Georgetown Security Law Brief

Vietnam granting amnesty to more than 5,000 prisoners

08/31/09: Jurist reports that Vietnamese Vice Minister of Public Security Le The Tiem said Monday that President Nguyen Minh Triet will grant amnesty to more than 5,000 prisoners on Wednesday in honor of National Day. Catholic priest Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly, who was sentenced to eight years in prison for anti-government activities in Vietnam in 2007, will not be granted amnesty.

New Jersey town goes to court to block Gadhafi stay

08/31/09: The Miami Herald reports that officials in a northern New Jersey town are expected in court to try to halt work on a mansion owned by the Libyan government. Englewood Mayor Michael Wildes wants renovations stopped because the he doesn't want Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to stay there next month. The issue is headed Monday to Bergen County Superior Court.

DOJ may skirt court order on interrogation documents

08/31/09: The Washington Independent reports that the Obama administration may circumvent the spirit of a judge’s order to disclose hundreds of documents relating to the CIA’s Bush-era interrogation program, delivering instead generic descriptions of the documents and legal arguments for continued nondisclosure. HT to FOIA blog.

Opinion: Finding a better way to prosecute terrorists

08/31/09: US News has an interview with Coast Guard Captain Glenn Sulmasy discussing his book, The National Security Court System. In the book, Capt. Sulmasy proposes a separate, hybrid court system, overseen by civilians, with detention, trials, and hearings held on US military bases.

Opinion: Protect our mariners

08/30/09: The Washington Times has an editorial discussing the US Coast Guard's recently issued anti-piracy guidelines, requiring vessels to submit plans for combating terrorism and piracy. However, those guidelines, allowing ships to carry arms onboard, still have to go through an arduous legislative process. The Times argues that, as piracy continues to escalate in 2009, Congress needs to act swiftly to clarify legislation allowing US-flag merchant ships and their American crews to arm their ships.

Spooks to Tap Aid Workers for Af-Pak Knowledge?

08/29/09: Wired reports that earlier this week, Gen. David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, won attention — and praise — for a plan to open an intelligence-training center that will allow military officers, intelligence analysts and covert agents to focus long-term on Afghanistan and Pakistan. But the plan has raised eyebrows in the humanitarian community, in part because of an apparent push to gather intelligence from aid workers.

Scholarship: Democracy goes to war

08/27/09: Nigel D. White (Univ. of Sheffield - Law) has published Democracy Goes to War: British Military Deployments under International Law. After considering the various legal and institutional regimes, the book examines the UK's decisions to deploy troops from the perspective of international law. In considering whether democratic accountability is effective in upholding the principles of international law, the book throws new light on an old democracy, and thereby makes a contribution to the current reform proposals that are aimed at improving democratic decision-making.

Accused of drug ties, Afghan official worries US

08/27/09: The New York Times reports that, in his bid for re-election, President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan has surrounded himself with checkered figures who could bring him votes: warlords suspected of war crimes, corruption and trafficking in the country’s lucrative poppy crop. But none is as influential as Marshal Fahim, his running mate, whose trajectory in and out of power, and American favor, says much about the struggle the United States has had in dealing with corruption in Afghanistan.

Cheney and ACLU types in sync on 'torture'?

08/27/09: Politico reports that Vice President Dick Cheney and the lawyers who represent Guanatanamo detainees appear to be in rare agreement about the lingering impact of harsh interrogation techniques. Cheney points to the information gleaned after the use of harsh interrogation techniques as an indication of their efficacy. Attorney's for detainees exposed to the same techniques claim that confessions and other admissions are not admissible at trial because they resulted from the techniques used.

Australia High Court rules military justice system unconstitutional

08/27/09: Jurist reports that the High Court of Australia ruled Wednesday that the Australian Military Court (AMC) is unconstitutional. The High Court held that the AMC employed the judicial power of the Commonwealth while AMC judges functioned within the hierarchy of the military, which was a violation of chapter three of the Australian Constitution. The ruling casts doubt on approximately 170 cases that the AMC has ruled on since its inception in 2007.

The CIA's Vietnam histories

08/27/09: The National Security Archive has posted newly-declassified CIA histories showing the agency's involvement in every aspect of the Indochina war. HT to beSpacific.

Jawad, young Afghan freed from Guantanamo, to sue US government

08/27/09: The Miami Herald reports that the family of one of the youngest prisoners ever held at Guantanamo plans to sue the U.S. government to compensate him for mistreatment and an adolescence lost to nearly seven years in a cell, his lawyers said Thursday. Mohammed Jawad returned to Afghanistan this week after a military judge ruled that he was coerced into confessing that he threw a grenade at an unmarked vehicle in the capital in 2002.

World faces hi-tech crunch as China eyes ban on rare metal exports

08/26/09: The Telegraph (UK) reports that Beijing is drawing up plans to prohibit or restrict exports of rare earth metals that are produced only in China and play a vital role in cutting edge technology, including precision-guided weapons. HT to Wired. 

Bodies of suspected Taliban found in Pakistan’s Swat

08/25/09: The New York Times reports that villagers in Pakistan's Swat valley have found the bodies of 14 suspected militants, reviving concern about extra-judicial killings after a successful army offensive against Taliban militants.

US says rendition to continue, but with more oversight

08/25/09: The New York Times reports that the Obama administration will continue the Bush administration’s practice of sending terrorism suspects to third countries for detention and interrogation, but pledges to closely monitor their treatment to ensure that they are not tortured, administration officials said Monday.

Marines seek crowd-blasting ‘Venom’ launcher

08/24/09: Wired reports that the Marine Corps has issued an urgent request for a powerful non-lethal weapon that can fire volleys of 40mm grenades. And in parallel, the service is launching a push for a more futuristic version of the same weapon.

Opinion: Targeted killings

08/24/09: The National Review has an opinion piece by Nathan Sales, law professor at George Mason University, arguing that, "As Congress looks into who knew what about CIA’s targeted-killing scheme, it should keep its eye on the bigger picture: Killing al-Qaeda kingpins isn’t just sound policy; it also stands on solid legal ground."

Red Cross should get early detainee info

08/24/09: The Miami Herald reports that the US military has quietly tightened its detention policy to require that the International Committee of the Red Cross be notified promptly of terror suspects held at a special camp in Iraq and another in Afghanistan, a senior military officer said Saturday.

Iraq military broadcasts confession on bombing

08/24/09: The New York Times reports that Iraq’s military showed on Sunday what it called the confession of a mastermind of last week’s deadly attacks on two government ministries, and it announced the arrests of police and army officers the man said had been bribed to allow a huge truck bomb through checkpoints into Baghdad. In brief, edited excerpts of videotaped remarks, the man, identified as Wisam Ali Khazim Ibrahim, calmly explained how he had organized one of the two bombings, which killed almost 100 people on Wednesday and wounded hundreds more. He said he did so on the orders of a man in Syria who wanted the attacks “to shake the administration.”

Federal judge rules lawyers for Guantanamo detainee may question 9/11 conspirator

08/23/09: Jurist reports that a judge in the US District Court for the District of Columbia has granted lawyers for another Guantanamo Bay detainee permission to question Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the self-proclaimed architect of the 9/11 attacks, in a ruling made public Thursday. Attorneys for Abdul Raheem Ghulam Rabbani will be allowed to submit narrow, written questions concerning Rabbani's work for Mohammed.

Pakistan foils suicide terror plot, minister says

08/23/09: CNN reports that, in the last four weeks, authorities arrested three men with suicide vests who were plotting to carry out the attacks.

Immigration judge clears Egyptian student previously acquitted in terrorism case

08/22/09: The New York Times reports that federal immigration judge Kenneth S. Hurewitz said the evidence put forward by lawyers from the Department of Homeland Security did not show that Youssef Megahed, a former engineering student at the University of South Florida and originally from Egypt, was engaged in or would probably engage in terrorist activities.

Ex-Vietnam lieutenant apologizes for massacre

08/22/09: The Miami Herald reports that, speaking in a soft, sometimes labored voice, the only US Army officer convicted in the 1968 slayings of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai made an extraordinary public apology while speaking to a small group near the military base where he was court-martialed.

Federal judge dismisses challenge to overseas wiretapping law

08/22/09: Jurist reports that a judge in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on Thursday dismissed a lawsuit challenging amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that expand government power to eavesdrop on overseas conversations. The suit was filed in July 2008 by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of various rights groups, shortly after then-president George W. Bush signed the FISA Amendments Act into law.

More at stake in Gitmo court orders than detainees’ fates

08/21/09: ProPublica reports that the impasse over releasing 29 Guantanamo prisoners who have been found to have been unlawfully detained of the 35 Guantanamo prisoners whose cases have been completed is usually discussed as a logistical problem of foreign diplomacy or domestic politics. But it also raises a deeper question of principle: What is the meaning of the constitutional right of habeas corpus – a core American right to be free from unjust imprisonment – in the new and potentially expanding context of terrorism detention?

Court rules government’s freeze of charity’s assets unconstitutional

08/21/09: The Lift reports that a federal court ruled in Kindhearts v. Geithner, for the first time late Tuesday that the government cannot freeze an organization’s assets under a terror financing law without obtaining a warrant based upon probable cause. The court also found that the government must give the organization notice of the basis for freezing its assets and a meaningful opportunity to defend itself.

Army wins court approval to burn chemical weapons

08/21/09: Bloomberg News reports that US District Judge Richard K. Eaton in Washington rejected a challenge brought by 20 citizen and environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation, that claimed plans to incinerate weapons containing chemicals such as sarin and the blister agent mustard would harm the environment and endanger public safety. HT to beSpacific.

Federal judge limits use of hearsay evidence in Guantanamo cases

08/21/09: Jurist reports that Judge Reggie Walton of the US District Court for the District of Columbia issued a ruling in Bostan v. Obama and Bihani v. Obama, Wednesday that severely curtails the federal government's ability to use hearsay evidence in trials against Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Scholarship: Shipping interdiction and the Law of the Sea

08/20/09: Douglas Guilfoyle of University College London has published Shipping Interdiction and the Law of the Sea.The book considers the State action of stopping, searching and arresting foreign flag vessels and crew on the high seas in cases such as piracy, slavery, drug smuggling, fisheries management, migrant smuggling, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and maritime terrorism. Interdiction raises important questions of jurisdiction, including: how permission to board a foreign vessel is obtained; whether boarding State or flag State law applies during the interdiction (or whether both apply); and which State has jurisdiction to prosecute any crimes discovered.

Tenet claims innocence in spy suit flap

08/20/09: Politico reports that former Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet is claiming he should not be punished for urging a federal court to dismiss a lawsuit involving an undercover operative and then failing to to advise the court for six years that the agent's covert status had been officially rolled back.

Pakistan's stake in the Afghan election

08/20/09: The Council on Foreign Relations has posted an interview with Daniel Markey, CFR Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia, in which he says Pakistan's interest lies in an election that yields a legitimate government and brings political and military stability to Afghanistan.

White House urged not to re-sign ICC Rome treaty

08/20/09: Jurist reports that the Obama administration should not re-sign and ratify the Rome Statute and join the International Criminal Court, according to a study released Tuesday by the Heritage Foundation. According to the report, the ICC lacks checks on its power, is a threat to national sovereignty, and could cause complications to military cooperation between the US and its allies.

Ex-Syrian soldier pleads innocent to arms dealing

08/20/09: The Miami Herald reports that a former member of the Syrian military has pleaded innocent to conspiring to sell military-grade weapons to a US-designated terrorist group in Colombia. Jamal Yousef appeared in federal court in Manhattan on Wednesday after he was brought to the United States earlier in the day. He was detained without bail.

Australia rights group criticizes proposed terrorism law changes

08/20/09: Jurist reports that [JURIST] Australian rights group Civil Liberties Australia on Wednesday sharply criticized the government's proposed reforms to Australia's national security and anti-terrorism legislation. Last week, Australian Attorney General Robert McClelland released a paper detailing the proposed changes, including "providing police with new emergency powers to enter and search premises without a warrant where it is suspected, on reasonable grounds, that there is material relevant to a terrorism offence and there is a threat to public health or safety" and "extending the time available for police to re-enter a premises under a search warrant from one hour to 12 hours in emergency circumstances." CLA called these expanded powers "highly problematic."

CIA assassination program had been outsourced to Blackwater

08/20/09: The LA Times reports that the secret CIA program to assassinate top Al Qaeda leaders was outsourced in 2004 to Blackwater USA, the private security contractor whose operations in Iraq prompted intense scrutiny, according to two former intelligence officials familiar with the events. The North Carolina-based company was given operational responsibility for targeting suspected terrorist commanders and was awarded millions of dollars for training and weaponry, but the program was canceled before any missions were conducted, the two officials said.

FBI agents’ role is transformed by terror fight

08/19/09: The New York Times reports that the FBI has doubled the number of agents assigned to counterterrorism duties to roughly 5,000 people, and has created new squads across the country that focus more on deterring and disrupting terrorism than on solving crimes. But the manpower costs of this focus are steep, and the benefits not always clear. Of the 5,500 leads that the squad has pursued since it was formed five years ago, only 5 percent have been found credible enough to be sent to permanent FBI squads for longer-term investigations.

Scholarship: Attempt, conspiracy, and incitement to commit genocide

08/19/09: Jens David Ohlin of Cornell University has posted Attempt, Conspiracy, and Incitement to Commit Genocide from the forthcoming "The UN Genocide Convention: A Commentary." The chapter explores three criminal law modes of liability as they apply to the international crime of genocide. HT to International Law Reporter. 

US to release members of Iraqi group that kidnapped five Britons

08/19/09: The Times (UK) reports that the US military is to release all detainees linked to a Shia extremist group that kidnapped five British men two years ago. Four of the hostages are thought to be dead. General Ray Odierno, the top US commander in Iraq, plans to release all members of Asaib al-Haq — League of the Righteous — as part of what he called a wider reconciliation process in the divided country. The number of detained group members is believed to be between 300 and 400.

Fugitive still licensed to fly by the FAA

08/19/09: The New York Times reports that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is offering a $50,000 reward for Joseph Mahmoud Dibee, a Seattle man it says is a domestic terrorist. However, that has not kept him from keeping his pilot’s license or from trying to sell his airplane online, apparently because the Transportation Security Administration has not compared the FBI’s wanted list with the Federal Aviation Administration’s list of licensed pilots.

Obama-backed bill worries FBI whistleblowers

08/19/09: The Washington Times reports that working with the administration, Congress is considering a new whistleblower-protection bill, and the protections afforded to national security and intelligence agency employees have emerged as a key sticking point. The White House sought changes in a Senate bill to strip existing rights for FBI whistleblowers despite Mr. Obama's campaign promises to increase such protections.

Iranian arms seized in Iraq, officials say

08/19/09: The New York Times reports that Iraqi and American troops seized a rocket launcher loaded with about a dozen Iranian-made rockets aimed at an American base in the southern city of Basra, Iraqi officials said Tuesday.

Pakistan catches Taliban operative Umar

08/19/09: The Wall Street Journal reports that Pakistani security forces captured a close associate of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, who was believed slain in a U.S. missile strike this month. The capture of Mr. Mehsud's close associate, Maulvi Umar, deals another blow to a Taliban insurgency that has racked Pakistan but now appears in disarray. Mr. Umar's arrest turns a key Taliban aide into a potential source of information on the militant network operating on Afghanistan's border.

Law & Order in Afghanistan’s Parwan Province

08/18/09: Wired reports that the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan is increasing involving the Afghan National Police in response to attacks.

International arbitration commission splits Ethiopia-Eritrea border war damages

08/18/09: Jurist reports that the specially-established Eritrea-Ethiopia Claims Commission on Monday awarded damages "resulting from violations of international law" that occurred during the nations' 1998-2000 border war. The five-person panel established under the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague awarded USD $174,036,520 to Ethiopia and $161,455,000 to Eritrea, not including an additional $2,065,865 granted to individual Eritrean claimants.

Scholarship: The treatment of prisoners under international law

08/18/09: Nigel Rodley of the University of Essex & Matt Pollard of Amnesty International have published the third edition of The Treatment of Prisoners under International Law. The book incorporates the complementary fields of international humanitarian law and international criminal law, while addressing the problems associated with their interaction with human rights law.

Scholarship: The International Court of Justice and self-defence in international law

08/18/09: James Green of the University of Reading has published The International Court of Justice and Self-Defence in International Law. The book examines the burgeoning relationship between the ICJ and the right of self-defence. It argues that the contribution of the ICJ has been confused and unhelpful, and compounds inadequacies in existing customary international law.

Last defendant sentenced in California terrorist plot

08/18/09: The Miami Herald reports that a man who helped a prison-based Islamic militant group to plot against the US government was sentenced Monday to 70 months in federal prison, prosecutors said. Hammad Samana was sentenced in US District Court in Santa Ana, said US attorney's office spokesman Thom Mrozek. Samana was the last of the four members of the group, Jam'iyyat Ul-Islam Is-Saheeh, or JIS, to be sentenced, and was a "lesser character" in the plot to target Israel supporters, Mrozek said.

Scholarship: The effectiveness of international criminal justice

08/18/09: Cedric Ryngaert of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, has published The Effectiveness of International Criminal Justice. The book aims to identify best practices which may inform the choice between the establishment of international criminal tribunals and recourse to other mechanisms, in an effort to fight impunity for crimes against international law and foster political reconciliation in affected States. HT to International Law Reporter. 

Scholarship: The International Criminal Court and the crime of aggression

08/17/09: The latest issue of the Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law contains a symposium on "The International Criminal Court and the Crime of Aggression." Contents include:

• Henry T. King, Jr., Nuremberg and Crimes Against Peace
• Benjamin B. Ferencz, Ending Impunity for the Crime of Aggression
• Mark A. Drumbl, The Push to Criminalize Aggression: Something Lost Amid the Gains?
• Larry May, Aggression, Humanitarian Intervention, and Terrorism
• Sean D. Murphy, Criminalizing Humanitarian Intervention
• Elise Leclerc-Gagné & Michael Byers, A Question of Intent: The Crime of Aggression and Unilateral Humanitarian Intervention
• Mark S. Ellis, Jurisdictional and Trigger Mechanisms
• David Scheffer, A Pragmatic Approach to Jurisdictional and Definitional Requirements for the Crime of Aggression in the Rome Statute
• Roger S. Clark, Ambiguities in Articles 5(2), 121 and 123 of the Rome Statute
• Report of the Cleveland Experts Meeting: The International Criminal Court and the Crime of Aggression

HT to International Law Reporter.

Charity sues government over 'rendition' of two men handed by British to US forces

08/17/09: The Times (UK) reports that a legal charity is suing the UK Government in connection with the extraordinary rendition of two men arrested in Iraq, passed to the US authorities and held at a detention center in Afghanistan for the past five years. The legal challenge aims to force Britain to reveal the identity of the men — believed to be from Pakistan — and the whereabouts of their families to enable the charity Reprieve to obtain authorization to challenge their detention.