International Law Blog Postings

In an address delivered in New York on June 6, United Nations Deputy Secretary General Mark Malloch Brown critiqued U.S. policy towards the UN in his speech "Power and Super-Power: Global Leadership in the Twenty-First Century." The Deputy Secretary challenged the United States to sustain "inside-the-tent diplomacy at the UN" and to drop its attitude of "take it or leave it," as well its "red-line demands thrown in without debate and engagement." The next day, as if on cue, the United Nations Association of the United States of America commenced its annual meeting in Washington, D.C. First on the agenda, members met with elected officials on Capitol Hill to discuss US-UN relations, voting records, and proposed legislation to withhold mandatory contributions to the UN. Next, members convened for three days of issue sessions. Experts, such as Dr. Joxel Garcia, Mark Lagon, Ambassador William H. Luers, Dr. Johanna Mendelson, and Ruth Wedgwood, spoke on the challenges facing the UN and the world, including UN reform, global health, the future of nuclear weapons, and international law. Continue Reading

The United States National Commission for UNESCO held its two-day annual conference for commissioners from 1-2 June 2006 in Washington, D.C. This year marks the 60th anniversary of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). The purpose of the meeting was for the commissioners to develop recommendations on issues related to education, science, communications, and culture for consideration as U.S. policy towards UNESCO by the U.S. Department of State. The U.S. Representative to UNESCO and officials from the U.S. Department of State outlined current priorities and policies, as well as the risks associated with the adoption of relatively new treaties, such as the Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions. Continue Reading

Today, 20 June 2006, marks the sixth annual commemoration of World Refugee Day. This year's theme is "Keeping the Flame of Hope Alive" for 20.8 million people who hold tenuously to a hope for peace and a better future. Since last year, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that an additional two million became asylum seekers and refugees, most of them women and children. For them, home is a place where they cannot return - at least not today. Equally, this day honors the staff and volunteers who provide services, aid, and comfort to the world's refugees and asylum seekers. Providing a ray of hope this past year, Afghanistan became the 143rd party, without declarations or reservations, to the 1951 Refugee Convention and 1967 Protocol. Continue Reading

World-renowned archivist Trudy Huskamp Peterson is on a campaign for the preservation of and access to records of the temporary international criminal courts. She spoke in Washington, D.C. on 31 March 2006 at the American Society of International Law, during its centennial meeting, and again on 15 June 2006 at a private lunch. She addressed the legal, political, and archival issues influencing the retention of historical documents generated by temporary commissions and courts, which, by mandate, were designed to go out of existence. Because the mandates are generally silent on the retention and preservation of records, the United Nations and individual governments lack clarity on who gets to retain long-term official custody of data archives. Should the United Nations establish and maintain a global institutional repository for archives of temporary commissions and courts? Alternately, should domestic archival, property, or intellectual property laws govern? Who gets to decide what, when, where, and how to store records, and under what authority? Continue Reading

The American Society of International Law held its centennial annual meeting from 29 March to 1 April 2006 in Washington, D.C. The meeting attracted the largest attendance ever and featured top justices, lawyers, and politicians. The theme of 100 years promoted a nostalgic atmosphere. In the plenary address, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Kennedy focused on the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, a treaty ratified by the United States in the same year in which Kennedy began his lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court. In a moderated discussion with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, ICJ Judge Rosalyn Higgins, and ASIL President-Elect Jose Alvarez, the panelists contrasted past world wars with today's war. Most notably, for the eighth time in its 100-year history, ASIL adopted a resolution at its annual meeting. Continue Reading