Law students and JURIST special guests comment on their legal experiences around the world. http://jurist.org/dateline JURISTremove_this@pitt.edu Jonathan Cohen, Pitt Law '12, studied in Jerusalem as part of a program hosted by the Touro College Law Center and sponsored by Pitt's Center for International Legal Education. He writes about the differences between Israel and the United States in the areas of judicial appointments and judicial review... This June, I took courses at the Agron Guest House in the heart of Jerusalem while on a study abroad program hosted by Touro College Law Center. I feel fortunate that I had a group of professors who clung tightly to the idea that "if you don't learn anything outside of the classroom, there is no reason to be in another http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/israel-judicial-appointments-standing-and-political-questions.php 2010-07-30T11:37:19-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/israel-judicial-appointments-standing-and-political-questions.php Joseph Schaeffer Megan McKee, Pitt Law '12, is currently an intern with Montreal's Social Justice Committee (SJC). She writes about the SJC's advocacy for corporate accountability in the extractive industries... In May I began working for the Social Justice Committee (SJC) of Montreal as a corporate accountability intern. The SJC is an independent human rights organization promoting education and advocacy in the areas of global poverty and inequality. In terms of corporate accountability, the SJC is currently advocating for passage of Bill C-300, also known the Corporate Accountability of Mining, Oil, and Gas Corporations in Developing Countries Act. This private member's bill currently before the Canadian parliament seeks to create a mechanism http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/canada-corporate-accountability-for-extractive-industry.php 2010-07-21T11:23:58-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/canada-corporate-accountability-for-extractive-industry.php Joseph Schaeffer Andrew Vogeler, Pitt Law '12 and Nordenberg Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative Private and International Private Law in Hamburg, Germany, writes about attempts to harmonize contract law in the European Union... Lately, there has been much debate over the proper direction of the European Union in response to the ongoing fiscal and monetary crises. These debates have well demonstrated the difficulty of bringing together a number of economies, and the particular problem of establishing the political arrangements necessary to do so successfully. As a Nordenberg Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law in Hamburg, I have had the chance to study a http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/germany-european-contract-law-harmonization.php 2010-07-15T15:04:49-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/germany-european-contract-law-harmonization.php Joseph Schaeffer Ingrid Burke, Pitt Law '11, writes on the detention of Peter Erlinder, law professor and defense counsel at the ICTR, in light of her recent visit to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda... In a recent piece for JURIST Dateline, I wrote about a visit that I had made to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania, as part of Professor Charles Jalloh's International Criminal Law Seminar. At that time, I argued in favor of the transfer of lower to mid-level ICTR cases to Rwanda's national jurisdiction largely on the basis of Rwanda's improved fair-trial standards and due process guarantees. In light of the recent arrest and http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/rwanda-peter-erlinders-detention.php 2010-07-07T15:01:52-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/07/rwanda-peter-erlinders-detention.php Joseph Schaeffer Ingrid Burke, Pitt Law '11, traveled to the ICTR in Tanzania with Professor Charles Jalloh through Pitt Law's Center for International Legal Education... As part of a group of Pitt Law students, I recently had the opportunity to spend three days observing the inner workings of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania. During my visit, I met numerous ICTR representatives, including members of the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP), the Registry, and various defense teams and judicial chambers. However, I was most excited by the opportunity to meet with Prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow and defense counsel representatives because of my curiosity about the status of the http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/tanzania-transferring-cases-from-the-ictr-to-rwanda-courts.php 2010-06-30T10:32:28-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/tanzania-transferring-cases-from-the-ictr-to-rwanda-courts.php Joseph Schaeffer Brittany Conkle, Pitt Law '10, recently visited the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania, as part of a program sponsored by the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and the Center for International Legal Education. She shares her perspective... I would be deliberately nonchalant if I neglected to say how excited I was to meet with Chief Prosecutor Hassan B. Jallow on our class trip to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Although other activities were planned, I knew from the minute the meeting was announced that it would be one of the highlights of my trip. It isn't every day that a person has the opportunity http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/tanzania-meeting-the-ICTR-chief-prosecutor.php 2010-06-28T10:19:22-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/tanzania-meeting-the-ICTR-chief-prosecutor.php Joseph Schaeffer Kristine Long, Jurist Student Staff Association (JSSA) President, Pitt Law '11, attended the First Annual JSSA Debate... The first debate hosted by the JURIST Student Staff Association concerned the heated topics of terrorism and national security. These topics have became increasingly relevant to Americans in the wake of 9/11, as the United States responded to the threat of terrorism by changing airline security procedures, drafting and passing the Patriot Act, and launching Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. In the nearly 10 years since 9/11, the War on Terror has impacted every American, and, as such, the debate was both timely and important. The two participants, Jeffrey Addicott, Director of the http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/pittsburgh-terrorism-and-the-law.php 2010-06-25T11:16:57-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/pittsburgh-terrorism-and-the-law.php Joseph Schaeffer Sara Burhan Abdullah, Pitt Law LLM '08 and JD '11, was an observer to the Iraqi Constitutional Review Committee through the University of Utah Quinney School of Law's Global Justice Project: Iraq. She shares her experiences with the issue of environmental protection in Iraq... The environmental catastrophe caused by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico reminded me of a vigorous debate concerning environmental protection between members of the Iraqi government and representatives of the autonomous Kurdish Region. As an extern student in Iraq in Summer 2009, I worked closely and regularly with the Iraqi Parliament and attended the meetings of the Constitutional Review Committee ("CRC"), where I had http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/iraq-environmental-policy.php 2010-06-18T11:39:55-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/iraq-environmental-policy.php Joseph Schaeffer Ekaterina Sivolobova, a student in the Faculty of Law at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, writes about the problem of legal impunity in Uruguay... Without a doubt, legal impunity is a problem affecting Latin America. Most South American states have issued amnesty laws that prevent the investigation of human rights violations committed during dictatorships. Although some of these amnesty laws have already been nullified, others remain valid, allowing human rights violations to go unpunished. One such case is Uruguay's amnesty law. The amnesty law of Uruguay, Law 15.848, is also known as the "Ley de Caducidad" (Expiry Law) and was enacted in December 1986 as a result of an http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/uruguay-approaches-to-the-expiry-law.php 2010-06-10T17:21:25-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/06/uruguay-approaches-to-the-expiry-law.php Joseph Schaeffer Kristine Long, Pitt Law '11, traveled to Belgrade, Serbia, for a pre-moot prior to the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot in Vienna, Austria... The conflict between Kosovo and Serbia is so contentious that it seemed appropriate to follow my recent article about Kosovo's independence with an article from the Serbian perspective. Luckily, I had the opportunity to travel with my moot team to Belgrade, where the University of Belgrade School of Law hosts one of the more prestigious pre-moots prior to the Vis competition in Vienna. Although I already begun to learn about Kosovo in the United States, my time in Belgrade provided me with first-hand experience as http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/05/serbia-belgrade.php 2010-05-27T10:36:44-05:00 http://jurist.org/dateline/2010/05/serbia-belgrade.php Joseph Schaeffer