Craig Martin

The media are not addressing the legal issues - but the use of military force against cartels within the territory of another state, without its consent, would be a violation of the fundamental prohibition on the use of force in Art. 2(4) of the UN Charter.
www.nytimes.com/2025...

Interesting analysis of a German case that includes charges of using starvation as a method of warfare in Syria, and discussion of its significance as a precedent for this seldom prosecuted war crime:
lieber.westpoint.edu...

Climate | Department of Energy This report evaluates existing peer-reviewed literature and government data on climate impacts of greenhouse gas emissions and provides a critical assessment of the conventional narrative on climate change.

The DOE report: www.energy.gov/topic...

The U.S. Dept. of Energy has released a new report claiming that reducing GHG emissions will do more harm than good - we are truly in an Orwellian phase of disinformation. Link in the comments.

Saint Lucia High Court Decriminalizes Same-Sex Conduct In a landmark victory for human rights, Saint Lucia has decriminalized consensual same-sex conduct. The High Court’s decision strikes down laws that criminalized intimacy between same-sex partners, which are discriminatory and inconsistent with international human rights standards.

Having been raised in St. Lucia, I’m thrilled to see this. Justice is not in retreat everywhere.
www.hrw.org/news/202...

An annotated bibliography on Crimes Against Humanity just posted by Beth Van Schaak - will be hugely helpful to anyone doing work in this area (regrettably, there are so many case studies ongoing now...)
papers.ssrn.com/sol3...

This is just so profoundly perverse and morally wrong - America’s actions on climate are not just harming future generations of Americans, but threatening all of humanity.

Such secrecy and lack of transparency in the development and testing of solar geoengineering is unacceptable - and highlights again why stronger governance is needed:
www.politico.com/new...

The irony that Republican administrations are banning books, like 1984, that the CIA used to smuggle into Warsaw Pact countries to undermine communist totalitarianism.

www.nytimes.com/2025...

In reporting on the ICJ Advisory Opinion on Climate Change, the media keep parroting that it is "non-binding" - but this reflects a misunderstanding - there is no binding order, but the many fundamental obligations identified by the court are all very much binding!!
Journalists, please note.

Canada’s remarkable joint statement on the suffering in Gaza is a good first step Monday’s letter is evidence that key members of the international community are not content to stand by as the cruelty continues

Surprisingly powerful and scathing piece by former foreign minister and former attorney general, supporting Canada’s condemnation of Israeli conduct in Gaza:
www.theglobeandmail....

In sum, a more powerful articulation of obligations, duties, and legal consequences for violation, than many likely expected or hoped for - and many states (particularly the US under this Administration) have to now be on notice that they are in violation of these obligations. 17/17.

And finally, breaches entail the full range of legal consequences, including duties of performance, cessation of wrongful conduct and guarantees of non-repetition, duties of reparation for the injured, which may include restitution, compensation, or satisfaction...16/17

Even more powerful, the court held that the underlying obligations to protect the climate system are erga omnes obligations, and thus any state may invoke responsibility of another state for violation, even if only an injured state may claim reparations...15/17

Moreover, the issue of causation is primarily related to questions of reparation, not to the determination of responsibility itself - and existing standards relating to nexus are sufficient for establishing causation in the context of climate change;...14/17

Strikingly, the court affirmed that a breach of any of these obligations not only constitutes an internationally wrongful act entailing responsibility, but that the primary wrongful act is the failure to protect the climate system from harm;...13/17

This creates obligations on states to respect, protect, and ensure effective enjoyment of human rights by taking necessary measures to protect the climate system - which includes mitigation, adaptation, and implementation of domestic law to regulate private entities;...12/17

States also have obligations under other environmental treaties and UNCLOS, as well as under human rights treaties - court affirmed that the right to healthy and sustainable environment, including climate, is a precondition for the enjoyment of all other rights, including right to life;...11/17

The duty to cooperate under customary international law is fundamental to the response to climate change, and is intrinsically linked to the duty to prevent harm, requiring good faith, continuous and sustained forms of collective action, applying to all states (subject only to CBDR);...10/17

This obligation also requires states to actively pursue and utilize available scientific information to assess harm probability, and the duty of due diligence increases as scientific certainty regarding risk increases;...9/17

Fulfillment of this obligation of prevention includes regulatory mitigation mechanisms for deep, rapid, and sustained GHG emissions reduction, adaptation measures, and effective enforcement against private operators;...8/17

On the issue of customary international law obligations, these include a duty to prevent significant harm to the climate system, which duty applies to the harm caused by GHG emissions, and states must use all means at their disposal to prevent such harm; ... 7/17

Each state also has binding obligations on adaptation, requiring adaptation planning and implementation; and states have an obligation to cooperate in good faith and with due diligence; and developed states have obligations to provide financing to developing states; ... 6/17

There are also expansive binding obligations under Paris (dispelling the persistent myth that Paris is not a binding treaty), including to prepare and communicate NDCs, and to ensure NDCs are increasingly ambitious, thus requiring mitigation measures;... 5/17

And particularly striking, states have robust mitigation obligations under UNFCCC, including, for Annex I states, to adopt national policies and take measures to limit GHG emissions; and all states have obligations to publish updates on national GHG emissions ... 4/17

These obligations include both obligations or result and of conduct, the latter including robust due diligence obligations, and under both CBDR and Annex I of UNFCCC, developed countries have the greater obligations; ...3/17

The violation of which will attract the full panoply of remedies under the law of state responsibility, with causation posing no particular obstacle.

On treaty obligations, there is an expansive reading of the binding obligations of parties to the UNFCCC, Kyoto, and Paris, ...2/17

Here are a few of the more striking aspects of the ICJ Advisory Opinion on the Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change, after a quick read, (thread) - though in short, this is a powerful articulation of a range of binding erga omnes obligations under both treaty and custom...1/17

The ICJ has issued its advisory opinion on the obligations of states in in respect of climate change. After a quick review, it takes an expansive interpretation and is hugely important. More to follow - here is the decision:
www.icj-cij.org/site...

This is noteworthy - not only was solar the top source of energy for the entire EU, but the 3 next in line were all carbon free, and coal was a mere 6%:
e360.yale.edu/digest...