This article analyses the requirements when the ICTY Appeals Chamber may overturn factual findings made by a Trial Chamber and may admit fresh evidence. The conclusion is that the Appeals Chamber should overturn factual findings only when strong reasons so indicate, since trial transcripts cannot provide the same information as did live impressions from the proceedings when the Trial Chamber reached its findings. Fresh evidence should be admitted exceptionally; otherwise the control (corrective) function of the ICTY Appeals Chamber could be weakened, endangering the division of tasks in the court organisation, the effective administration of justice and a final hearing within a reasonable time.

The issue addressed here is what types of property are protected by the law and by what qualities they are chosen for such protection. It is then proposed to consider whether it is helpful and possible to draw an analogy between the concepts of “protected persons” and “protected property.” Limited space will be given to the issue of protection of cultural property. The protection of property in land warfare is the main target of examination. The focus when selecting evidence is placed on existing treaties and cases from international tribunals (including the ICTY) dealing with cases arising from international conflicts. The conclusion contains seven principles regarding the protection of property, as evidenced by practice.

In 2001 the International Law Commission finally adopted on second reading the Draft Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts and the commentaries thereto, thereby successfully concluding almost half a century of work on the topic by the ILC. Subsequent to the adoption, the General Assembly welcomed the conclusion of the work of the ILC. This article highlights the main changes made during the second reading 1998–2001, among them the issue of international crimes, the concept of injured state and countermeasures. While the 59 articles are the result of compromise, they undoubtedly are a major achievement in one of the most important and most sensitive areas of international law. Ultimately they may be a useful tool to promote the enforcement of community interests in the international legal system.

This article focuses on two key aspects of the Keraterm case before the ICTY. The first is Duško Sikirica's acquittal of the crime of genocide. The Trial Chamber's construction of the phrase “destruction in part of a group” is critically examined and compared to the reasoning of a differently constituted Trial Chamber in the Krstić case. The second key aspect of the Keraterm case is the decision by all three defendants to enter into plea agreements with the Prosecutor at a relatively late stage in the trial. This article discusses the rules governing plea agreements, general sentencing factors and the extent to which guilty pleas have resulted in a pattern of lighter sentences in the jurisprudence of the Tribunals.

Judges in international tribunals have historically been subject to political pressures which might influence the independence of their position. The Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court has created a system in which judges are selected by political representatives of state parties, without any independent screening process. Furthermore, judges will have a high degree of control over the fundamental decisions as to who should be prosecuted, an area which normally falls in the province of the Prosecutor. There are legitimate reasons to fear that this system will fail to provide the necessary safeguards to ensure that judicial independence is maintained.

A key achievement of the International Criminal Court is its acknowledgment of the rights of victims to participate in proceedings and to seek reparation before the Court. This article analyses some of the specific challenges relating to the ICC reparations regime, stemming from the interplay between the ICC and national courts on such issues as tracing assets and implementing protective measures, and in enforcing the ICC's reparations orders. A review of several examples of legislation adopted by states parties on cooperation with the ICC is undertaken with a view to examining its potential impact on these issues.

An unlimited right of non-self-incrimination of witnesses before international criminal tribunals exists only during the pre-trial investigation (Article 55 ICC Statute); during trial the right is not unlimited, as the witness can be compelled to answer any question, either on the basis of an ex ante assurance of non-use of the evidence against him/her coupled with an assurance of confidentiality (ICC Rule 74(3)(c)) or on the basis of a guarantee of non-use without an explicit assurance to that effect (ICTY/ICTR Rules 90(F)). It is doubtful whether these rules are compatible with the principle nemo tenetur se ipsum accusare since this principle protects not only the accused but also the witness from a criminal prosecution which is based on her own statements.

Belgian legislation gives the national criminal justice system far reaching competence to prosecute international core crimes. International and national judicial decisions as well as policy considerations may however dictate restrictions.

The jurisprudence of the ICTY and the ICTR has denied this question, but accepts causality as a basic principle of criminal responsibility. Since the relevant articles in the Statute of the ICTY (Article 7(3)) and the ICTR (Article 6(3)), differ from Article 28 of the Rome Statute, which demands “a result of his or her failure to exercise control properly,” a comparative study is desirable. It has to include the question, whether this failure overlaps with the omission “to take all necessary or reasonable measures within his or her power,” and whether the last alternative “failed […] to submit,” requires at all a causal nexus.

The purpose of this article is not to propose yet another normative vision for Jerusalem's future. Instead, I map out the major sovereignty-related issues that have traditionally preoccupied the literature on the subject, and argue that most of these issues have become moot following the latest rounds of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. In response to this recent paradigm shift, I propose that international law scholarship should turn its attention to studying the politics of Jerusalem's private sphere, a sphere so far dismissed as “merely technical,” yet also a sphere replete with such deep distributional stakes as to make it the primary arena for playing out power-relations in the city's future. I conclude with critiquing recent proposals that privatization would play a constructive role in defusing political tensions associated with the future Jerusalem.

At the beginning of the 21st century, the United States is criticized widely for its attitudes to treaty-making. It has sought to oppose, or withdraw from, a number of treaties such as the Kyoto Protocol or the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Such behavior is conventionally attributed, in neo-realistic international law and political science theories, to the interests and ideologies that the US Government articulates. This essay uses a constructivist approach, namely focusing on how treaty-making is shaped by the interpretive work of people regarding the world they live in, to expand the analysis to include structural and cultural factors. The United States' treaty-making is also affected by the decentralized and participatory system of government, and by broader societal commitments to political transparency and culturally contingent understandings of risk.

The issue of state immunity in the case of human rights violations has been controversial in the last decade, partly due to the absence of international judicial pronouncements. The bringing of the three cases previously litigated in the United Kingdom and Ireland before the European Court of Human Rights was supposed to reduce this uncertainty. However, decisions of the Court seem to have failed to meet these expectations. The Court has failed to properly examine whether the sources of international law support the scope of state immunity as portrayed in the decisions. Furthermore, the decision on Al-Adsani is deficient in that it fails to respect the difference between sovereign and non-sovereign acts, and the effects of peremptory norms with regard to state immunity.

On 10 May 2001 the European Court of Human Rights delivered the above Judgment which pronounces for the first time on the overall legal consequences of Turkey's invasion and continued military presence in Cyprus since 1974. The Judgment is important in many respects. It deals with a wide spectrum of systematic violations and decides certain significant legal questions in the sphere of international law and of human rights in particular pertaining to state responsibility, continuing violations, liability for missing persons, denial of access to homes and property, domestic remedies by de facto organs and administrative practice. The Judgment is also noteworthy for its various dissenting opinions.