International Law Blog Postings

One week after the adoption by UN General Assembly of the International Convention on the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism, satellite photos confirm that there is no flume of smoke arising from the cooling tower of the Yongbyon nuclear reactor in North Korea, an indication that the reactor has been shut down. Possible reasons range from technical difficulties associated with the aging 5-megawatt reactor to an attempt by North Korea to obtain fissile material for nuclear warheads by extracting plutonium from spent fuel rods. If the latter proves true, North Korea's provocative move heats up a precipitous environment in which North Korea threatens to use "invincible deterrent force built up for scores of years" upon aggressors. Continue Reading

International Convention on the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism
On April 13 and after more than seven years of negotiations, the UN General Assembly adopted by consensus the 28-article International Convention on the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism. The Convention obliges nations to extradite or prosecute potential terrorists, to criminalize within domestic laws the acts of nuclear terrorism defined in the Convention, and to cooperate to suppress potential terrorism acts. If ratified by at least 22 countries, the Convention will become international law as the 13^th UN treaty on terrorism and the 23^rd international legal convention on terrorism adopted at either the global or regional level. It will also become the first international legal instrument to address the prevention of terrorism rather than the response to it. The treaty opens for signatures by the 191 nations of the UN on September 14, 2005, a date chosen to coincide with the Millennium+5 Summit marking the 60^th session of the General Assembly high-level plenary to be held at the UN headquarters in New York. Given the lack of consensus by UN member states on what constitutes the difference between a legitimate use of force and terrorism, the Convention narrows the scope of "terrorism" Continue Reading

In an update to the earlier post on the Sudan, the UN Security Council voted 11-0 to refer the war crimes of Darfur in western Sudan to the International Criminal Court (ICC) located in The Hague in the Netherlands. The 15-member council adopted Resolution 1593 just before midnight on 31 March 2005, more than two months after the International Commission of Inquiry 176-page report called upon the Security Council to "immediately refer" the situation to the ICC (p.148). The referral to the Prosecutor of the ICC applies to war crimes committed in Darfur since the entry into force of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court on 1 July 2002. This landmark decision represented the first time the Security Council voted to refer a case to the ICC and involved two controversial issues: the jurisdiction of the Court over a state not party to the Rome Statute and an immunity clause extended to states not party to the Rome Statute. Rather than veto the resolution, four countries abstained from the vote: Algeria, Brazil, China, and the United States. Continue Reading

After months of practice, research, and intense regional and national competitions, this year's participants of the Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition converged in Washington, D.C. for the final championship round held at the Wyndham Hotel. Taking home the Jessup World Champion Trophy... Continue Reading