Go On! Conference on Constitutional Rights and International Human Rights

(Go on is an occasional item of symposia of interest) This weekend I'm off to the Minerva Centre for Human Rights, Hebrew University, Jerusalem to present a paper at their conference entitled Constitutional Rights and International Human Rights (conference programme).

The conference features an illustrious line-up including Fionnuala Ní Aoláin and Aharon Barak and was organised in honour of Prof. David Kretzmer who recently left Hebrew U. to join the Faculty of the Transitional Justice Institute, University of Ulster (Northern Ireland). If any readers happen to be there, please feel free to introduce yourselves!

On November 16, ...

... 1384, the daughter of a Hungarian king whose ancestors were from Poland, Jadwiga, was crowned King of Poland. The masculine title was meant to stress that Jadwiga was the sovereign ruler, and not a queen consort. Jadwiga (left) and her newborn daughter died soon after childbirth in 1399.
... 2007 (today), is celebrated the International Day of Tolerance, as established a decade ago by the U.N. General Assembly, in recognition of the 1995 Declaration of Principles on Tolerance that sets out a framework for fighting racism, xenophobia, and other global ills. Here's Principle 1.4:

Consistent with respect for human rights, the practice of tolerance does not mean toleration of social injustice or the abandonment or weakening of one's convictions. It means that one is free to adhere to one's own convictions and accepts that others adhere to theirs. It means accepting the fact that human beings, naturally diverse in their appearance, situation, speech, behaviour and values, have the right to live in peace and to be as they are. It also means that one's views are not to be imposed on others.

Brother No. 3, Not Our Sister arrested together

They are hardly the first couple to commit incomprehensible crimes in synchrony—Diane Marie Amann’s remarkable IntLawGrrls series on women at Nuremberg described the postwar trial of Ilse Koch, “wife of the Buchenwald Camp commander [Karl Otto Koch] who was complicit in the atrocities committed under his command.” But on November 12, 2007, Khmer Rouge couple Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith (above) became the first husband and wife to face charges together before a contemporary Nuremberg-type tribunal, this one in Cambodia, confirming speculation about the couple’s arrest reported in IntLawGrrls last July by Beth Van Schaack. (The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda established another grim first by indicting a mother and son for their respective roles in the 1994 Rwanda genocide.)
The Cambodian couple were charged with crimes against humanity (Ieng Sary was also charged with war crimes) and were detained under the authority of the Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia (logo below), a court that, as Jaya Ramji-Nogales and other IntLawGrrls have posted, was established by the United Nations and the Government of Cambodia to try surviving senior leaders and others who were most responsible for Khmer Rouge-era atrocities. Their arrest this week doubled the number of suspects detained by the ECCC.
Ieng Sary, known as “Brother Number 3” during the Khmer Rouge era, served as Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister in the regime of the infamous “Brother Number 1”—Pol Pot, who died in 1998. (“Brother Number 2,” Nuon Chea, has already been detained by the ECCC.) Ieng Thirith (“Not Our Sister”) served as Minister of Social Affairs and Education during the Khmer Rouge reign of terror. Her sister, Khieu Ponnary, was married to Pol Pot.
How individuals come to commit crimes so horrific they transcend our capacity to comprehend is a perennial mystery, and the enigma of wholesale evil is somehow compounded when the alleged perpetrators are married to each other.
To meet Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith is to deepen the mystery. Twenty-three years ago this month, I spent a surrealistic weekend interviewing the two, along with noted constitutional lawyer Floyd Abrams, at the Khmer Rouge’s guerrilla headquarters in the Cambodian jungle. They were charming hosts: We asked about genocide, they offered us shrimp and champagne. In response to our persistent questions about Khmer Rouge atrocities, Ieng Sary finally acknowledged that the Khmer Rouge “owe the world an accounting” for the “unfortunate events of the 1970s.” But, Ieng Sary explained, with the Khmer Rouge still at war with the Cambodian government, they were rather busy. The accounting would have to wait. At long last, the wait may be over.

On November 15, ...

... 1941, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler issued a decree by which members of the security forces who engaged in homosexual conduct were subject to execution or imprisonment. The decree was extended to all males within months, part of a program of persecution, by death and consignment to concentration camps, during the Nazi regime.
... 1999, France enacted the law creating the Pacte civil de solidarité, or PACS, which permits civil unions between couples, of opposite sex and same sex alike.
... 1951, U.S. Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Cal.) was born in Newark, New Jersey.

Holiday biodiversity

Wednesday's Food Section day in many newspapers, and today they're chockful of recipes for the United States' annual food feast, Thanksgiving. Worth a look for folks concerned about global matters, and not only because the savoring of succulent treats is a human universal.
Strong in some stories is a a message of socially responsible cooking. Cooks're to choose their holiday bird not just because it's the plumpest, their greens not just because they're the greenest. The challenge, rather, is to buy off the beaten path -- to choose a foodstuff because it's unusual, a strain that Big Food's squeezed off the supermarket shelves. Look then, for "heritage turkeys"; cook, then, with "heritage eggs."
This ought to be more than a marketing gimmick. According to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization, 1 out of 5 species that used to thrive in the world's barnyards now is endangered. It's a problem of biodiversity not less significant than the threats in the wild discussed in meetings like that of the International Mechanism of Scientific Expertise on Biodiversity in France this week.
Seems this year the holidays're a time to eat all around the food chain.

On November 14, ...

... 1934, Catherine McGuinness was born in Belfast. A member of the Irish Senate from 1979 to 1987, she became a judge in 1993, progressing by 2000 to the position of Justice of Ireland's Supreme Court. McGuinness resigned from the Court a year ago, but remains President of Ireland's Law Reform Commission.
... 1947 (60 years ago today), the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution recognizing Korea's claim to independence. To further pursuit of that claim, it established a U.N. Temporary Commission on Korea, and recommended that elections be held throughout the country in March 1948.
... 1954, Condoleezza Rice was born in Birmingham, Alabama. Following service as Stanford's Provost, Dr. Rice became National Security Adviser to U.S. President George W. Bush in 2001. She has been Secretary of State since 2005.

Affirmative action and past wrongs

Recognition of past wrongs can take many forms. As posted yesterday, there's the package of compensation, exhumation, and verdict-reversals that comprise Spain's proposed Ley de Memoria Histórica. There're international criminal justice and truth commissions, too. There's the establishment of monuments, lasting reminders that boost public awareness.
And there's affirmative action.
In an EbonyJet.com article entitled "The New Brazil: coming to grips with race - finally," Judith Morrison (above), Regional Director for South America and Caribbean for the Inter-American Foundation, writes that "Brazil has analyzed the experiences of the US, Malaysia and South Africa and has opted to implement affirmative action programs throughout the country." Matilde Ribeiro (below), Secretary for the Promotion of Racial Equality, heads a new, Cabinet-level, government agency. Individual states are considering affirmative action in social programs, and universities have worked to diversify student bodies. "The prestigious Brazilian Foreign Service known as Itamaraty," Morrison writes, "has a quota system to set aside spaces for Afro-Brazilians to study diplomacy." Morrison concludes:

Brazil had long been seen as the model of a unique brand of racial harmony (insidiously called racial democracy) that hid underlying state policies of racial discrimination. Brazil is finally beginning to come to terms with its long history of racism and exclusion through innovative policies and national attention to racial disparities -- it is worthwhile for all of us to study this interesting example.

(Heartfelt thanks to Nekesha Batty for the head's up on this article.)

Genii, er, geniae. That's us.

Recognize this's silly-season stuff, but couldn't resist the examination that's swirling about academic blogdom these days. It's the Blog Readability Test, which purports to answer what's apparently a burning question among bloggers: "What level of education is required to read your blog?"
For IntLawGrrls, the answer's in the image →
'Nuff said.

On November 13, ...

... 1950, the Government of Tibet complained to U.N. Secretary-General Trgve Lie that it was the victim of Chinese aggression. The complaint by Tibet (flag at left) stated that even as international troops resisted aggression in Korea, "[s]imilar happenings in remote Tibet are passing without notice."

... 2001, President George W. Bush issued a Military Order on Detention, Treatment, and Trial of Certain Non-Citizens in the War Against Terrorism. Announcing a plan to detain captives in the "war on terror" that Bush'd declared in the wake of the terrorist attacks on September 11 of that year, the Order asserted the power "to ... detai[n], and, when tried, to ... tr[y] for violations of the laws of war and other applicable laws by military tribunals" any person whom "there is reason to believe":

(i) is or was a member of the organization known as al Qaida;
(ii) has engaged in, aided or abetted, or conspired to commit, acts of international terrorism, or acts in preparation therefor, that have caused, threaten to cause, or have as their aim to cause, injury to or adverse effects on the United States, its citizens, national security, foreign policy, or economy; or
(iii) has knowingly harbored one or more [such] individuals ....

Executive detention at home and abroad of persons who came to be called "enemy combatants" -- among them 2 U.S. citizens, José Padilla and Yaser Esam Hamdi, as well as many noncitizens -- soon followed. The Supreme Court invalidated aspects of that policy in its 2004 decisions in Rasul v. Bush and Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, and in its 2006 decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. It is due again to consider detention, in Boumediene v. Bush, on December 5, 2007.

Ley de Memoria Histórica de España

Fully 32 years after transition from the dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco to civilian government in the form of a constitutional monarchy, Spain's moving toward enactment of la Ley de Memoria Histórica, the Law of Historical Memory. Proposed last summer by the government of President José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, a Socialist, the bill's been opposed by right-wing politicians who "argu[ed] it reopened wounds that would further divide the country," the Los Angeles Times reported. Disputing that claim was Deputy Prime Minister María Teresa Fernández de la Vega (below left), who declared, "Nothing could be further from the truth." Her position prevailed, and the lower house of Parliament okayed the bill earlier this month. Senate approval is expected soon to follow.
Among the features of the law, which focuses on Spain's Civil War of 1936-39, would be: annulment of convictions of dissidents; restoration of citizenship to dissidents forced into exile; banning of fascist rallies at Franco's burial site; and government exhumation of mass graves.
Just as NGOs like Asociación para la recuperación de la memoria histórica have worked to uncover events during Franco's regime, private groups already have undertaken some exhumations. Francesc Torres' photographs of mass graves are now on exhibit at the International Centre for Photography in New York. Speaking at once of his work and of la Ley de Memoria Histórica, Torres told London's Guardian:

'There can be a good use of memory, a setting the record straight, and making sure things like this never happen again.'

(photo above right (c) 2007 Francesc Torres)

On November 12, ...

... 1992 (15 years ago today), 69% of the Inuit people voted in favor of an agreement to create the Nunavut Territory, a semi-autonomous region in in the north of Canada. "Nunavut" means "our land" in the Inuktitut language, and the territory "has been home to Inuit for millennia and part of Canada for more than a century," according the the website of the Government of Nunavut, which "now provides a wide range of services tailored to the unique needs of approximately 29,500 residents."
... 1954, Ellis Island closed. "New York's main immigration control centre" for 62 years, it was the gateway through which well over 15 million immigrants came to the United States.
... 1933, U.S. Rep. Diane E. Watson (D-Cal.) was born in Los Angeles.

Bhutto and Suu Kyi briefly swap places

With the road leading to her home blocked by barbed wire, metal barricades and dozens of police officers, Benazir Bhutto, former Prime Minister and major opponent of Pakistan’s General Pervez Musharraf, was kept yesterday from attending a rally. Bhutto had intended to lead demonstrators in protest against the week-old state of emergency (see our discussion of states of emergency in posts below by Diane, Michelle, Fiona, myself and again Fiona), but found herself confined for the day. She was, however, able to meet with her party’s leaders Saturday midday. Bhutto has only recently returned to Pakistan, following a deal with Musharraf. Her brief confinement has probably increased her credibility without damaging her chances of making a deal with Musharraf; indeed, it is reported that talks between the two are continuing. (Bhutto's by no means the only woman to have endured house arrest this last week; see Diane's post below.)

Meanwhile in Burma/Myanmar, Aung San Suu Kyi (see here and here) has been under house arrest for 12 of the past 18 years, and hasn’t met with members of her party, the National League for Democracy, since 2004. Yesterday, she was allowed to do so to discuss the preconditions the military junta has set for meeting with her. Though Suu Kyi is not seeking confrontation or regime change, the proposed talks follow on massive demonstrations led by monks ending in a crackdown by the junta in the last days of September. Ibrahim Gambari, the UN representative who has visited Burma/Myanmar twice since then, was apparently “instrumental” in arranging the proposed talks between the junta and Suu Kyi. Talks may lead to a constitutional referendum and election: after 14 years of on-again off-again sessions, in early September a constitutional convention produced guidelines for a constitution. Unfortunately, the guidelines ensure a strong role for the military.

Human rights lawyer still under house arrest; American lawyers plan to march in solidarity

Further to Naomi's post above:
Less attention has been paid by the media to a human rights lawyer who remains under house arrest in Pakistan. She is Asma Jahangir, head of Pakistan's Human Rights Commission -- the website for which, incidentally, appears to have been removed from the Internet. (Jahangir photo at left courtesy of jazbah.org, a website by and about women in Pakistan)

Foreign correspondent Emily Wax wrote in yesterday's Washington Post that Jahangir

was placed under house arrest last Saturday, and since then the government has turned her two-story family villa into a jail. More than 20 prison guards, some with submachine guns, are posted in her garden, and plainclothes officers in oversize suits peer through her windows.
. . . .
Life under house arrest has been 'just lovely, and it hasn't hurt me,' Jahangir, 55 and mother of three, said Friday in an interview at her home. 'I am so proud of Pakistanis and specifically of our lawyers for speaking out and getting their heads bashed in for a better Pakistan.'

American Bar Association lawyers, meanwhile, plan to march around the Supreme Court in Washington on Wednesday to show solidarity with Pakistan's lawyers, and the ABA encourages similar marches throughout the country. Details here.

On November 11, ...

... 1970, the Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity, which had been concluded 2 years earlier in New York, entered into force. Today the treaty, which would expose persons suspected of enumerated international crimes to the risk of prosecution no matter how old the alleged incident, has 51 states parties. Among these is found only 1 of the 5 permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- the Russian Federation.
... 1946, U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown (D-Fla.) was born in Jacksonville, Florida.
... 1940, U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Cal.) was born in Brooklyn, New York. She's pictured at left on the Senate floor, outlining her opposition to the nomination of then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice to become Secretary of State. In January 2005 Rice was confirmed by the full Senate; Boxer was among 13 Senators who voted "nay."
... 1918, at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, as schoolchildren learn, an armistice took effect, ending World War I on its western front, though sporadic violence continued for a time in the east. The ceasefire agreement'd been signed earlier in the day by the Axis power, Germany, and Allied powers, Britain, France, and the United States. The event is cause for memorials in many countries, by names varying from Fête de l'Armistice to Remembrance Day to Poppy Day (right) to Veterans Day.

Plus ça change: The Trial of Henry Wirz

The 1865 trial of Henry Wirz (right) before a military commission is often touted as a prominent early war crimes prosecution. Wirz, Swiss by birth, was a Confederate Captain. After spending a year in Europe as a special emissary to Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy, he was appointed commander of Camp Sumter (below) near Andersonville, GA. The prison housed Union POWs. At one point, its population swelled to 33,000 persons, making the prison the 5th largest city in the Confederacy, according to one report. Of the almost 50,000 prisoners detained in the camp during the war, over 10,000 apparently died of disease and malnutrition given the over-crowded and squalid conditions.

At the end of the War, General Robert Lee and other high level Confederate officials (including the Confederate Secretary of War) were to be charged with the broad crime of conspiring to injure the health of Union soldiers held in the Confederate states. However, in August 1865, President Andrew Johnson (left) ordered that the high-level charges be dropped. Nonetheless, Wirz was eventually prosecuted for mistreating and murdering Union soldiers detained in the prison in violation of the laws and customs of war. Several former prisoners testified against him.

In his defense, Wirz argued that under the circumstances of the war, he was unable to ensure proper conditions in the prison and was otherwise just following orders. In pleading his case, he wrote:

I do not think that I ought to be held responsible for the shortness of rations, for the overcrowded state of the prison (which was in itself a prolific cause of the fearful mortality), for the inadequate supplies of clothing, and of shelters &c. Still I now bear the odium, and men who were prisoners here seemed disposed to wreak their vengeance upon me for what they have suffered, who was only the medium, or I may better say, the tool in the hands of my superiors.

May 7, 1865 letter from Capt. Hy Wirz to Maj. Gen. J. H. Wilson. (This letter, the indictment, and judgment against Wirz are available in U.S. Army, 8 The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies.)

The military commission rejected Wirz’s defense and sentenced him to death by hanging. Notwithstanding that many wrote to President Andrew Johnson pleading Wirz’s pardon or at least the commutation of the death sentence, Wirz was hanged on November 10, 1865 (left). On the gallows, he reputedly stated:

I know what orders are. And I am being hanged for obeying them.

2 more blogs for & by women

Check out:
(1) Ms. JD, which features posts by and about women beginning law careers. Very entrepreneurial, both in its ads from major law firms (no doubt seeing a market worth reaching) and prominent women guest bloggers.
(2) The XX Factor, written by the women of the online magazine Slate. Posts typically tend toward domestic political culture (e.g., "O'Connor is Much Among Us" and "Breasts, etc.") but occasional posts of transnational consequence (e.g., "Ayaan Hirsi Ali: How To Help") are also to be found there.

On November 10, ...

... 1995, Nigeria hanged "writer and human rights activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa," and 8 other opponents of military rule in the country, "despite worldwide pleas for clemency." The execution followed conviction on charges related to murder -- charges that Saro-Wiwa maintained were trumped up in order to stop his fight on behalf of the Ogoni people affected by oil exploitation in their homeland. The event remains the subject of litigation brought in the United States pursuant to the Alien Tort Claims Act. See, e.g., Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., 226 F.3d 88 (2d Cir. 2000).
... 1999, pursuant to terms set for in the Lausanne Declaration on Doping in Sport issued earlier in the year, the World Anti-Doping Agency was established to "promote and coordinate the fight against doping in sport internationally." Among its efforts is adoption of a World Anti-Doping Code of 2003. An independent entity, "[t]he agency consists of equal representatives from the Olympic Movement and public authorities."
... 2007 (today), persons of Indian and Nepalese ancestry continue the 5-day Diwali celebration, a festival of lights. Enjoy!

Iraqi Refugees Return: Don't Believe the Hype

Claims by the Iraqi government this week that the return of 46,000 refugees last month was due to the improved security situation in Baghdad left me skeptical, to say the least. First, this optimistic claim is at odds with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees' most recent statistics: 60,000 Iraqis flee their homes every month; 4 million Iraqis displaced (2.2 million within Iraq) as of September 2007. These numbers all represent sharp increases since April, when 40-50,000 Iraqis fled each month and 3 million Iraqis were displaced (1 million within Iraq). If the security situation is improved, as Iraqi officials claim, why are we seeing this increase? The answer is that Iraqis are returning "not because they are confident of Iraq's future, but because they ran out of money." Others are coming back because host countries like Syria are making it more difficult for them to stay, and recently began requiring Iraqis to obtain visas to enter -- visas that have been granted thus far to academics and merchants only. Many refugees currently in Syria hold only 3-month visas, and will be forced to return to Iraq when those visas expire. In the words of Zainab, a 25-year old Iraqi refugee in Syria whose husband was killed in a car bombing in Baghdad this year, "We have to go back, although we don't want to. We have no choice." The U.S. State Department announced yesterday it will begin processing Iraqi refugees in Syria for resettlement in the United States. Having taken in only 1700 Iraqi refugees so far (compared to Syria's 1.4 million), State's promise to take in up to 1000 Iraqis each month is too little, too late for those forced to return to the violence in Iraq. (Photo courtesy of .ash)

The Video Game That Changed the World?

As one of those Luddites raised without a television, video games have never been my forte. But two recent games that seek to raise awareness about the plight of refugees and migrants caught my attention. This week, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees released "Against All Odds", a video game that seeks to educate youngsters by placing them in the shoes of a refugee. Players can also read stories and watch movies about individual refugees. And in January 2008, Breakthrough, an international human rights NGO that uses education and popular culture to promote social change, will release ICED!, a game in which players live the life of an undocumented immigrant teenager. Being chased by immigration officials, landing in detention and being separated from one's family -- the player undergoes all of these virtual experiences. It turns out these are just the tip of the iceberg: Darfur is Dying, put together by organizations including the International Crisis Group, simulates the life of a displaced Darfurian facing challenges to the survival of her refugee camp; La Migra puts the player in the role of an immigration official deciding whether or not to let immigrants into the United States while Crosser, modeled after my all-time favorite video game (yes, yes, even the Luddite has a favorite), Frogger, the player tries to cross a river and then runs into border patrol agents who send him back to Mexico. A new game, Squeezed, will put the player in the role of a tree-hopping frog who leaves home to seek work abroad picking fruit. There's even a support network, Games for Change, that provides visibility and shared resources to creators of these social justice games. These games are certainly a step up from the violent video games that have been shown to increase violent thoughts and behaviors. And they are a creative and sympathetic way to introduce children to the important issues of our day. But do they trivialize the plights of refugees and migrants? And the Luddite inside has to ask whether this is any substitute for giving children a good book on the migration experience or introducing them to a migrant willing to share their story? Perhaps, but perhaps by speaking in the language of popular culture, these video games truly do offer the possibility of changing the world.

On November 9, ...

... 1996, newly elected Bosnian Serb President, Biljana Plavšić dismissed Gen. Ratko Mladić, whom the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia had indicted on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. She said in a televised statement "that international opposition to General Mladic had made it impossible for him to remain," the New York Times reported, adding, "The television is tightly controlled by the Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic." Today, as posted, Plavšić (left) is serving an ICTY-imposed sentence. But co-indictees Karadžić and Mladić remain at-large fugitives from that mechanism of international criminal justice.

... 1953, 2 days after King Norodom Sihanouk returned from exile, self-imposed months earlier as a protest against colonial rule, Cambodia became independent from France.