The United Nations Conference on the Representation of States in their Relations with International Organizations, held in Vienna from February 4 to March 14, 1975, adopted by a vote of 57 in favor to one against, with fifteen abstentions, a new international convention governing the status and functions of missions and delegations of states to international organizations and conferences.

Grenada is one of seven small and newly independent island nations in the Caribbean sharing a common cultural and political background and a close association within the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS). Because of their small size and common background, these seven nations share a common market, a common currency and to some extent common administrative, diplomatic, judicial and defense functions within the OECS framework. Although independent, in many respects they have closer ties than, for example, members of the OAS or even the EEC.

A quarter of a century has now elapsed since the end of World War II. During that time concerted efforts have been made to bring to justice those responsible for the appalling atrocities committed in the name of the Nazi forces. While many of the principal authors of war crimes have been punished, some of them are known to be still at large. Either by managing to escape detection or by fleeing to a country of haven, they have successfully avoided prosecution and punishment. In other cases 1 judicial proceedings have not yet been completed against persons suspected of war crimes or crimes against humanity.

In addressing oneself to the subject of “diversity and uniformity in the law of nations,” it is well to suggest at the outset that these two attributes are perennially present not only in the international legal system but in many, if not all, legal systems. This is a statement of the obvious, but it merits some attention at a time when there is such a spate of writing about the changes in international law which are said to be required to meet the needs of an international society which is itself experiencing great changes.

On Sunday evening of March 31, 1968, millions of Americans watched President Lyndon Johnson announce a major bombing halt in the hostilities in Viet-Nam and his intention not to seek re-election as President. At the same time a reception was being held in the United States Ambassador’s official residence in Mexico City in honor of Vice President Hubert Humphrey, who took leave from the many guests to listen to the President’s address.

The United Nations functions in the main by persuasion rather than by coercion. The persuasive influence of its resolutions are powerful in proportion as they have the opinion of governments and peoples behind them, but the mobilization of such an opinion depends in no small degree upon the conviction of all the Members that resolutions are within the competence of United Nations organs. That competence is measured by the concept of domestic jurisdiction. The sentiment of nationalism is such that if many states believe a resolution directed toward a particular state constitutes an intervention in matters which are essentially within its domestic jurisdiction, the state addressed and other states may so resent the resolution that its effect, far from mobilizing world public opinion, will tend to disintegrate the United Nations.

The issue of whether and how the trading system should deal with social and economic policies not strictly within the ambit of the WTO has been with us at least since the inception of the GATT in 1947-1948. It is not a new question. The problem, however, has become even more vexing since the 1970s, as tariffs became less important in trading relationships and governments struggled to respond to a proliferation of nontariff barriers to trade. I will argue, in this Afterword, that the question is not whether the WTO should or should not deal with the “trade and … ” subjects—trade and environment, trade and public health, trade and labor rights, trade and human rights, trade and competition, trade and investment, and trade and intellectual property, to name a few. It already does and has done so, in many respects, since 1948. The question I would pose is this: how should these so-called nontrade subjects be dealt with within the WTO system? And who should define the scope of WTO recognition/cognizance of these subjects: WTO member governments (the “Members”) or the quasi-judicial bodies of the dispute settlement system (the panels and the Appellate Body)?

The “Hostages” case was surely one of the most remarkable ever to be presented to the World Court for a decision. And among its remarkable features, none is more striking than that prior to delivery of the Court’s Judgment the United States attempted to rescue the hostages by force. This attempt to accomplish by force what the United States had sought to achieve through the judicial process raised profound issues regarding the relationship between the use of force and adjudication, the purpose and effect of interim measures of protection, and the role of the Court in the contemporary international order. This article will analyze these issues in the light of the Court’s treatment of the rescue attempt.

The Franco-Turkish dispute over the Sanjak of Alexandretta presents another notable case of the consequences of the acceptance of an imperfect settlement at Lausanne between the Allies and Turkey following the first World War. The most important dispute that arose from the Lausanne settlement related to the Vilayat of Mosul, a district comprising the whole northern section of Iraq and valuable for its oil and strategic position, in which Turkey challenged Great Britain's interests and prestige in Iraq.That dispute was successfully settled by the Council of the League of Nations in 1925 in favour of Iraq. Ten years later another dispute arose from the imperfect settlement of Lausanne which concerned this time Turkey's frontiers with Syria. By then the international situation had deteriorated and the League's prestige was undermined. France, the Mandatory Power for Syria, was in need of Turkey's friendship and consequently her bargaining position was weaker. The dispute was eventually won by Turkey.

The advisory opinion handed down by the International Court of Justice on December 15, 1989, Applicability of Article VI, Section 22, of the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations, has revived the topicality of the possible dual application of the Court’s advisory procedure. This procedure, provided for in Article 96 of the Charter, is governed by Articles 65-68 of the Statute of the Court.

The treaty of peace between Germany and the Allied and Associated Powers, signed at Versailles on the 28th of June, 1919, formally sanctioned the principle that individuals belonging to the armed or naval forces of the adversary, as well as his civil functionaries, are responsible under military law for offenses against the laws and customs of war and may be tried and punished for such offences.

The treaty declares that Germany recognizes “the right of the Allied and Associated Powers to bring before military tribunals persons accused of having committed acts in violation of the laws and customs of war.” It adds: “Such persons shall, if found guilty, be sentenced to punishments laid down by law. This provision will apply notwithstanding any proceedings or prosecution before a tribunal in Germany or in the territory of her allies.”

The treaty further requires Germany to hand over to the Allied and Associated Powers, or to such of them as shall so request, all persons accused of having committed an act in violation of the laws and customs of war, who are specified either by name or by the rank, office, or employment which they held under the German authorities, and to furnish “all documents and information of every kind, the production of which may be considered necessary to the full knowledge of the incriminating facts, the discovery of offenders, and the just appreciation of responsibility.

Attribution of state-sponsored cyberattacks can be difficult, but the significant uptick in attributions in recent years shows that attribution is far from impossible. After several years of only sporadic attributions, Western governments in 2017 began attributing cyberattacks to other governments more frequently and in a more coordinated fashion. But nongovernment actors have more consistently attributed harmful cyber activity to state actors. Although not without risks, these nongovernmental attributions play an important role in the cybersecurity ecosystem. They are often faster and more detailed than governmental attributions, and they fill gaps where governments choose not to attribute. Companies and think tanks have recently proposed centralizing attribution of state-sponsored cyberattacks in a new international entity. Such an institution would require significant start-up time and resources to establish efficacy and credibility. In the meantime, the current system of public-private attributions, decentralized and messy though it is, has some underappreciated virtues—ones that counsel in favor of preserving some multiplicity of attributors even alongside any future attribution entity.

Access to an effective remedy is part of the third pillar of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (Guiding Principles). It should require states to provide access to judicial remedies for human rights violations, even those that have occurred outside the territory of the state by a corporation domiciled in that state, especially where claimants “cannot access [their] home State courts regardless of the merits of the claim.” While the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. may seem to overwhelm or even drown some of the expectations of such remedies within the United States, the case law in the rest of the world is unlikely to be greatly affected by the ruling due to the jurisdictional and legal system foundations of other states. This article will examine the main case law and judicial remedies sought across the world, with a special emphasis on Europe, where the majority of large non-U.S. transnational corporations have their headquarters.