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Analyzing State Support to Non-State Actors – Part II: Response Options and Conflict Classification
As non-State actors assume an increasingly prominent role in international affairs, State support to them as a strategic tool for advancing political objectives has become more common. Such support presents significant challenges to the clear-eyed application of...
Analyzing State Support to Non-State Actors – Part I: Primary Obligations and Attribution
Today, armed conflicts are frequently characterized by State support to non-State actors as a means of advancing the former’s strategic objectives. For instance, Iran continues to enable Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi, and other militia operations throughout the Middle East...
Deterrence Doesn’t Fly in Space: Nuclear Weapons in Outer Space as a Threat of Force
In an interview with German newspaper Die Welt on Friday April 12th, NATO Secretary-General Rutte expressed concern regarding the potential deployment of Russian nuclear weapons in orbit around Earth. While this possibility had already surfaced in 2024, as reported by...
Lieber Studies Series – Military Investigations
Editors’ note: This post is based on the author’s chapter in Civilian Protection in Armed Conflict: Select Issues (Jelena Pejic and Margaret Kotlik eds. 2025), the eleventh volume of the Lieber Studies Series published with Oxford University Press. Military...
Cross-Border Drone Strikes Against Mexican Drug Cartels
In April 2025, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations Colby Jenkins testified that U.S. forces did not have legal authority to conduct cross-border drone strikes against drug cartels in Mexico even though President Trump had designated several cartels...
The So-Called Principle of Equal Treatment of Belligerents by the Neutral State
Conventional legal wisdom says neutral States owe belligerents equality of treatment (see for example here, p. 282–84, here, p. 237, and here, p. 466). This is largely inaccurate, however. What’s more, it is astonishing how persistently some cling to this erroneous...
Using the Proliferation Security Initiative to Disrupt Iran’s Oil Shipments
Since the Islamic revolution of 1979, the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran has been hostile to the United States and its allies and partners. It is the leading State sponsor of terror in the world. Iran’s nuclear program additionally poses an existential...
Clarifying Neutrality: The Rise of Different Statuses?
With the armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine, one can witness the rebirth of a classical topic of international law: the law of neutrality. Some argue that neutrality is “obsolete.” An alternative perspective is that a new kind of neutrality, called “qualified...
Australian Compensation for War Crimes in Afghanistan: A Rights-Based Approach, Not Military Charity, is Needed
In July 2024, Australia adopted a new legal scheme to compensate victims of war crimes committed by the Australian Defence Force (ADF) in Afghanistan, which was deployed there from 2001 to 2021, including as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance...
Ukraine Symposium – Litigating the Act of Aggression as Human Rights Claims
The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine reports that since February 2022, there have been 40,176 verified civilian casualties caused by the conflict in Ukraine: 12,340 killed and 27,836 injured. The number of combatant casualties is much higher. President...
Al Hassan Symposium – Superior Orders: A (Hopefully) Overlooked Afterthought
Editors’ note: This post is part of a joint symposium hosted by the Armed Groups and International Law and Articles of War blogs. The symposium addresses the ICC’s judgment in the Al Hassan case. The introductory post is available here. In its 822-page judgment in the...
The Conflict in Eastern DRC and the State Responsibility of Rwanda and Uganda
In late January 2025, a rebel alliance involving the militia group M23 seized control over the town of Goma, the provincial capital of North Kivu in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Notwithstanding their declaration of a unilateral ceasefire, at the time of...