Academic

When to Kill and When to Capture?My previous post on the Osama bin Laden killing and a number of posts at Opinio Juris have attracted a very productive discussion in the comments, which I would recommend to all readers who haven’t seen it already. The key issue that has emerged …

UN Panel of Experts Report on the Sri Lanka ConflictThe report of the Panel of Experts appointed by the UN Secretary-General to investigate the circumstances of the conclusion the Sri Lanka war has been made public today – full report here, BBC News article here. The report was disclosed to …

Interpreting and Applying the UNSC sanctions on Iran in the Admiralty Context: The Sahand [2011] SGHC 27Seow Zhixiang is an officer in the Singapore Legal Service. The views here are his own. The High Court of Singapore has recently delivered its grounds of decision in a case which considers the impact …

The UN/French Use of Force in Abidjan: Uncertainties Regarding the Scope of UN AuthorizationsAntonios Tzanakopoulos is Lecturer in Public International Law at the University of Glasgow. Many thanks are due to Professor Vaughan Lowe QC, as well as to Drs James Upcher and Marko Milanović.I. The History of the Conflict in Côte …

Can the Allies Lawfully Arm the Lybian Rebels?My friend Claus Kress yesterday brought to my attention a most pertinent legal issue: In Resolution 1970, the UN Security Council imposed an arms embargo on Lybia. The embargo was reaffirmed and strengthened in op. paras. 13-16 of Resolution 1973. The embargo appears …

What does UN Security Council Resolution 1973 permit?I spent much of yesterday conducting interviews with the media about the situation in Libya. One of the questions I was repeatedly asked concerned the scope of the UN Security Council Resolution 1973 which authorises the use of force in Libya.  How far does the resolution …

Security Council Passes Resolution 1973, Authorizing Use of Force Against LybiaThe full text of the resolution is available here. The key provision is op. para. 4:4. Authorizes Member States that have notified the Secretary-General, acting nationally or through regional organizations or arrangements, and acting in cooperation with the Secretary-General, to …

Questioning the Peremptory Status of the Prohibition of the Use of ForceDr James A. Green is lecturer in law at the University of Reading School of Law.The prohibition of the unilateral use of force, as set out most crucially in Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, is often seen as …

Two New Decisions on Subject-Matter Immunity, Torture and Extrajudicial Killings Lorna McGregor, Senior Lecturer, School of Law, University of Essex. Her publications include: Torture and State Immunity: Deflecting Impunity, Distorting Sovereignty’, 18 European Journal of International Law 903 – 919 (2007) and ‘State Immunity and Jus Cogens’, 55(2) International and Comparative …

The Difference between Rhetoric and Reality: Why an Illegitimate Regime May Still be a Government in the Eyes of International LawStefan Talmon is Professor of Public International Law at the University of Oxford.The current situation in Libya provides a good example of grand political rhetoric meeting legal reality. Over the …

In Swift, Decisive Action, Security Council Imposes Tough Measures on Libyan Regime, Adopting Resolution 1970 in Wake of Crackdown on ProtestersSituation Referred to International Criminal Court;Secretary-General Expresses Hope Message ‘Heard and Heeded’ in LibyaDeploring what it called “the gross and systematic violation of human rights” in strife-torn Libya, the Security …

Security Council Adopts Resolution 1970 (2011) with respect to LybiaYesterday the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1970, whereby it (1) imposed an arms embargo on Lybia; (2) imposed targeted sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, on high-level persons in the Lybian regime; (3) and referred the situation in …