During the 1970’s human rights appeared to enjoy low esteem in Africa. The basic documents in inter-African relations were the UN and the OAU Charters. In its Preamble, as well as four substantive articles, the UN Charter refers to respect for human rights as a basis for international relations. The principles of human rights were further elaborated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 whose principles, in the view of some writers, have become part of customary international law. This Declaration was in turn elaborated on in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of 1966.

The U.S. Supreme Court has finally decided Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. It is the Court’s second modern decision applying the cryptic Alien Tort Statute (ATS), which was enacted in 1789. Since the 1980 court of appeals decision in Filartiga v. Pena-Irala permitting a wide of range human rights cases to go forward under the statute’s auspices, the ATS has garnered worldwide attention and has become the main engine for transnational human rights litigation in the United States. The statute itself and the decisions that it generates also serve as state practice that might contribute to the developing customary international law of civil universal jurisdiction, immunity for defendants in human rights cases, the duties of corporations, and the right to a remedy for violations of fundamental human rights. During the 1990s, the ATS became the focal point for academic disputes about the status of customary international law as federal common law. Indeed, to the extent that the “culture wars” have played out in U.S. foreign relations law, the ATS has been their center of gravity.

The deterritorialization of the Internet and international communications technology has given rise to acute jurisdictional questions regarding who may regulate online activities. In the absence of a global regulator, states act unilaterally, applying their own laws to transborder activities. The EU's “extraterritorial” application of its data protection legislation—initially the Data Protection Directive (DPD) and, since 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)—is a case in point. The GDPR applies to “the processing of personal data of data subjects who are in the Union by a controller or processor not established in the Union, where the processing activities are related to: (a) the offering of goods or services . . . to such data subjects in the Union; or (b) the monitoring of their behaviour . . . within the Union.” It also conditions data transfers outside the EU on third states having adequate (meaning essentially equivalent) data protection standards. This essay outlines forms of extraterritoriality evident in EU data protection law, which could be legitimized by certain fundamental rights obligations. It then looks at how the EU balances data protection with third states’ countervailing interests. This approach can involve burdens not only for third states or corporations, but also for the EU political branches themselves. EU law viewed through the lens of public international law shows how local regulation is going global, despite its goal of protecting only EU data subjects.

Muslim states have shown in recent years eagerness to participate in international organizations and co-operate with other Powers to promote international peace and security. This is a significant phenomenon in the behavior of states whose traditional law of nations is so radically different from the modern law of nations and the principles implied in the United Nations Charter.

The Agreement which was concluded between Israel and the Federal Republic of Germany on September 10, 1952, and went into force on March 27, 1953, is in some ways unique in the history of diplomacy. It is a treaty between two states which do not entertain diplomatic relations and do not even intend to establish such relations for the purpose of carrying into effect their mutual contractual undertakings. Furthermore, it is a treaty between states of which one was not in existence as a state and the other was not yet constituted in its present legal form when the events giving rise to the payment of reparations occurred. These are the somewhat unusual circumstances in which the Agreement was concluded, and they must be borne in mind when considering some of its features which, at first sight, might seem strange. A short account of the history preceding its conclusion may therefore be of assistance in providing the correct perspective.

1. 1. A State is internationally responsible for an act or omission which, under international law, is wrongful, is attributable to that State, and causes an injury to an alien. A State which is responsible for such an act or omission has a duty to make reparation therefor to the injured alien or an alien claiming through him, or to the State entitled to present a claim on behalf of the individual claimant.

2. 2. (a) An alien is entitled to present an international claim under this Convention only after he has exhausted the local remedies provided by the State against which the claim is made.

   1. (b) A State is entitled to present a claim under this Convention only on behalf of a person who is its national, and only if the local remedies and any special international remedies provided by the State against which the claim is made have been exhausted.

Recent jurisprudence in investment arbitration, almost all of which originated in disputes arising out of Argentina’s turn-of-the-century fiscal crisis, has raised difficult questions about the existence, nature, and advisability of necessity as a defense to state responsibility. The jurisprudence has contributed to a sophisticated literature focusing on necessity’s role in the special context of investment arbitration. But the growing prominence of necessity pleas in international law has not been so limited. Nor will its effects be. In the first place, investor-state arbitral jurisprudence contributes to the evolution of general international law. Investment tribunals invoke the latter, for example, to inform their interpretation of bilateral investment treaties (BITs) or to cure lacunae in the law. More significantly, beyond the realm of investment arbitration, the past few decades have seen a striking growth in necessity pleas in fields ranging widely across the landscape of international law.

A strange thing about the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is that for most of its life, it has thought about its death. The Tribunal, of course, kept getting a reprieve. But today it seems more likely than not that the ICTY will indeed close down sometime in 2017, after the conclusion of the two cases it currently has at trial. Yet even after its closure, the ICTY will continue in a sort of un-death, through the unfortunately named Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, which will complete retrial and appellate proceedings in the cases currently tried before the ICTY.

One dusty day in 2002, at Takhta Baig Voluntary Repatriation Centre near Peshawar in northwestern Pakistan, an Afghan woman—let us call her Amena—entered a nondescript room and sat down in front of a camera. A brief conversation took place with a woman sitting nearby at a computer terminal. Amena placed her chin where she was directed to do so, swept back a few strands of hair creeping out of her veil, and stared straight ahead for a few seconds while a series of photographs of one of her eyes was taken. Almost immediately, a small alarm sounded on the computer terminal of the woman seated alongside her. Amena was gently ushered toward the other side of the room for discussions with other officials. Some short time later, she was advised that her request to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for a modest cash grant and some supplies to aid her and her family's repatriation to Afghanistan had been denied. This was because, according to output of the UNHCR’s iris verification program, she had already received assistance earlier the same year. When asked, Amena admitted that she had indeed sought UNHCR repatriation assistance multiple times, under pressure from family members. She walked away. Soon, she could soon no longer be seen amid the press of trucks, cars, bicycles, and people that stretched to the suburbs in the distance.

Legal scholars are familiar with the problem of executive overreach, especially in emergencies. But sometimes, instead of being too audacious or extreme, a national executive's attempts to address a true threat prove far too limited and insubstantial. In this Essay, we seek to define and clarify the phenomenon of executive underreach, with special reference to the COVID-19 crisis; to outline ways in which such underreach may compromise constitutional governance and the international legal order; and to suggest a partial remedy.

The relationship between the International Court of Justice and the Security Council may be approached from the perspective of the United Nations Charter and the way it delimits competences between two principal UN organs and regulates the exercise of their concurrent powers. The Court, however, has a dual, ambivalent role. It is not only the principal judicial organ of the United Nations under Article 92 of the Charter; it is also an autonomous adjudicative body with the function, under Article 38 of its Statute, of applying international law to such disputes between states as are brought before it. Viewed in the light of Questions of Interpretation and Application of the 1971 Montreal Convention Arising from the Aerial Incident at Lockerbie, the relationship between the judicial and political organs raises some fundamental questions of general international law that go beyond UN constitutional issues.

The relationship between the International Monetary Fund (Fund) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) is a continuation of the long-standing relationship between the Fund and the Contracting Parties to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), as modified by new developments associated with the establishment of the WTO. The two organizations generally act in a complementary and cooperative fashion. Discussions about the legal aspects of the relationship, however, including recent WTO dispute settlement cases concerning the Fund, reflect misunderstandings about the legal nature of Fund activities and how they relate to the WTO provisions on this relationship. In addition, certain issues about the Fund/WTO relationship are not clearly resolved in the text of the WTO Agreements. This article discusses key legal provisions of the WTO Agreements that concern the Fund and explains the legal nature of the Fund’s activities relevant to these provisions.

This was written shortly after the gulf war of 1990-1991 came to an end. The collective action taken under the aegis of the United Nations has been hailed as a vindication of international law and of the principle of collective security. At the same time, it has also been perceived by many as still another example of the dominant role of power and national self-interest in international relations. A plausible case can be made for each of these views. An optimist may conclude in the rosy glow of the desired outcome that law and power have happily converged in this case. Even so, the massive devastation of civilian life during the war and the threat of renewed violence are troubling features. The promise of a new world order based on the rule of law still seems far from fulfillment, but there is renewed hope that the UN Charter will be taken seriously as an instrument of collective responsibility.

The dominant story of transboundary environmental impact assessment in international law has the following elements: (1) customary international law prohibits transboundary pollution; (2) according to the classic version of this prohibition, contained in Principle 21 of the 1972 Stockholm Declaration, states must ensure that activities within their territory or under their control do not harm the environment beyond their territory; (3) to ensure that activities within their jurisdiction will not cause transboundary harm, states must assess the potential transboundary effects of the activities; and (4) to that end, states enter into international agreements requiring them to carry out transboundary environmental impact assessment (transboundary EIA) for activities that might cause transboundary harm.

Since its first transatlantic use in 1901, the radio has proven a remarkably powerful and versatile tool. It was used to incite racial hatred in Nazi Germany, Bosnia and Rwanda. Through Vatican Radio and other outlets, it has been harnessed to inspire love and peace. It has been used as an implement both to wage war and to coordinate relief activities in the aftermath of disaster. International broadcast stations like Radio Free Europe and Radio Martí have been viewed by some as a force of liberation, and by others as a tool of imperialism and hegemony.

Self-defense on the international level is generally regarded, at least by international lawyers, as a legal right defined and legitimated by international law. Governments, by and large, appear to agree. When they have used force, they have nearly always claimed self-defense as their legal justification. Governments disputing that claim have usually asserted that the legal conditions of self-defense were not met in the particular case. However, despite the apparent agreement that self-defense is governed by law, the meaning and validity of that proposition remain open to question. There are some who challenge the basic idea that the security of a state—its self-preservation—can and should be subjected to international law. Others question whether under present conditions the ideal of a rule of law can be applied on the international level to national security decisions. My aim in this essay is to explore some aspects of the problem raised by these challenges to the applicability of international law to claims of self-defense. It is not my intention, I should add, to consider specific interpretations of self-defense.

The second substantive session of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea was held at Geneva from March 26 to May 10, 1975. It was decided at the outset that this would be a negotiating session. There was no general debate. Few formal meetings were held. Even informal working groups of the whole tended to rely on smaller groups the work of which was necessarily removed from public view. Progress, in many respects substantial progress, was made toward producing generally acceptable texts in this way. However, the Conference did not complete the negotiation of a new Law of the Sea Convention or approved texts.

In January 1989, in the follow-up to the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (the so-called Helsinki process), the United States signed the Vienna Declaration, in which it recognized “that the promotion of economic, social, cultural rights … is of paramount importance for human dignity and for the attainment of the legitimate aspirations of every individual.” To that end, the United States in signing the declaration undertook, inter alia, to guarantee “the effective exercise” of economic, social and cultural rights and to consider acceding to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. These undertakings seem to warrant renewed consideration of proposals that have been made at various times over the past quarter of a century for the United States to ratify the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.