year, concerns about climate change have led to Nobel prizes, Academy Awards, and changes in governments; but the UNFCCC...
17 Apr Strategies for Appealing the Afghanistan Decision
...of Kenya against the ‘Decision on the Request for Assistance Submitted on Behalf of the Government of the Republic of Kenya Pursuant to Article 93(10) of the Statute and Rule 194 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence'”, ICC-01/09-78, 10 August 2011, paras. 15-16; Prosecutor v. Gaddafi and Al-Senussi, ICC A. Ch., Decision on the admissibility of the “Appeal Against Decision on Application Under Rule 103” of Ms Mishana Hosseinioun of 7 February 2012, ICC-01/11-01/11-74, 9 March 2012, para. 10). That said, I think it might be worthwhile for the...17 Nov The Legality of Pardons in Latin America (Part II)
...part of international criminal law as retribution, and it will likely constitute another crossroads for the Court in the near future. In 2012, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (E/2012/51) explored “whether the continued incarceration of older persons is a disproportionately severe punishment”, stating that “[c]onsidering the purposes of punishment –retribution, incapacitation, deterrence, and rehabilitation- there may be little justification for many older persons’ continued incarceration in the prison system in certain instances” and that “alternative forms of punishment may be preferable based on the financial, practical, and...15 May The Fog of Technology and International Law
...– Giovanni Lo Porto. As President Obama himself announced, the United States inadvertently killed Lo Porto and Warren Weinstein, a USAID contractor, as part of a January drone strike targeting an al Qaeda compound in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region. Both aid workers were Al Qaeda hostages; Lo Porto had been kidnapped in 2012, while Weinstein was abducted in 2011. The story made global headlines for Obama’s apology that the United States had not realized these hostages were hidden on-site, and thus their deaths were a tragic mistake: As President and...