Articles for category: English Articles

The EU’s Eastern Border and Inconvenient Truths

The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, alongside with the EU’s confrontation with Russia’s ally Belarus, however, has deeply impacted the securitisation of migration within the EU. Highly politicised conflict-related securitisation narratives have rarely found their way so swiftly into Member States’ domestic migration and asylum laws, leading to open and far-reaching violations of EU and international human rights law. Hardly ever before have ill-defined concepts and indiscriminate assumptions been so broadly accepted and used to shift from an individual-focused approach to blanket measures stigmatising, dehumanising and excluding entire groups. And rarely before have radical changes of this kind received so little criticism - a deeply unsettling and dangerous trend.

27. Februar 2024

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How the EU Death Machine Works

Since 2015, more than 27.500 innocent people died or ‘went missing’ in the Mediterranean. They drowned by themselves thanks to villain smugglers, the Council submits; accountability for the death toll is a complex matter, the Court of Justice finds; besides the geopolitical times are complex – the Commission is right. But what an accident: mare nostrum, a great thoroughfare, turned itself into a racialized grave. Yet, these deaths at EU borders, just as mass abuse and kidnappings by EU-funded and equipped thugs in Libya do not happen by chance. The EU-Belarus border is another locus of torture and violence. All this is a successful implementation of well-designed lawless policies by the Union in collusion with the Member States. In this post, we map key legal techniques deployed by the designers of the EU’s death machine.

27. Februar 2024

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Rethinking the Law and Politics of Migration

2023 was, to put it mildly, a terrible year for (im)migrants and their human rights. With the declared end of the Covid pandemic came an end to the exceptional border policies it had led to which had further restricted already weakened migrants’ rights. Yet governments have largely chosen to replace them with legal frameworks that incorporated many of the same rights negating policies and ideas- except for this time they put them on a permanent legal basis. Liberated from their initial emergency rationales, asylum bans have now joined outsourcing and overpopulated mass detention camps as standard methods of migration governance. What is the role of legal scholarship and discourse at a time where governments seem increasingly comfortable to eschew many long-standing legal rules and norms, often with majority support?

26. Februar 2024

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On Citing Van Gend & Citing it Correctly

There are multiple common misunderstandings that have, over time, taken on the status of established truths. For example, to Sherlock Holmes is often attributed the quote “Elementary, my dear Watson”, which never appears in the Conan Doyle novels. Neither did Voltaire ever confide to anyone that he “disagreed with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it”. In EU law, there exists a similar widespread misconception, albeit tiny in nature. Simultaneously, it does concern the probably most famous ruling ever delivered by the European Court of Justice, so the comparative weight is substantial.

26. Februar 2024

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The Curious Fate of the False Claim of Genocide

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) delivered another blow to Ukraine’s litigation strategy. The ICJ only confirmed its jurisdiction for considering Ukraine’s narrow claim that it had not committed genocide in Donbas. As we have previously argued, given the expected modest outcome of the case for Ukraine, it would make sense for Ukraine to expand its litigation strategy beyond the false claim of genocide. Ukraine may consider lodging a new lawsuit before the ICJ under the Genocide Convention, alleging that Russia breached the Convention by committing genocide against Ukrainians as a protected national group.

24. Februar 2024

Accountability for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine

Two years have passed since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine – an act of aggression which 141 states of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) condemned as such shortly after. This crime of aggression has brought unimaginable suffering to the people of Ukraine. As this blog will highlight in the following, a reform of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) concerning the crime of aggression is necessary and long overdue. The current jurisdictional regime leaves accountability gaps, which have become painfully visible in the past two years. Plausible suggestions for the reform are already out there – it ultimately “all depends on the political will” of the 124 ICC state parties.

24. Februar 2024

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Taking War to Court

A surprise attack launched by Hamas on October 7 ignited yet another period of violence in Israel and Gaza. In response, Israel launched an unprecedented invasion of the Gaza Strip, which resulted in the deaths of over 25,000 Gazans, most of them civilians. While the war does not seem to come close to an end, Israel has meanwhile encountered a different kind of problem; following the October 7 attack, Israel captured hundreds of Hamas fighters. Immediately following the start of the war, voices in Israel urged the government to launch criminal prosecutions of these attackers, with some arguing that Israel should impose the death penalty on the perpetrators.

23. Februar 2024

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A2D for Researchers in Digital Platforms

Over the past decade, access to data (A2D) in digital platforms has emerged as a significant challenge within the research community. Researchers seeking to explore data hosted on these platforms encounter growing obstacles. While legal policies in the US have generally focused on establishing safeguards for researchers against the restrictions on access imposed by private ordering, the recent EU Digital Service Act (DSA) introduces a legal framework, which enables researchers to compel platforms to provide data access. These complementary legal strategies may prove instrumental in facilitating A2D for research purposes.

23. Februar 2024

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Pakistan’s Qazi Court and Who is Afraid of the Cricket Bat

In a fundamental misunderstanding of classical Islamic law, legendary sociologist Max Weber conceptualised it as ‘Qadi justice’ quintessentially characterized as an Islamic judge “sitting under a tree” handing out informal and irrational decisions. Weber may have been incorrect in his characterization of Islamic law, but the Qazi Court of Pakistan appears to fit that mould. In several decisions, the Qazi Court effectively condoned the unconstitutional delay in elections, suppression of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) of Imran Khan’s election campaign, and turned a blind eye towards a campaign of repression by the military-backed establishment. However, the unkindest cut of them all to Pakistan’s democracy and the legitimacy of the elections was the Qazi Court’s decision denying the PTI its electoral symbol: the cricket bat.

22. Februar 2024

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