Party autonomy provides certainty and predictability to the parties, reduces litigation costs, promotes the prompt assertion of jurisdiction by a court, and simplifies case management between different countries. However, the existence of an exclusive jurisdiction clause cannot completely extinguish conflicts of jurisdiction. Common law countries traditionally adopt discretionary instruments, such as forum non conveniens and anti-suit injunctions to tackle conflicts of jurisdiction. Both instruments work together in common law countries to create a balance between international comity and effective case management. The application of these two instruments, however, has been questioned in the European Union (EU). This article examines conflicts of jurisdiction in the Brussels I Regulation and particularly focuses on the effect of the European approach in cases involving a jurisdiction clause. It is submitted that the current Brussels regime in dealing with conflicts of jurisdiction and choice of court agreements demonstrates three weaknesses: procedural certainty takes priority over party autonomy; mutual trust and comity override justice in individual cases; and an artificial fragmentation of the internal and international market. It is expected that situations will be improved after the proposed amendment in the Recast Proposal and the Presidency Amendment is adopted, which provides harmonised choice of law rules to decide on the material validity of a jurisdiction clause and the negative kompetenz-kompetenz rule to decide on the preliminary issue of an exclusive choice of court agreement. Although the proposals do not accept the common law instruments to tackle conflicts of jurisdiction in cases with exclusive jurisdiction clauses, it may not be necessary to insist that forum non conveniens and anti-suit injunctions be adopted where a proper approach has been established to ensure the effectiveness of an exclusive jurisdiction clause and to provide for the priority of the courts in deciding on its validity. However, the European lawmaker should pay specific attention to the improvement of the functioning of the Regulation in the international context to tackle conflicts of jurisdiction in choice of court agreements involving a third country.

After a conceptual examination of global values and their role in international law, this article examines the role of the United Nations, especially the General Assembly, in the translation of globally shared values into legally binding international commitments. This process already commenced with the United Nations Conference on International Organization, held in 1945 in San Francisco, where the UN Charter was born. The way this process functions is illustrated by using the global value of social progress and development as an example. First, it is shown how this value ended up in the UN Charter in 1945. This is followed by a description of this value's evolution, especially the inclusion of a ‘sustainability element’, which took place at the General Assembly and various global conferences organized under the auspices of the United Nations.

On 2 April 2012, it was thirty years ago that an armed conflict between Argentina and the UK erupted. The conflict lasted two and a half months and was fought in the South Atlantic region. At the heart of the conflict was the sovereignty dispute over the Falklands-Malvinas. By coincidence or not, a series of events occurred on the eve of the anniversary which has put the dispute once again in the spotlight. The persistence of the dispute over the centuries, the current absence of sovereignty talks between both states while the dispute is heating up, coupled with the earlier 1982 breaches of international peace, make it not only timely but also necessary to revisit the question of the Falklands-Malvinas and to investigate how international law rules and mechanisms could facilitate a peaceful settlement of the dispute. The focus of this article will be on the UN as an international organization established and endowed precisely with the task of facilitating the peaceful settlement of international disputes that are likely to endanger international peace. The article provides a historical record of the UN actions in relation to the question at hand and offers some overarching observations on the adequacy of the UN in facilitating the settlement of territorial disputes.

The United Nations Human Rights Committee is a body of 18 independent experts (including a member from the Netherlands, Professor Cees Flinterman) who are tasked with monitoring compliance with the provisions of the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (in force 23 March 1976). The Committee deploys four principal activities – periodic examination of State Party reports, interpretation and progressive development of the provisions of the Covenant in the form of General Comments, and adjudication of individual complaints under the Optional Protocol, as well as follow-up procedures. This article analyzes the Committee's second General Comment on Article 19 of the Covenant, which stipulates freedom of opinion and freedom of expression. In 52 paragraphs the General Comment systematically examines, defines and delimits the concepts contained in the three subparagraphs of Article 19, basing itself primarily on the Committee's concluding observations upon examination of State Party reports and on the case-law in response to petitions under the Optional Protocol. The Committee highlights the primacy of freedom of opinion, recognizing that it is crucial for a democratic society that persons have access to truthful, reliable and pluralistic information, including through the internet, in order to develop a personal opinion whose expression must then be protected by law. The Committee notes, however, that whereas it is inadmissible to impose any restrictions on freedom of opinion, there are certain responsibilities that attach to the exercise of freedom of expression, namely the respect of the reputation of others as well as considerations of health, morals and national security. The Committee holds that so-called ‘memory laws’ as well as blasphemy laws are incompatible with Article 19 and that defamation laws must strike a balance between competing rights and interests. Paragraph 49 of the General Comment clearly affirms the right to hold non-conformist historical views and the right to be wrong. While it is not the function of lawyers or judges to establish what historical truth is, Article 20 of the Covenant imposes an obligation on governments to prohibit incitement to racial hatred or violence, the criminalization of which requires narrow definition of the elements of the crime.

This article addresses R. O'Keefe's 1999 publication entitled ‘The Meaning of “Cultural Property” under the 1954 Hague Convention’. There the author made two points regarding the protection of ‘cultural objects and places of worship’ in the 1977 Additional Protocols to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949 that have been commonly shared by legal scholarship and practice. First, he claimed that despite the divergences between the definitions of cultural property in the 1954 Hague Convention and the 1977 Additional Protocols, the spectrum of cultural property they covered was exactly the same. Secondly, he held that the Additional Protocols awarded a higher regime of protection to cultural property for not being subject to imperative military necessity. This article reconsiders and qualifies these statements. It argues that while both instruments tackle objects which represent each party's national heritage, their scope of application differ since the 1954 Hague Convention cannot cover places of worship that constitute the spiritual heritage of peoples per se. This, we will see, has resulted in its own different consequences in international practice. It also aruges that it is erroneous to maintain tout court that the 1954 Hague Convention offers a weaker regime of protection for cultural property. From a closer look at the relationship between the concepts of ‘military objectives’ and ‘imperative military necessity’, a distinct and more nuanced conclusion follows: the 1954 Hague Convention offers stricter guarantees against the likelihood of acts of hostility aimed at cultural property. This article continues a scholarly debate initiated by O'Keefe, casts some clarity on issues that seem to trouble the ICTY, and challenges the mainstream interpretation given to the protection of cultural property under the two Additional Protocols.

This article examines whether there is a link between the legality or otherwise of an armed conflict under jus ad bellum and the subsequent conduct of the campaign under jus in bello. This is done by comparing two conflicts where the legality was not in serious dispute, The Falklands/Malvinas conflict and the Iraq War 1990-1991, and three where the legality has been questioned, Kosovo 1999, the ‘global war on terror’ and the Iraq War 2003. In looking for a common link, the author is drawn away from concerns over the jus ad bellum to doubts over the content of the relevant law governing the conduct of hostilities. Uncertainties in the law have occurred both from the extension to non-international armed conflict of ‘Hague law’, traditionally applicable only in international armed conflicts, and the overlap between human rights law and the law of armed conflict. The author concludes that there is a danger that the balance between military necessity and humanity may be disturbed so that the law will become impracticable in the cauldron of conflict to the detriment of all, soldier and civilian alike.