This week’s General Assembly’s resolution welcoming the International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion on Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change provides significant guidance. It calls upon all States to ‘comply with their respective obligations under international law to ensure the protection of the climate system and other parts of the environment from anthropogenic
EJIL: Talk!
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From Opinion to Action: The General Assembly Votes to Operationalize the ICJ’s Climate Advisory Opinion
On 20 May 2026, the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution A/80/L.65 welcoming the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change. The draft, tabled by Vanuatu and a cross-regional Core Group attracted 90 co-sponsors and was adopted by a recorded vote of 141…
From Option to Methodology: The ILC’s Missed Opportunity on Judicial Precedent
The International Law Commission (ILC), during its seventy-sixth session in May 2025, provisionally adopted the first-reading draft conclusions on Subsidiary means for the determination of rules of international law. Among these, Draft Conclusion 6 [7] addresses the use of judicial decisions, provisionally stating:
Draft conclusion 6 [7] Absence of legally binding precedent in international law …
Announcements: CfP Journal of International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict; CfP European Yearbook of Constitutional Law
By Mary Guest
1. Call for Papers: Journal of International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict. The Journal of International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (JILPAC / HuV) invites submissions for its second issue of 2026 on the “Enforcement of International Humanitarian Law Beyond the Battlefield”. The issue seeks to explore sanctions as tools of IHL enforcement, frozen…
Two Weeks in Review: 4—15 May 2026
The last two weeks have seen commentators range across a number of topics and jurisdictions. The US-Israeli war in Iran has remained in focus, with the use of US bases abroad raising questions of neutrality and the interdiction of Iranian oil tankers novel question of the laws of the sea and naval warfare. The European…
Use of third-state air bases by the United States in the conflict with Iran
The United States has used air bases located in third states in the armed conflict with Iran that began on 28 February 2026. Yet, the action of the United States in Iran may be qualified as aggression, given that neither the conditions of self-defense nor an authorization by the Security Council appear to be…
The ECtHR’s First Victimisation Judgment… 50 years after the 1975 Equal Pay Directive
In December 2025, in Ortega Ortega v. Spain, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), for the first time, found that unremedied employer retaliation against a sex discrimination complainant amounted to sex discrimination. The domestic courts upheld a woman’s dismissal after she complained about unequal pay. The ECtHR found a violation of Article 14 with…
The Twice-Coerced Zambia and the Synergy Between Human Rights Violations and Prohibited Intervention
Last week, like many other scholars and activists, I was due to participate in RightsCon, the leading conference on human rights in the digital age. This year it was supposed to take place in Zambia, with thousands of participants. The conference is organised by Access Now. They had for many months directly cooperated with…
Functional Immunity and “Covert Violent Acts”: The BGH’s Progressive Development of CIL in the Nord Stream Case
On 10 December 2025, the German Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) delivered its order (StB 60/25, English press release available here) in the criminal case against Serhiy K., accused of participating in the destruction of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines in September 2022. K.’s defence raised functional immunity as…
Diriyah Meets Washington: The IMF’s Institutional Reform Dilemma
Amid uncertainty over the continuation of the war in the Middle East, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) held its spring meetings from 13 to 18 April 2026 in Washington, D.C. As expected, the economic turbulences created by the conflict dominated the proceedings. The IMF promised to step up its support for struggling countries. In the…