'Publications' Articles
May 16th, 2013 by Julien Maton
Professor Philippa Webb has published a book entitled “International Judicial Integration and Fragmentation”.
This book asks whether the growing number of international judicial bodies renders decisions that are largely consistent with one another, which factors influence this (in)consistency, and what this tells us about the development of international law by international courts and tribunals.
It answers these questions by focusing on three areas of law, genocide, immunities, and the use of force, as in each of these areas different international judicial entities have dealt with cases stemming from the same situation and set of facts.
The work focuses on four main courts: the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the International Criminal Court (ICC), the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), which often interpret, apply, and develop the same legal principles, despite their different mandates and functions.
It argues that judicial fragmentation is damaging to the international legal system, as coherent and compatible pronouncements on the law by international courts are vital to retaining the confidence of the international community. Ultimately, the book makes a plea for the importance of judicial integration for the stability and reliability of the international legal system.
If you wish to order it, click here.
May 8th, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
The UC Irvine School of Law International Justice Clinic has just released The Council and the Court: Improving Security Council Support of the International Criminal Court, a report designed to answer critical questions about how the UN Security Council may improve its support of the International Criminal Court (ICC): What steps may be taken to convert the rhetorical and political support of the Council to concrete measures supporting Court activities? How may supporters build lasting support for the Court on the Council? How can strong support be developed without compromising the ICC’s independence? What kind of efforts might be helpful to build lasting support in perceived-to-be reluctant capitals, especially Beijing and Moscow?
The result of a project supported by Humanity United, and involving a collaboration with the UCLA Burkle Center for International Relations, The Council and the Court explores the relationship between the two institutions and offers proposals to build a sustainable relationship between them, one that is sensitive to the Court’s mandates of accountability and independence and the Council’s mandate of maintaining international peace and security. It addresses factors that animate the Council’s relationship with the Court, highlighting legal, political, and diplomatic dynamics that shape support for the Court on the Security Council. It offers principles that should govern the Council-Court relationship, steps the Council and others may adopt to improve the Council’s support of the Court, and recommendations to engage China and Russia in developing a sustainable relationship between the institutions of security and justice.
Download the full report here or the Executive Summary here.
April 29th, 2013 by Julien Maton
International criminal law is at a crucial point in its history and development, and the time is right for practitioners, academics and students to take stock of the lessons learnt from the past fifteen years, as the international community moves towards an increasingly uni-polar international criminal legal order, with the International Criminal Court (ICC) at the helm.
The Ashgate Research Companion to International Criminal Law takes a critical approach to a wide variety of theoretical, practical, legal and policy issues surrounding and underpinning the operation of international criminal law as applied by international criminal tribunals.
The book is divided into four main parts. The first part analyses international crimes and modes of liability, with a view to identifying areas which have been inconsistently or misguidedly interpreted, overlooked to date or are likely to be increasingly significant in future.
The second part examines international criminal processes and procedures, and here the authors discuss issues such as victim participation and the rights of the accused.
The third part is a discussion of complementarity and sentencing, while the final part of the book looks at international criminal justice in context.
The authors raise issues which are likely to provide the most significant challenges and most promising opportunities for the continuing development of this body of law.
iLawyer Wayne Jordash wrote a chapter entitled: “Joint criminal enterprise liability: result orientated justice”. It involves an analysis of the application of Joint Criminal Enterprise at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia since the Appeals Chamber in Brdanin in 2007 pronounced that there was no risk of attributing guilt by association providing that the contours of the criminal purpose was defined in the indictment and the elements found proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
If you wish to order the book, click here.
April 23rd, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
The Human Rights Review Panel (HRRP) has recently issued its latest newsletter covering the period February to April 2013.
HRRP Newsletter no. 3 covers the conclusions of the 15th regular session of the Panel held in Pristina earlier this month. The newsletter also addresses the Meeting with the EULEX Head of Mission, appointment of new members and the public outreach campaign developed by the Panel.
For newsletter subscriptions, please send an email to the HRRP Secretariat.
April 9th, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
New titles and discount offer by Oxford University Press. Continue reading ‘New Titles in International Criminal Law from Oxford University Press’
April 4th, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
The International Bar Association’s International Criminal Court (ICC) Programme has recently issued its latest online newsletter Fair Trial Digest. Fair Trial Digest is a bi-monthly publication highlighting select fair trial issues arising at the ICC during the preceding two months.
The February-March 2013 edition features the following:
Situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo: The Prosecutor v. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo
- Defence wants ICC President Judge Sang-Hyun Song off of appeals cases
Situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo: The Prosecutor v. Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui
- Matthieu Ngudjolo acquitted but held in administrative detention by Dutch authorities
March 20th, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
The ADC-ICTY (Association of Defence Counsel practicing before the ICTY) just published its latest newsletter. ADC-ICTY Newsletter Issue 44 covers recent decisions and trial developments before the ICTY, including cases of Šainović et al., Karadžić, and Hadžić. The newsletter also addresses recent events at the international courts and tribunals as well as general international law updates.
February 14th, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
The Open Society Justice Intitiative (OSJI) has published a report on human rights abuses associated with the US Central Intelligence Agency’s post-September 11, 2001, secret detention and extraordinary rendition operations. The 216-page report, entitled Globalizing Torture: CIA Secret Detention and Extraordinary Rendition, is presented as the most comprehensive account yet assembled of the human rights abuses associated with CIA secret detention and extraordinary rendition operations. Globalizing Torture details what was done to the 136 known victims of the CIA’s highly classified program of secret detention and extraordinary rendition of terrorist suspects put in place after the September 11, 2001 attacks. The program was designed to place detainee interrogations beyond the reach of law. Suspected terrorists were seized and secretly flown across national borders to be interrogated by foreign governments that used torture, or by the CIA itself in clandestine “black sites” using torture techniques. The report also lists the 54 foreign governments that participated in these operations.
Concluding that responsibility for the abuses lies not only with the United States but with dozens of foreign governments that were complicit, Globalizing Torture makes it unequivocally clear that the time has come for the United States and its partners to definitively repudiate these illegal practices and secure accountability for the associated human rights abuses.
January 26th, 2013 by Raphaelle Rafin
CRIMES DE GUERRE DES SOCIÉTÉS : CONDAMNER LE PILLAGE DES RESSOURCES NATURELLES (CORPORATE WAR CRIMES: PROSECUTING PILLAGE OF NATURAL RESOURCES)
de James G. Stewart
Open Society Foundations, New York, October 2010
The English version of this publication can be found here.
Une version française du livre de James G. Stewart Corporate War Crimes: Prosecuting Pillage of Natural Resources est désormais disponible sous le titre Crimes de guerre des sociétés : Condamner le pillage des ressources naturelles.
- James G. Stewart
Résumé : Pillage signifie le vol pendant la guerre. Bien que l’interdiction du pillage date de l’Empire romain, piller est un crime des guerres modernes qui peut être poursuivi devant des juridictions pénales internationales et nationales. A la suite de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale, plusieurs hommes d’affaires furent reconnus coupables du pillage commercial de ressources naturelles. Et bien que le pillage ait été poursuivi au cours des dernières années, les acteurs commerciaux sont rarement tenus pour responsables de leur rôle dans l’alimentation du conflit.
Ranimer la responsabilité des sociétés en cas de pillage de ressources naturelles ne consiste pas seulement à protéger les droits de propriété durant un conflit, mais peut aussi jouer un rôle important dans la prévention d’atrocités. Depuis la fin de la guerre froide, l’exploitation illicite de ressources naturelles est devenue un moyen répandu de financer le conflit. Dans des pays, comprenant l’Angola, la République démocratique du Congo, le Timor oriental, l’Irak, le Libéria, le Myanmar et la Sierra Leone, le commerce illicite de ressources naturelles dans les zones de conflits n’a pas seulement créé des incitations à la violence, il a aussi fourni aux parties belligérantes les finances nécessaires pour soutenir les hostilités les plus brutales de l’histoire récente.
Le livre est disponible en libre téléchargement. Cliquez ici pour y accéder.
December 12th, 2012 by Raphaelle Rafin
The International Bar Association’s International Criminal Court (ICC) Programme has recently issued its latest online newsletter Fair Trial Digest. Fair Trial Digest is a bi-monthly publication highlighting select fair trial issues arising at the ICC during the preceding two months.
The September – November 2012 edition features the following:
CONTENTS
Fair Trial Focus
The Prosecutor v. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo
- Verdict, sentence and reparations decision appealed in ICC’s first case
The Prosecutor v. Germain Katanga and The Prosecutor v. Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui
- Trial Chamber II severs case and notifies Mr Katanga of possible regulation 55 recharacterisation of mode of liability
The Prosecutor v. Jean Pierre Bemba Gombo
December 11th, 2012 by Raphaelle Rafin
The ADC-ICTY (Association of Defence Counsel practicing before the ICTY) just published its latest newsletter. ADC-ICTY Newsletter Issue 40 covers recent decisions and trial developments before the ICTY, including cases of Perišić, Lukić & Lukić, Haradinaj et al, Mladić, Hadžić, Karadžić. The newsletter also addresses recent events at the international courts and tribunals as well as general international law updates.
November 10th, 2012 by Raphaelle Rafin
The War Crimes Research Office (WCRO) recently issued its sixteenth report on the International Criminal Court (ICC) as part of the initiative launched in 2007, the ICC Legal Analysis and Education Project, aimed at producing public, impartial, legal analyses of critical issues raised by the Court’s early decisions. The Report examines the Investigative Management, Strategies, and Techniques of the International Criminal Court’s Office of the Prosecutor.
At the occasion of the ten-year anniversary of the entry into force of the Rome Statute and of the departure of the Court’s inaugural Chief Prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the report examines some of the potentially problematic aspects of the Office of the Prosecutor’s (OTP) investigative practices that have been identified by the judges of the Court and outside observers to date. Recognizing the challenges of conducting international criminal investigations and the substantial successes achieved by the OTP in a short period of time, the aim of the report is to explore some of those issues and offer recommendations that could contribute to improving the OTP’s investigative practices, thereby helping to build a stronger Office of the Prosecutor and enhancing the Court’s capacity to administer justice more effectively.
“At the time of this writing, just over ten years after the Rome Statute governing the ICC entered into force, the Court had issued warrants of arrest or summonses to appear against twenty-nine individuals. To date, fourteen of these individuals have appeared before the Court for purposes of participating in a hearing before a Pre-Trial Chamber to determine whether the Prosecution’s charges should be confirmed and the case should be sent to trial. While the Pre-Trial Chambers have confirmed charges against the majority of individuals appearing before them thus far, they have declined to confirm the charges against four suspects, meaning that the Prosecution has failed to establish that there are ‘substantial grounds to believe’ the charges against nearly one-third of its suspects. Furthermore, even in those cases that do survive the confirmation hearing and proceed to trial, charges have occasionally been dropped by the Pre-Trial Chamber due to an insufficiency of evidence. Finally, the first case to actually go to trial before the Court involved limited charges that were widely perceived as not fully reflecting the criminal conduct of the accused, and the Trial Chamber, in its judgment, determined that the evidence provided by a number of Prosecution witnesses could not safely be relied on due to questionable practices employed by intermediaries working with the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP).” [Executive Summary, extract]
For a hard copy of the report or more information, contact the War Crimes Research Office at warcrimes@wcl.american.edu, or +1 (202) 274-4067.
The reports are also available online here.
September 18th, 2012 by Julien Maton
ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK OF INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL LAW
Edited by William A. Schabas and Nadia Bernaz
International criminal law has developed extraordinarily quickly over the last decade, with the creation of ad hoc tribunals in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, and the establishment of a permanent International Criminal Court. This book provides a timely and comprehensive survey of emerging and existing areas of international criminal law.
The Handbook features new, specially commissioned papers by a range of international and leading experts in the field. It contains reflections on the theoretical aspects and contemporary debates in international criminal law.
The book is split into four parts for ease of reference:
The Historical and Institutional Framework – Sets international criminal law firmly in context with individual chapters on the important developments and key institutions which have been established.
The Crimes – Identifies and analyses international crimes, including a chapter on aggression.
The Practice of International Tribunals – Focuses on topics relating to the practice and procedure of international criminal law.
Key Issues in International Criminal Law – Goes on to explore issues of importance such as universal jurisdiction, amnesties and international criminal law and human rights.
Providing easy access to up-to-date and authoritative articles covering all key aspects of international criminal law, this book is an essential reference work for students, scholars and practitioners working in the field.
466 pages | August 2012
If you want to order it, click here.
September 8th, 2012 by Julien Maton
THE LAW OF TARGETING
by William H. Boothby, Former Deputy Director of Legal Services, Royal Air Force
Targeting is the primary method for securing strategic objectives in an armed conflict. Failure to comply with the law of targeting jeopardizes the achievement of those aims. It is therefore essential that all those involved in or studying issues surrounding targeting have an accurate and complete understanding of this area of law. This book offers the definitive and comprehensive statement of all aspects of the law of targeting. It is a ‘one-stop shop’ that answers all relevant questions in depth. It has been written in an open, accessible yet comprehensive style, and addresses both matters of established law and issues of topical controversy.
- Detailed, practical, and accessible, this is the definitive work on the controversial topic of targeting in warfare
- Highly contemporary account analysing new attack methods, including drone attacks and the complex issues surrounding cyber warfare
- With both a doctrinal and practical perspective, this book will be invaluable to government and army legal advisers as well as to scholars and students in the area
656 pages | August 2012 | Price £95.00
If you want to order it, click here.
August 8th, 2012 by Julien Maton
Doughty Street Chambers has published its latest “Human Rights Bulletin”, summarizing key human rights decisions in UK courts as well as in European courts and internationally between March and August 2012. The bulletin was prepared by pupils at Doughty Street Chambers Conor McCarthy, Andrew Burrow and Jane Elliot Kelly. It is available here.
August 3rd, 2012 by Julien Maton
Joseph Rikhof, Senior Counsel with the Crimes against Humanity and War Crimes Section of the Department of Justice, Canada, has just published a book entitled ‘The Criminal Refugee: the Treatment of Asylum Seekers with a Criminal Background in International and Domestic Law’.
While the book explores the effects of criminality on the ability of asylum seekers to be granted status in countries where they seek refuge, a large portion of the book also examines key concepts of international criminal law, such as the parameters of war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity and terrorist activities, as well as the notions of extended liability, defences and child soldiers.
Both the criminal and the refugee aspects are studied in reference to international institutions and in comparing the nine countries most active in this area.
As such the book represents an useful reference guide for both criminal and refugee law practitioners.
May 12th, 2012 by Julien Maton
Africa Research Institute is pleased to announce the publication of “How Rwanda judged its genocide” by Dr. Phil Clark, co-founder of Oxford Transitional Justice Research and lecturer at the School of Oriental and African Studies. This Counterpoint is published to coincide with the official closing of the gacaca courts in June.
Since 2001, the gacaca community courts have been the centrepiece of Rwanda’s justice and reconciliation process. Nearly every adult Rwandan has participated in the trials, but lawyers have been banned from any involvement. Many human rights organisations fiercely opposed the use of gacaca for trying genocide cases, on the grounds that it fell short of international standards of fairness.
Dr. Clark has spent nine years observing gacacahearings and interviewing participants. In his Counterpoint, he argues that much criticism of gacaca reflects legal rigidity in the face of the unprecedented challenges confronting post-genocide Rwanda – and a limited understanding of the aims of the community courts. Gacaca was inevitably imperfect, but also highly ambitious and innovative. While the full impact of the process will not be apparent for many years, Dr. Clark asserts that gacaca has delivered benefits to Rwandans in the spheres of justice, truth and democratic participation. He suggests that other societies confronting the aftermath of mass conflict could learn much from Rwanda’s approach to local justice.
April 27th, 2012 by Dina Mahmoud
(Source: www.libyanjustice.org)
تم نشرالعدد الأول من الرسالة الإخبارية ل «محامون من أجل العدالة في ليبيا» في ٢٥ أبريل تحت إشراف مديرة التحرير إلهام السعودي.
هذه الرسالة الإخبارية تبرزمقالة بقلم المحامية أمل علم الدين المتخصصة في القانون الجنائي الدولي، تدرس فيها السؤال المثير للجدل وهو: هل يلزم محاكمة سيف الإسلام القذافي في المحكمة الجنائية الدولية أم في المحاكم الليبية؟
هذه الرسالة الإخبارية مميزةعن مثيلاتها في مجال العدالة الدولية وحقوق الإنسان لأنها تقدم وجهة نظر مجموعة متنوعة من أفراد الشعب الليبي عن ثورة فيبراير منهم: الناشط في حقوق الإنسان، أرملة الشهيد، المحامي، المحلل السياسي، القاضي والطبيب.
يمكن قراءة الرسالة الإخبارية بالكامل هنا. كما توجد نسخة باللغة الإنجليزية من هذه الرسالة الإخبارية هنا.
The first issue of the newsletter for “Lawyers for Justice in Libya” was published on 25 April under the supervision of the editor Elham Saudi.
This newsletter features an article by iLawyer Amal Alamuddin, exploring the controversial question of whether Saif Al-Islam Al-Gaddafi should be tried by the ICC or by a Libyan court.
The Mizaan newsletter is unique because, unlike other publications in the field of international justice and human rights, it presents the points of view of a mix of Libyan people on the February revolution: the human rights activist, the widow of a revolutionist, the lawyer, the political specialist, the judge, and the doctor.
You can read the full newsletter here. An english version of the newsletter can be found here.
April 18th, 2012 by Amal Alamuddin
The iLawyerblog team has published its first newsletter on the latest developments in international justice, covering February-April 2012. This issue includes a double-interview with Daniel Bellemare (outgoing Prosecutor) and Francois Roux (head of Defence) at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, the first UN-sponsored court with jurisdiction over terrorist offences. It also includes a round-up of events and contributions from Prof. Goran Sluiter, David Tolbert, Judge Shireen Avis Fisher, Philippa Webb, Alex Bates, Amal Alamuddin, Shannon Torrens and Mariya Nikolova.
March 26th, 2012 by Julien Maton
The ICTY has published its Annual Outreach Report for 2011, setting out its activities and achievements during one of the most ambitious and dynamic periods for the programme since its inception.
The report reflects various aspects of the Tribunal’s enhanced outreach strategy at a defining moment in the Tribunal’s history as the end of its mandate approaches.
The report presents the full range of the Outreach Programme’s activities – from youth and media outreach to work with grass-root communities and judicial capacity building. Particular highlights range from a groundbreaking youth outreach project, in which 3,000 young people from high schools and universities across the former Yugoslavia will reflect with ICTY officials on the Tribunal’s contribution to justice in their communities, to the production of a feature-length documentary on the ICTY’s pioneering prosecution of wartime sexual violence. An analysis of the impact of Outreach’s enhanced presence on the Web through its new social media platforms is also presented.
The Outreach Programme was created in 1999 for the purpose of improving the understanding of the work of the Tribunal and its relevance in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. As the first programme of its kind, the Tribunal’s Outreach Programme set a precedent for other criminal tribunals which have since set up similar initiatives.
March 15th, 2012 by Julien Maton
Oxford University Press has recently published three important and exciting new titles by renowned authorities in the field of International Criminal Law. For more information please visit their website by clicking on the links below:
UNIMAGINABLE ATROCITIES
JUSTICE, POLITICS, AND RIGHTS AT THE WAR CRIMES TRIBUNALS
By William Schabas, Professor of International Law, University of Middlesex
As international criminal justice has grown in prominence, so have the challenges facing it. This book discusses the unresolved questions and dilemmas confronted by international war crimes courts. These include the controversies surrounding prosecutorial policy, the tension between peace and justice, and accusations of victor’s justice. Throughout the book there is a strong historical perspective, with constant reference to the early experiments in international justice at Nuremberg and Tokyo. The work also analyses the growing pains of the International Criminal Court as it enters its second decade.
978-0-19-965307-2 | Hardback | February 2012| Price: £34.99
http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199653072.do
INDIVIDUAL CRIMINAL RESPONSIBILITY IN INTERNATIONAL LAW
By Elies van Sliedregt, Professor of Criminal Law, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Oxford Monographs in International Law
Atrocities such as genocide or crimes against humanity are usually committed by a large number of perpetrators spread out over a considerable area. Moreover, those who masterminded the crimes may not have actively participated in them. This book sets out how these people can be held responsible for their crimes by international criminal tribunals. It also critically reflects on how criminal responsibility has been developed in the case law of international criminal tribunals and courts. It thus illuminates and analyses the rules on individual responsibility in international law.
376 pages | 978-0-19-956036-3 | Hardback | March 2012 | Price £70.00
http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199560363.do
INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL PROCEDURE
By Christoph Safferling, Professor of International Criminal Law, Philipps-University Marburg
The procedural law applied by international criminal tribunals usually involves a mixture of common law and civil law, which is especially the case at the International Criminal Court. As a result, many procedural points remain unclear or controversial. This book sets out the ICC’s procedural regime and suggests a coherent theoretical underpinning that is not founded on any specific legal culture.
640 pages | 978-0-19-956288-6 | Hardback | March 2012 | Price: £95.00
http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199562886.do
Professor Philippa Webb has published a book entitled “International Judicial Integration and Fragmentation”.
