International and Foreign
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Decision Time: Key Issues in the U.S.-Afghan Bilateral Security Agreement
The U.S. and Afghanistan agreed this week on the terms for an extended U.S. military presence in Afghanistan after 2014.The Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA), which the Loya Jirga…

The New US “Red Line” – No Privacy Rights For Foreigners
Colum Lynch has a fascinating blog at Foreign Policy based on a leaked memo reflecting the United States’ latest “redline”:  that no privacy rights be recognized for foreigners…

Expert Opinion on Iran’s “Right” to Enrich Uranium in the Face of Security Council Resolutions
It is early morning in Geneva and dawn of the latest round of negotiations to decide the fate of Iran’s nuclear program. As I wrote yesterday, Iran’s claim to a “right”…

Iran’s Purported “Right” to Enrich Uranium, and Alleged Bias at the New York Times
As attention turns to the upcoming negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program, an important factor will be the media coverage that inevitably shapes public opinion. In a recent piece…

Major New Step Forward For International Debate on Autonomous Weapons Systems
Today, the 117 state parties to the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) agreed to hold the first ever intergovernmental meeting on autonomous weapons systems.  The…

Preventive Detention and Human Rights Law: A Way Out of Bagram or Another Dead End?
With the drawdown of US forces in Afghanistan, one of the thorniest problems involves the detention of individuals who cannot be criminally tried but nevertheless pose an acute…

Afghanistan Post-2014: Closing Bagram
With the U.S. combat role in Afghanistan coming to an end, and the Bilateral Security Agreement now under review, officials are under pressure to do something many observers may…

Creative Ambiguity – International Law’s Distant Relationship with Peacetime Spying
In all the sound and fury over “five eye” intercept programs, commentators appear so far to have paid relatively little attention to international law.  This is no simple…

More on the Rights of Others – Ben Wittes’ Failure of Imagination
Ben Wittes weighs in today on Lawfare on the side of rejecting privacy rights for anyone but U.S. citizens, aligning himself with Orin Kerr and against myself [see my previous…

Why Killing Terrorists Creates Long-Term Due Process Obligations and What Happens When these Debts Become Due
In July 2013 the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) found the United Kingdom in violation of its investigative obligations under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human…

Who Can You Trust? Competing Media Versions of France’s Role in the Iran Nuclear Talks
At the conclusion of the nuclear talks in Geneva this weekend, a consensus emerged in the media: as a result of French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius’s objections, the talks…

Some Thoughts on the ICC OTP Strategic Plan: Trying to Build the Future on the Failures of the Past
On October 11th of this year, the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) at the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued its Strategic Plan for 2012-2015. This roadmap for the conduct…