Japan’s Southern Ocean “scientific” whaling program is contrary to international law, the International Court of Justice found last night after a four week trial between Australia and Japan in June last…
In a historic speech to both houses of the Russian parliament on 18 March in support of Russia’s annexation of Crimea, Vladimir Putin drew a bold comparison between the Crimean crisis and the recognition…
The Australian government cannot duck and weave and imply that events on Manus Island involving asylum seekers were lawless acts over which it had no control. A policy aimed at “stopping the boats” does…
The release on Wednesday of the review into the circumstances of how and why the Australian navy repeatedly entered Indonesian waters might have been expected finally to reveal information about Australia’s…
There was once consensus that the earth is flat. Similarly, the international legal situation of Israeli settlements is flatly said to be criminal. The truth is different and more complex. Ben Saul’s recent…
Anyone who watched the ABC Four Corners episode Stone Cold Justice last night could not help but be moved by its vivid portrayal of the plight of many Palestinian boys at the hands of the Israeli army…
The Abbott government has reacted indignantly to allegations by Sudanese asylum seeker Yousif Ibrahim Fasher that asylum seekers were mistreated and had their hands deliberately burnt by Australian Navy…
The Australian government has become an apologist for Israeli war crimes and a wrecker of sacred international humanitarian law principles. Last week, Australia’s foreign minister Julie Bishop asked to…
Australia should respond to the extraordinary actions of the government of Nauru in deporting and terminating the employment of its only magistrate, Peter Law, and denying its Chief Justice, Geoffrey Eames…
Australia has been engaging in “tow-backs” of asylum-seeker boats. This has involved intercepting boats carrying asylum seekers at sea, before they reach Australia, and forcing them to return to Indonesia…
The question of accountability under national law for the wrongs committed by international companies has been debated and litigated for many years in many different courts and across many different countries…
Several issues of international law arise from Timor Leste’s dispute with Australia over the negotiations of a 2006 treaty regulating the exploitation of petroleum and similar resources in the Timor Sea…
Nazih Abdul-Hamed al-Ruqai, or Abu Anas al-Liby, as he is more commonly known, has pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy to kill and maim Americans abroad and to attack US national defence facilities…
All 30 crew of Dutch Greenpeace vessel Arctic Sunrise, including an Australian, have been detained and charged with piracy by Russian authorities, after attempting to board an oil platform in the Arctic…
With the release Friday of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report of the state of climate science, the message has never been clearer: we have to do something to get…
As the drums beat louder for the possibility of Western military intervention in Syria, we have seen discussion of an intervention on moral, strategic and practical grounds. But so far none of the major…
The new asylum seeker arrangement between Australia and Papua New Guinea is almost certain not to comply with Australia’s international law obligations. In favour of the Australian government’s legal position…
The Coalition promises it will “turn back” asylum seeker boats in Australian waters where it is safe to do so if it wins the next election. With Australian border patrols said to be at “breaking point…
1. Julie Bishop: Australia has the right to return asylum seeker boats to Indonesia “We cannot escape from the fact that they are Indonesian boats with Indonesian crews from Indonesian ports. Of course…
Dispatches from The Hague: Tony Press, CEO of the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre at the University of Tasmania, is in The Hague for four weeks of hearings at the International…