International Law Archive

Amid the torrent of news this week regarding multiple brewing crises from North Korea to Venezuela, one item of seemingly minor importance managed to filter through. It was a personnel matter, a bureaucrat’s decision, but one that highlights the magnitude of the current struggle to develop an international system for conflict resolution, accountability and justice. On Sunday, the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria confirmed that its most prominent member, Carla del Ponte, had resigned from the body. The resignation points to a major flaw in the system: the ability of powerful players, in this case Russia, to thwart […]

Few noticed the negotiations at the United Nations for a legally binding prohibition on nuclear weapons, until they were quickly completed last month. On July 7, 122 states voted in favor of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which prohibits parties from engaging in activities related to the development, deployment or use of nuclear weapons, and lays out pathways to eventually disarm those states that possess them. The ban is likely to reinforce existing divides between countries that rely on nuclear weapons for their security, and those that don’t—an outcome for which proponents and opponents of the treaty […]