Anthony Clark Arend

Twenty-years ago– on August 2, 1990– Iraq invaded Kuwait.  Undoubtedly, Saddam Hussein expected nothing more than a desultory, toothless response from the international community– especially the United Nations. Such had been the case since the founding of the Organization in 1945. With the exception of its response to North Korean’s invasion of the South in 1950, the United Nations had …

A step in the right direction . . . .The Voice of America reports:
A landmark treaty banning cluster bombs became binding international law Sunday.
The Convention on Cluster Munitions prohibits signatory countries from using, producing or transferring the weapons, which scatter hundreds of small bomblets over a wide area.
The scattered ordnance can remain armed for years and often wounds civilians long …

The BBC reports:
Sudan says it has instructed UN peacekeepers in Darfur to inform Khartoum of all their travel plans.
Government spokesman Rabie Abdelati told the Reuters news agency that the UN had failed to keep the peace at refugee camps in the western region.
Peacekeepers will now have their bags searched at airports, and will have to inform the Sudanese government before …

Over at the Huffington Post, Lt. Col. (ret) William Astore raises an interesting challenge. Astore writes:
A subtle change has been happening right before the eyes of Americans. Our troops are being told they’re no longer primarily citizen-soldiers or citizen-airmen; they’re being told they’re warriors. Indeed, they’re reminded of this linguistic turn in “creeds” that many of them (and often …

The UN News Centre reports:
30 July 2010 – The Security Council today voted to extend by another year the mandate of the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur, where violence once again rocked a large camp for people uprooted by the conflict in the war-ravaged Sudanese region.In its unanimously adopted resolution, the Council strongly condemned all attacks on …

In case you missed this . . .my friend, Cornell Professor Gustavo Flores-Macías, had an outstanding op-ed in the New York Times on how to address the drug war in Mexico. He writes:
BOTH the United States and Mexico have approached the war on Mexican drug cartels with Colombia in mind.
Washington’s Merida Initiative, loosely modeled on its Plan Colombia antidrug campaign …

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Conversations with America: The New START Treaty

Office of the Spokesman of the State Department

Washington, DC

July 29, 2010
Ellen Tauscher, Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security, will hold a conversation with Steven Pifer, Director of the Brookings Institution’s Arms Control Initiative, on the New START Treaty. The discussion will be moderated by Philip J. Crowley, Assistant Secretary of State, …

The International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion on Kosovo’s Declaration of Independence

FPC Briefing
Harold Hongju Koh
Legal Adviser of the Department of State
U.S. Ambassador to Kosovo Christopher Dell
Foreign Press Center
Washington, DC
July 22, 2010
4:00PM EDT
MODERATOR: Good afternoon and welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center. This afternoon we are pleased to have the legal advisor of the Department of State Harold Koh, …