Academic

Diplomatic Asylum for Julian Assange? Professor Kai Ambos is Chair of Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure, Comparative Law and International Criminal Law at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Germany (since May 2003) and Judge at the Provincial Court (Landgericht) of Lower Saxony in Göttingen Julian Assange’s medal-worthy self-staging as a militant for worldwide freedom …

A case of negative regional complementarity? Giving the African Court of Justice and Human Rights Jurisdiction over International Crimes Max du Plessis, Visiting Fellow at the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict.  He is an Associate Professor, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban; Senior Research Associate, International Crime in Africa Programme, …

May the UK Terminate the Diplomatic Status of Ecuador’s Embassy? Ecuador has announced that it is granting asylum to Julian Assange, the Wikileaks founder, who has taken refuge in the Ecuardor’s embassy in London. Assange sought refuge in the Embassy after the UK Supreme Court ruled a few weeks ago that …

Oil exploration around the Falklands (Malvinas) In June, I looked at the longstanding sovereignty dispute over the Falklands Islands (Malvinas) on the occasion of the 30-year anniversary of the 1982 war. I revisit this topic today to examine the question of investor protection in areas where sovereignty is disputed, taking the Falklands (Malvinas) …

“Without further delay” – Senegal must prosecute or extradite Hissène Habré On 20 July 2012, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued its final judgment (summary found here; press release found here) in the proceedings brought by the Kingdom of Belgium against the Republic of Senegal concerning the desired prosecution of …

UN human rights treaty monitoring reform update: promising OHCHR proposals now to be acted upon by the General Assembly (and the EU) John Morijn, PhD (EUI (Law)) is senior human rights adviser, Dutch Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations and assistant professor of human rights law, University of Groningen, …

Award of Compensation by International Tribunals in Inter-State Cases: ICJ Decision in the Diallo Case This week, the International Court of Justice decided that the Democratic Republic of Congo is obliged to pay $95,000 to the Republic of Guinea for material and non-material injury arising out of the DRC’s violations …

Competing Views on Libya’s Obligation to Surrender Saif Gaddafi to the ICC Over at Opinio Juris, Kevin Jon Heller notes that the debate which he, Jens David Ohlin and I have had regarding whether Libya can postpone it’s obligation to surrender Saif Gaddafi to the International Criminal Court is now being waged …

Kiobel: Universal Civil Jurisdiction under international Law  Barrie Sander has law degrees from Cambridge and Leiden, and from September 2012 will be a PhD candidate in International Law at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva. In an earlier post, I considered the question of corporate liability …

Symposium on ExtraTerritorial Jurisdiction One of the topics that will be taught in any basic course on public international law is “Jurisdiction”. By this is meant the jurisdiction of States and as Rosalyn Higgins explains in her book Problems and Process: International Law and How We Use It, questions of …

ICC Prosecutor Decides that He Can’t Decide on the Statehood of Palestine. Is He Right? On Tuesday, the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court issued a statement denying the Prosecutor’s competence to decide on Palestine’s acceptance of ICC jurisdiction. The ICC Prosecutor indicated in his statement that he could not take …

The ‘left-to-die boat’: whose responsibility for the death of 63 migrants in the Mediterranean?  Francesco Messineo is lecturer at Kent Law School, Canterbury. Given the relative lack of media hype (with notable exceptions, see also here), readers may have missed the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly’s scathing report on the …