Tag Archives: international law

This Land Is Your Land: A Response to Susan

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“I’ve always said to my men friends, If you really care for me, darling, you will give me territory. Give me land, give me land.”

Eartha Kitt had it right: land is critical.  It’s certainly unfortunate that global warming is turning the country that gave us “.tv” into a modern-day Atlantis.  Even though that sucks, that doesn’t mean submerged island nations will get to dub themselves a “nation” even when their homes dip into the deep blue sea.

The territory requirement is an important one in international law.  Without a territory, a number of questions would arise surrounding any putative “state.”  If the measure of a government is its exclusive monopoly on force within its own territory, how would we measure the effectiveness of a landless regime?  As a sovereign nation, what rights would a landless nation really possess?  (After all, the principle of inviolability would become irrelevant.)  How would one define members of this transient state?  Could anyone simply declare themselves a member — or would a blood test or sacred oath be required?  How could a state be considered “independent” (another requirement of statehood) when its people necessarily fall under the control of another sovereign authority?

More importantly, granting statehood without territory would set a troubling precedent.  Does that mean that every group of people that lost its territory through troubling circumstances gets to call itself an independent state?  Welcome to the UN, Chechnya!  Can the Assyrians finally get a seat, too?  How about the Sahrawis?  And of course, we can all agree that Palestine would be a state, once and for all.

Moreover, the existence of some “sovereign-like” entities doesn’t really help the island nations’ case very much.  One could say that the United Nations and other intergovernmental organizations also exhibit sovereign-like characteristics.  (Heck, the U.N. even controls territory sometimes.)  Nevertheless, I don’t think anyone would argue in good faith that these pseudo-sovereigns deserve recognition as ‘states.’  The sandbar idea probably isn’t going to fly either.  After all, if there’s no requirement that land be inhabitable for a new nation to form, folks can start forming countries on the fly.  I could found Michaeland at the bottom of the Pacific, because who says the land has to be above water?

Unlike Susan, I find it difficult to imagine a future of landless territories.  Susan’s conception gives undue weight to a single characteristic of statehood:  the capacity to enter into relations with other states.  But, as Judge Jessup said, “[O]ne cannot contemplate a state as a kind of disembodied spirit . . . [T]here must be some portion of the earth’s surface which people inhabit and over which its Government exercises authority.”

-Michael

Climate Change and the Jurisprudence of Statehood: Is a State Without a Territory Still a State?

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I went to the program ASIL had yesterday on “Rights-Based Responses to Climate Change Induced Displacement,” which discussed the role of international law in handling ‘environmental migrants’ and internally displaced persons who are forced out of their homes as a result of conditions brought on by climate change. One of the speakers brought up an interesting scenario I had not considered before.

Rising sea levels may pose a serious risk to the national security of many island nations. For states such as the Bahamas and Tonga, a higher sea level is a grave threat, as the low lying parts of their territories that are at the greatest risk of going under tend also tend to be the areas of greatest habitation. But for other island nations, such as Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, the Maldives, and Tuvalu, climate change may pose a more severe and existential threat: these states may actually be at risk of becoming entirely submerged by rising sea levels. If these island states were to become completely swamped so that no part of their islands were above sea level, effectively leaving them with no physical territory to call their own, would they continue to exist as an entity recognized by international law?

Prof. Kälin mentioned the possibility of citizens of these at-risk countries becoming “stateless” if their islands go under. But statelessness, as he put it, could mean being without a nationality, not being without a state.  Even if an island nation were swamped, it does not necessarily imply that its government would not continue to exist.

Under international law, the traditional criteria for statehood does include “territory.” However, would such a formalist interpretation prevail after a climate related disaster sunk a whole nation? Or, in practical terms, would any state really have the callousness to stand up and announce, “It is unfortunate that the Maldives was submerged by rising sea levels, but we now object to its continued claims of statehood and UN Membership”? Maybe I am being too generous, but I doubt it.

There is also the possibility that any sunken nation could build up a tiny sandbar over the remains of their country, if the technical requirement of territory is found to be mandatory. There is no requirement that a state’s government be located within its territory, after all, merely that it have some. For instance, the recognized government of Somalia has in the past operated out of Kenya.

Additionally, although statehood as a fluid entity that exists as a corporate-esque structure rather than as bound to a specific geographical region has been a somewhat common science fiction trope, there is in fact some modest precedent for that idea under international law. The Order of Malta claims to be a non-state sovereign entity, and has permanent observer status with the UN. It has diplomatic relations with 103 states, and even issues its own currency and stamps. Although most international scholars reject the notion that the Order of Malta is an “actual” sovereign entity, it clearly does exhibit some sovereign-like traits in practice.

Perhaps a nation submerged by rising sea levels would face a future similar in some respects to the current status enjoyed by the Order of Malta, although it seems likely a formerly-territoried state would face far less objection to its continued claims of sovereignty. The theoretical underpinnings of statehood have always been forced to evolve and adapt to changing political structures, however; it is not too difficult to imagine a hypothetical future world in which the idea that statehood is dependent upon attachment to a patch of dirt is considered to be archaic.

-Susan

How California, Bermuda, and Hogonas Are Undermining the International Legal Order

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Via Legal Theory, a cool if short article on the implications of sub-state activity in the international realm, Sovereignty, Territory and Fluidity: Lessons from Hoganas.

The modern conception of statehood, with its neat division of sovereign territories along recognized and inviolable boundaries, seems sometimes to be the inevitable geopolitical structure of the world, but it is of course a relatively modern invention — sovereignty, as we recognize it today, only emerged in the past two or three centuries. There is no reason to assume it will be the perpetual condition. Probably the most frequently discussed threat to sovereignty is the emergence of supra-state entities such as a “world government,” or at least a “continental government” in the style of the European Union. A second, lesser, challenge to the state model is the uncertain status of non-governmental non-state entities, such as the Red Cross.

But often overlooked is the role of sub-state entities in undermining sovereignty. Not only are top-down systems changing the nature of international law, but so are new bottom-up patterns of behavior emerging from domestically-recognized internal sub-sovereign entities.

A high profile example of this occurred recently, with Bermuda’s resettlement of ex-Guantanamo detainees.

At the time of the Uighur transfer, the government of the United Kingdom launched public protests because neither the government of Bermuda nor the government of the United States discussed the potential transfer with it at any point prior to the actual transfer of the Uighurs. The diplomatic intricacies of the relationship between these states are beyond the scope of this paper. However, this example is important to the paper’s overall discussion of states and sub-states in that it involves an outside state – and a powerful ally of the United Kingdom at that – recognizing that a sub-state could enter into an agreement which was in direct violation of the explicit laws of the sub-state and the state of which it is a part. Further, it illustrates an instance in which a sub-state derogated from accepted law and practice in order to insert itself into an issue for which the larger state has an accepted stance and acted in contravention of the larger state’s policy in the realm of security and international relations

Under “pure” international law, the only recognizable entities are states. Sub-states — let alone individual people — are simply non-existent on the international plane. But in the U.S., individual states, not the federal government, form the bulk of the vanguard for international environmental law developments.

[M]any individual states – including powerful states such as California and New York – have thwarted these [U.S.] policies and grouped together to engage in carbon capping and trading on a regional level. Additionally, the State of California has entered into climate change related agreements with Canadian provinces and outside states, such as Brazil and China, although the United States government has not done so.

Finally, in Sweden, the town of Hogonas in bringing into sharp relief some of the complications to the sovereignty model caused by the European Union. Although by domestic law, Sweden’s Riskbank is the only entity that can declare what will be accepted as legal tender, the southern tourist town of Hogonas has simply announced and put into effect a plan for local merchants to accept Euros as well as krona. In fact, this is not merely a violation of domestic law — even under international instruments, it is unambiguously clear that such fiscal decisions are to be made at the national level.

[I]f the Swedish government had acted to stop Hoganas’ acceptance of the euro, this paper would have an entirely different discussion. However, Hoganas’ actions in defying the stance of the Swedish government regarding the euro, as well as the layers of statutory and constitutional laws which established the state as the ruling authority in matters of monetary policy, finance, and international and EU relations were not stopped or counteracted by the Swedish authorities. The mayor and merchants of Hoganas openly announced that they would be accepting the euro as of January 1, 2009, and no national efforts were made to stop them, although it was accepted that such actions were in contravention of Swedish governmental and popular policy regarding the use of the euro and the retention of the krona.

…

Taken together, these examples suggest that international law is becoming the site of fluidity in the relationship between sovereignty and territory. Certainly, the classic understanding of the fixed nature of sovereignty and territory continues to exist in international law, perhaps most obviously when a portion of a state’s sovereign territory is threatened or attacked by another state or group of actors. Yet outside of such extreme examples, fluidity does exist and international law is increasingly impacted by it.

-Susan

How Much Noopolitik Do You Want For That Realpolitik?: Nauru’s Recognition of Abkhazia

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The recognition of a State by another State is usually based upon a mixture of factual and political concerns — factually, does the state meet all the traditional criteria of statehood, and politically, what are the risks and rewards of recognizing or refusing to recognize another sovereign. The tiny island nation of Nauru, however, has shown the potential of a third important consideration: raw financial compensation.

For $50 million, Nauru has effectively sold its vote in the statehood electoral college to the fledgling international entity of Abkhazia. Hat tip International Law Prof.

Nauru, an eight-square-mile rock in the South Pacific with about 11,000 inhabitants, was no pushover, according to the influential Russian daily newspaper Kommersant. In talks with Russian officials, Nauru requested $50 million for “urgent social and economic projects,” the newspaper reported, citing unnamed Russian diplomats.

This is not the first time Nauru has put a price tag on recognition of statehood. Back in 2002, in a somewhat more contentious situation, Nauru switched its recognition from Taiwan to the PRC for $130 million. So in merely 7 years, the price has already fallen dramatically, by $80 million.

This could of course be a case of price discrimination — Nauru knows China can afford to pay a lot more than Abkhazia — or perhaps it could be argued that Nauru’s recognition was more valuable to China as it was not just a vote for them it was a vote against Taiwan. But I think it is more likely that the difference in price can be attributed to a decrease in the service’s value.

State recognition is more art than science, but the specific motivations behind a State’s decision to recognize another State do affect how much weight that choice to recognize is given when it is factored into the overall statehood calculation. Now that we know Nauru is willing to give a vote of statehood to any wannabe sovereign that can meet its price, the significance of recognition by Nauru as an indicia of statehood will be severely discounted. Therefore, the more often Nauru engages in recognition-for-cash sales, the more Nauru’s recognition will decrease in value. Just like the phosphate that once sustained Nauru’s economy, recognition is a non-renewable resource, and will not sustain Nauru forever.

Essentially, for a mere $50 million, Nauru has sold off a portion of its international law making power to Abkhazia.

On the other hand, Abkhazia may benefit from the trade in other ways. Although Nauru’s recognition is worth little in itself, the fact Abkhazia was able to demonstrate its ability to acquire $50 million, engage in international diplomacy with another recognize state, and donate a sum of money as “foreign aid” could signal to other nations that Abkhazia is a serious player after all.

Under Article 1 of the Montevideo Convention, the fourth and final qualification for statehood is a “capacity to enter into relations with the other states.” The deal may have been somewhat sordid and tacky, but nevertheless, by acquiring Nauru’s recognition, Abkhazia proved it had the capacity to engage in foreign relations.

-Susan

The Alien Tort Statute Under the Obama Administration: Executive Suggestions vs. Explicit Requests

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On December 1st, the United States Government filed a Statement of Interest (SOI) [PDF] in defendants’ appeal from In re S. African Apartheid Litig., 617 F. Supp. 2d 228 (S.D.N.Y. 2009) to the Second Circuit, seeking reversal of the district court’s denial of the defendants’ motion to dismiss. The U.S. brief, in a turn around from its previously voiced opinions on the case, argues that the Second Circuit should decline to find jurisdiction and allow the litigation to continue in the district court.

Background on the case: The South Africa Apartheid Litigation — a combination of the Khulumani and Ntsebeza cases — has been winding its slowly through the courts for a few years, bouncing its way back and forth between the District Court and the Second Circuit. Plaintiffs have alleged that several major multinational corps are guilty of “aiding and abetting” the apartheid South African government, and eight years ago the plaintiffs brought suit under the Alien Tort Statute. After going back in the district court on remand, the defendants filed for dismissal, inter alia, on comity. They lost, and sought interlocutory appeal of the dismissal, with a hearing in the case set for January 6, 2010.

A major issue, however, is whether the Second Circuit can even hear the appeal of the dismissal. For interlocutory appeals, in addition to two other factors not at issue here, a decision by the district court must be effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment.

The U.S. Government’s SOI asks the court of appeals to find it has no jurisdiction over the case because the U.S. has not explicitly asked for its dismissal. Therefore, according to the U.S., requiring defendants to wait until a final order in the case is given does not impair any of the U.S.’s interests (not the defendants’ interests), and accordingly jurisdiction for interlocutory appeal is not present. As stated in the government’s brief,

when a defendant seeks appellate review of a district court’s order denying a motion to dismiss a suit predicated on the adverse consequences on the Nation’s foreign relations, the court of appeals has jurisdiction under the collateral order doctrine only if the district court denied defendant’s motion despite the fact that the Executive Branch explicitly sought dismissal of the suit on that ground. The requirement of an explicit request for dismissal on foreign policy grounds by the Executive Branch is, in our view, critical.

The U.S.’s implicit endorsement of continuing the apartheid litigation was apparently precipitated by a letter recently sent by the South African Justice Minister [PDF]. Previously, South Africa has strenuously objected to having South African apartheid-era torts tried in American courts. However, in September, 2009, Minister Radebe wrote to the district court, unsolicited, stating that “[t]he Government of the Republic of South Africa, having considered carefully the judgement of the United States District Court, Southern District of New York is now of the view that this Court is an appropriate forum to hear the remaining claims of aiding and abetting in violation of international law.” Shortly thereafter, the U.S. filed its own SOI in which it evinced no objections to continuing the case. The impression given is that, once South Africa dropped its objections, all of the U.S.’s objections immediately evaporated as well — and that so long as the foreign sovereign involved is happy, the U.S. has no concerns of its own.

But something more is going on here. Despite the SOI’s careful language, which stresses repeatedly that the U.S. never “explicitly request[ed]” a dismissal, and its framing of earlier U.S. involvement as merely an attempt to express “concerns” about procedural scope, this is in reality a radical shift from the U.S.’s previous stance under the Bush Administration. Let’s take a look at what the U.S. had to say back in 2007:

“[i]t would be extraordinary to give U.S. law an extraterritorial effect in [these] circumstances to regulate [the] conduct of a foreign state over its citizens, and all the more so for a federal court to do so as a matter of common law-making power. Yet plaintiffs would have this Court do exactly that by rendering private defendants liable for the sovereign acts of the apartheid government in South Africa.” Brief of the United States of America Amicus Curiae Supporting Defendant-Appellees, at 21, Khulumani v. Barclay Nat. Bank, Ltd., 504 F.3d 245 (2d Cir. 2007).

This is not a statement given by a government that merely has “concerns” that can be easily resolved with a few tweaks. And according to Jack Goldsmith and Curtis Bradley, “This should have been enough for dismissal.”

However, because Obama inherited this case from Bush, he — or rather, his legal people — are trying to impose their new policy stances in a manner that is not blatantly inconsistent with previous government filings. So in the U.S. Government’s Dec. 2009 SOI, they are forced into using rather cagey language: “[t]he requirement of an explicit request for dismissal on foreign policy grounds by the Executive Branch is, in our view, critical.” Because Bush’s legal team forgot to preface its filings with the legal equivalent of ‘mother may I,’ the U.S. Government can now argue that despite all of their earlier protests and disagreements with allowing the litigation to continue, the government never actually wanted the case to be dismissed. A few years back in Sosa, the Supreme Court stated “there is a strong argument that the federal courts should give serious weight to the Executive Branch’s view of the case’s impact on foreign policy.” This statement still holds true, save that Obama is clarifying now that “the Executive Branch’s view” means only official requests — in other words, executive suggestions must now be phrased as executive demands.

Essentially, under the legal analysis offered by the government’s SOI, any opinions given by the U.S. Government in an ATS case will be treated as just another voice in the crowd (if perhaps a particularly loud one), unless and until the U.S. tells the Court, “Hey, hold up now, this time we’re actually being serious! We actually want it to be dismissed now! Consider this an explicit request!” If the U.S. opposes an ATS case but merely “reference[s] the adverse foreign policy consequences of recognizing plaintiffs’ claims,” [SOI, p. 10, referring to previous appellate briefs filed by the U.S. in Khulumani], then, according to the government’s filing, the U.S. is just making a legal argument acknowledging that foreign policy concerns exist, it is not actually invoking an Executive Branch smack down.

Unfortunately for Bush, he didn’t know about this new safe word. So instead of making an Official Executive Suggestion That the Court Stop Its Shenanigans, like he thought he was doing, Bush just gave the court a heads up on his personal legal opinion.

As for those wondering why the government’s opinion on the South African apartheid litigation has changed under Obama, well, remember — the State Department’s new legal advisor is Harold Koh, and it seems very likely that the U.S. Government’s brief was partially (or more) a result of his influence. Koh, prior to his current post, had joined a brief in the Khulumani case arguing for a broad aiding-and-abetting standard for corporate liability for complicity in foreign human rights abuses. And, as everyone knows, Koh’s also a Godless, U.N.-worshipping America-hater. With him in charge, the Obama Administration is getting ready to throw an Alien Tort Statute party, and all corporate human rights violators are invited. Until Obama explicitly says they’re not.

-Susan

Evaluating the Amanda Knox Trial: A Response to Susan

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Although I find the entire Amanda Knox saga tragic, I have to say that I feel very different about it than Susan apparently does.  True, there is a lot about the Amanda Knox trial that is unsettling: a prosecutor advancing bizarre case theories, a jury apparently driven by nationalist pride, a sensationalist media account that likely tainted the jury pool, etc.  Still, I’m not sure if this case merits State Department involvement, let alone “the big guns.”

As much as we might prefer otherwise, American standards of justice do not apply around the world.  Indeed, it is difficult to establish any principles of due process and justice that apply with equal weight throughout the world.  (Although Article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is an attempt to define such rights, even that list is controversial and sometimes ambiguous.)  Thus, Americans cannot expect to enjoy the protections of “American” due process everywhere they go; travel should be accompanied by a recognition that one leaves the protective sphere of America and enters places where the protections might be minimal at best. 

Therefore, the government of the United States should probably only get involved in foreign trials in two instances: (1) where a trial violates well-established principles of international law or (2) where a trial violates the laws of the country where the trial is held.  Even in the second instance, however, involvement should be limited, as a nation should be permitted to interpret its own laws and administer its own system in the manner of its choosing.  Most of the critiques of the Knox trial I have seen don’t implicate either situation, however.  Instead, they are simple attacks on the “weight of the evidence” or the “bias of the prosecutor.”  I don’t think that merits American intervention.

These principles may seem disquieting in a situation like the Amanda Knox trial.  How can we really allow such an “injustice” to proceed?  Nevertheless, as Susan noted, our American system of justice is not that receptive to outside influences.  See, e.g., the Medellin situation involving Texas’ rejection of an ICJ order and international condemnation of our death penalty in general.  If we wish to construct our system of justice in a sphere free from outside influence, we should treat other systems in the same manner.

Lastly, I would question the notion of “American” justice.  It almost goes without saying that American prosecutors are often imperfect instruments of justice, and American juries are often motivated by impure considerations (e.g., racism, a hatred of the poor, etc.)  Outrages upon justice happen over here too, perhaps more often than we care to think about.  I think there’s even some possibility that Amanda Knox would have been found guilty in a stateside trial, given her conflicting accounts and strange behavior following her roommate’s death.  True, the prosecutor’s case theory probably would not have involved any satanic orgies, but in the end that doesn’t matter that much.  And had Amanda been tried in her home state of Washington, she would have been subject to the death penalty (unlike in Italy, where the death penalty is not an option).

As I said, this is not a happy case at all.  But I think it’s important to look past our anger and ask if we actually have a principled leg to stand on before we start taking diplomatic measures against Italy.

-Michael

Death Row Phenomenon Revisited

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As I noted a while ago, there seems to be an increasing interest in U.S. jurisprudence in the notion of a “death row phenomenon.”   That interest was reflected yet again in a denial of certiorari in the case of Cecil Johnson, who spent 29 years waiting to die (11 on death row) before being executed early today.  In a statement [PDF] accompanying that denial, Justices Stevens and Breyer both expressed great concern about the length of Johnson’s stay on death row:

[There are] two underlying evils of intolerable delay. First, the delay itself subjects death row inmates to decades of especially severe, dehumanizing conditions of confinement.  Second, “delaying an execution does not further public purposes of retribution and deterrence but only diminishes whatever possible benefit society might receive from petitioner’s death.”  Thus, I find constitutionally significant both the conditions of confinement and the nature of the penalty itself.

[snip]

One does not need to accept the proposition “that the imposition of the death penalty represents ‘the pointless and needless extinction of life with only marginal contributions to any discernible social or public purposes,’” in order to agree that the imposition of the death penalty on these extreme facts is without constitutional justification.

(citations omitted)

Justice Thomas responded with a concurrence in the denial [PDF] that directly rejects any notion of death row phenomenon and mocks the philosophy’s implicit reliance on international law:

It has been 14 years since JUSTICE STEVENS proposed this “novel” Eighth Amendment argument.  I was unaware of any constitutional support for the argument then.  And I am unaware of any support for it now.  There is simply no authority “in the American constitutional tradition or in this Court’s precedent for the proposition that a defendant can avail himself of the panoply of appellate and collateral procedures and then complain when his execution is delayed.”

[snip]

[Justice Stevens's view] deviates from the Constitution and . . . proponents of his view are forced to find their support in precedent from the “European Court of Human Rights, the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe, the Supreme Court of India, or the Privy Council.”

[snip]

At bottom, JUSTICE STEVENS’ arguments boil down to policy disagreements with the Constitution and the Tennessee legislature.  There are, of course, alternatives. As Blackstone observed, the principle that “punishment should follow the crime as early as possible” found expression in a statute decreeing that “in case of murder, the judge shall in his sentence direct execution to be performed on the next day but one after sentence passed.”  I have no doubt that such a system would avoid the diminishing justification problem JUSTICE STEVENS identifies, but I am equally confident that such a system would find little support from this Court.

(citations omitted)

This is a great articulation of both sides of the argument.  Frankly, I don’t know which way to come out on this one, but it should be interesting to see what role international law plays in a debate over the proper interpretation of the Eighth Amendment.

-Michael

Should Colonel Sanders Be Tried For International Crimes?

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Everyone loves a good piece of fried chicken, but is it possible that Colonel Sanders (of KFC fame) is an international criminal?  No, I’m not referring to the fact that KFC and its kin have probably caused more deaths than history’s most terrible genocides.  Rather, Colonel Sanders might be guilty of violating international law as a result of some recent shenanigans at the United Nations.

As noted over at Opinio Juris, Colonel Sanders recently breached security at the United Nations and gained access to a number of restricted areas.  Sanders (ok, technically an actor playing Sanders) was even able to pose for a picture with new UN General Assembly president Ali Treki.  There’s no suggestion that the Colonel was engaged in any malicious activity like espionage (although he is very good at keeping secrets).  Even so, one might argue that he violated international law when he started sneaking around the UN complex.

The United Nations complex and the area surrounding it is called the “headquarters district.”  Under Article III, Section 7(a) of the Headquarters Agreement governing the district, that area is “under the control and authority of the United Nations as provided in the agreement.”   Admittedly, the same agreement also provides (in Article III, Section 7(c)):

Except as otherwise provided in this agreement or in the General Convention, the federal, state, and local courts of the United States shall have jurisdiction over acts done and transactions taking place in the headquarters district as provided in applicable federal, state, and local laws.

This provision suggests that Sanders might only have to worry about anything more than a common trespass conviction.  But note that the provision does not vest exclusive jurisdiction in U.S. courts.  Thus, the United Nations may argue that, given the international character of the headquarters district, Colonel Sanders might also be subject to international liability for sneaking into the “inviolable” district.  See Art. III, Sec. 9. 

Still, there are other obstacles that would have to be overcome before we could see the Colonel in the dock at any international court.  First, what international crime did he commit?  Strangely, there would not seem to be any well-established notion of “international trespass” on internationally-held lands.  (I say strangely only because it would seem to be a crime of international concern if other extraterritorial outposts were trespassed upon, like CERN or NATO headquarters.)  It would also be extreme to resort to any prosecution of the basis of international “aggression.”  Lacking a crime, there can be no trial.  Second, where could the Colonel be tried?  The International Criminal Court certainly would not have jurisdiction.  An ad hoc tribunal would be out of the question.  Third, it is unclear whether the United Nations could independently impose any penalty for any violation of “international law” under Section 10 of the Headquarters Agreement:

Persons who violate such regulations [of the United Nations] shall be subject to other penalties or to detention under arrest only in accordance with the provision of such laws or regulations as may be adopted by the appropriate American authorities.

In sum, it looks like the Colonel will escape international prosecution.  Still, I think there’s some chance that KFC’s new “grilled chicken” is an international human rights violation in the making.

-Michael

International Humanitarian Law Does Not Prohibit Shooting Locusts, Brutes, and Infected: Why Game Developers Should Stop Being Lazy and Stop Using War Crimes in Lieu of Plot

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Via Opinio Juris, a Swiss NGO has produced a report on the promotion of violations of international humanitarian law in video games. [PDF] This is a subject that’s actually bothered me before, and I am glad to see someone giving it some serious thought. Not only is the report’s game-by-game analysis of possible international law violations fascinating, but I’m completely on board with the authors’ stated purpose:

The goal is not to prohibit the games, to make them less violent or to turn them into IHL [International Humanitarian Law] or IHRL [International Human Rights Law] training tools. The message we want to send to developers and distributors of video games, particularly those portraying armed conflict scenarios, is that they should also portray the rules that apply to such conflicts in real life, namely IHRL and IHL. We would thus like to propose the producers to incorporate the essential rules of IHL [obligations].

First person shooters are pretty much the only game type I seriously play, but as a general rule, I don’t play FPS games that involve hunting down and killing other humans. My avoidance of them is due to a variety of factors: in part due to a dislike for the game concept, in part due to personal squeamishness, and in part due to an inability to suspend disbelief enough to become immersed in a game when I’m busy murdering people left and right. I would never advocate censorship of video games, but I would love for developers to be more aware of their games’ incidental promotion of war crimes, and to see new games incorporate into gameplay some of the real considerations involved in armed conflict, including compliance with humanitarian law.

As it stands today, many games treat war so callously and so unrealistically that they are not only offensive, they are also just plain bad and boring to play. I remember Army of Two, which is discussed unfavorably in the NGO article, being particularly nasty. Aside from the gameplay being laughably asinine (collecting “agro” so your partner turns invisible? For reals?), I had serious problems with playing two white dudes who are happily blasting their way through various hordes of Somalis and then blasting their way through various hordes of Iraqis, with the general mission guideline being “if someone looks like a native, shoot them.”

The game was even more disturbing when you realize that its timeline (1993 in Somalia, 2003 in Iraq) explicitly matches up with real life armed conflicts that the U.S. has been involved in. These games are not about theoretical, imaginary wars where only bad guys die — they are about very real events that resulted in the very real deaths of many innocent civilians.

War crime-promotion is disturbing in itself, but also bothersome in that, oftentimes, games that require the indiscriminate killing of human beings do so at the expense of having an enjoyable and nuanced story line. Pretty much all the games I do play, with one partial exception, feature clever and creative stories that avoid any need for human-on-human carnage. As a result, I can happily blast my way through Gears of War’s Locusts, Left 4 Dead’s zombies, and Halo’s Covenant troops without ever worrying about accidental humanitarian violations. (Well, okay — I sometimes feel a little guilty for mowing down terrified Grunts. But I do it anyway.)

The one FPS I enjoy that does involve killing humans is Half-Life. A lot of the shooting is directed at adorable little head crabs and antlions, which is cool by me, but the game also requires you to shoot at human Metro Cops. However, even there, thanks to the masks and voice disguisers, the CP’s are fairly easy to dehumanize. In terms of the game’s narrative, killing them does not tread as far into moral gray zones as do other human-killing games; they are an Orwellian paramilitary police force whose troops are all citizens who have become traitors to humanity. So shooting a couple in self-defense ain’t so bad, and doesn’t entail any risk of torture, summary execution, POW mistreatment, or abuse and murder of civilians.

Essentially, there is no game-based justification for why a game should allow players to engage in consequence-free war crimes. Designing games based upon a theme of wanton murder is a cheap cop-out by developers; gameplay could only benefit if violations of humanitarian law had serious in-game consequences, forcing players to either find a way to accomplish an objective without committing a war crime, or else go ahead and commit the war crime but then be forced to pay a substantial cost as a result.

I’d also point out that that even if a video game does not involve shooting humans, there is still ample room left over for indulgent, ivory tower analysis of gameplay under international law. Many important legal questions remain, such as, How is it in Halo that the UN finally got together the funding and state support necessary to create the elite UN Marine force? How do the laws of international organization responsibility apply to ODSTs? Does the treaty that formed the COG in Gears of War actually permit the forced conscription of soldiers in return for feeding their families? Not to mention, if a massive zombie invasion breaks out in an allied nation, does NATO require other states to act in collective defense of that state?

-Susan

The International Law of Antarctic Whiskey of Historical Value

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A New Zealand expedition is planning to drill for one hundred year old whiskey in Antarctica, from two crates left behind by the Nimrod Expedition in 1909.

The Nimrod Expedition, lead by Sir Ernest Shackleton, came within 97 miles of the South Pole before they gave up and came home. They’d originally brought with them 25 crates of McKinlay’s scotch, but two were found to have been left behind in the expedition’s Cape Royds base hut.

However, a century of ice and snow isn’t the only thing standing in the way of the whiskey’s recovery. International law may also pose a barrier, as the hut at Cape Royds has been designated an Antarctic Specially Protected Area (ASPA) under Annex V to the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty. Art. 8(4) of the Annex requires that “Listed Historic Sites and Monuments shall not be damaged, removed or destroyed.” Although temporary removal of objects for conservation purposes is permitted, and taking samples of the whiskey for study would be permitted, the crates and most the whiskey are prohibited from being removed completely by any one party under current treaty law. Today, preservation of the hut is the responsibility of the New Zealand Antarctic Heritage Trust, hence their carrying out of the whiskey mission.

There are a couple sources of treaty requirements regarding Shackleton’s whiskey and other historical relics. Resolution 3 from ATCM XXXII incorporated the Guidelines on Preservation of Historic Areas, which states:

“To that end, Parties should notify the other Parties of the discovery, indicating what remains have been found, and where and when. The consequences of removing such remains should be duly considered. If items nonetheless were removed from Antarctica, they should be delivered to the appropriate authorities or public institutions in the home country of the discoverer, and remain available upon request for research purposes.”

Measure 5 of ATCM XXXII, “Revised Management Plan for ASPA 121 (Cape Royds),” is more specifially relevant to the McKinley whiskey, as it addresses the handling and conservation of artifacts from the Nimrod Expedition. The plan became effective in July, 2009. Section 7(vii) requires that:

“Material may be collected or removed from the Area only in accordance with a permit should be limited to the minimum necessary to meet scientific or management needs.”

“Any new artifacts observed should be notified to the appropriate national authority. Relocation or removal of artifacts for the purposes of preservation, protection or to re-establish historical accuracy is
allowable by permit.”

So while recovering a sample of whiskey with a syringe to take back for study would qualify as a “scientific need,” it or any other materials retrieved must remain in the hands of a public institution and be available to other nations for research purposes. Incidentally, I do not know exactly what “permits” are required or where they are obtained from, but I find it depressing to know that not even the remote icefields of Antarctica are free from the strictures of bureaucracy.

Finally, part of me suspects that the whiskey retrieval mission is less about getting a sample of historical whiskey and more about an awesome publicity campaign. Or possibly just part of an advertising war between whiskey makers — Jameson’s may dive into the sea during a storm to recover a barrel of their whiskey, but McKinlay’s can trump that by sending an expedition to Antarctica to retrieve Shackleton’s lost whiskey cache.

-Susan