US says combatants on both sides of Sudan conflict have committed war crimes
Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday announced his determination that combatants on both sides of Sudan’s ongoing civil conflict have committed war crimes in recent months, and that some had also committed crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing. Since mid-April, members of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia [...]
Lawrence Wilkerson is a retired United States Army Colonel who held key roles in government, including serving as Chief of Staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell from 2002 to 2005. Wilkerson played a role in preparing US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s presentation in 2003 at the United Nations in making the case for [...]
Beat the Drum for War: Vladimir Putin Through a Middle Eastern and Arab Looking Glass
The Russian-Ukrainian crisis started to deteriorate in early 2021 when Ukraine arrested pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk on allegations of conspiring a coup d’etat, and Russia initiated military exercises near the Ukrainian border. Russia is the second-largest oil producer, trailing only the United States, and the third-leading oil exporter, behind Saudi Arabia and the United Arab [...]
Samuel Moyn’s Unprincipled Attack on Human Rights Giant Michael Ratner Is Shameful
Samuel Moyn’s vicious and unprincipled attack on Michael Ratner, one of the finest human rights attorneys of our time, was published in the New York Review of Books (NYRB) on September 1. Moyn singles out Ratner as a whipping boy to support his own bizarre theory that punishing war crimes prolongs war by making it [...]
Americans were shocked by Wednesday’s storming of the US Capitol by the Proud Boys and other rightwing mobs and militia. International observers and some U.S. politicians began referring to the country as a “banana republic” – a derogatory statement referring to banana-producing countries in Central America with histories of unstable and corrupt governments. Latin Americans [...]
Supreme Court rules states can restrict electoral college voters
The US Supreme Court unanimously upheld states’ “faithless elector” laws on Monday, which either penalize or remove presidential electors who do not vote for the candidate they pledged to support. The court decided both challenges to “faithless elector” laws on the same grounds. Currently, 32 states and the District of Columbia have “faithless elector” laws. [...]
Former Secretary of State: Trump has 'drifted away' from Constitution
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said Sunday that President Donald Trump has “drifted away” from the Constitution. Powell, a Republican who served in George W. Bush’s administration, endorsed presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden in the interview. “We have a Constitution. And we have to follow that Constitution. And the President has drifted away from [...]
Supreme Court asked to decide whether electors must vote for state popular vote winner
Three 2016 electors from Washington state petitioned the US Supreme Court on Monday to decide whether the state has the power to enforce how an elector casts their ballot and to fine that elector for voting with discretion. In re Guerra is being appealed from the Supreme Court of Washington, which upheld $1,000 fines on [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Megan A. Fairlie of the Florida International University College of Law discusses the value of preserving an important, unsung hero of the State Department... Earlier this month, former State Department Deputy Beth van Schaack first reported on...
The lead-up to the Iraq War began in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. During President George W. Bush's national address on the night of the attacks, he announced that the US would not distinguish between terrorists...
