Dr Benjamin Thorne

You know who is getting things done today? ICC appeals court judges.

They just released a decision keeping former Philippine President Rodrigo Dutertein custody.

The online banner shows a Call for Papers: "New Approaches to the Study of the ICTY Archives". Conference dates: October 15-16, 2026 at the University of Graz. Application deadline: March 31, 2026.

📣 #CfP: "New Approaches to the Study of the ICTY Archives"

Workshop @uni-graz.at, Oct 15–16, 2026. We welcome proposals on tribunal truths, digital infrastructure & memory politics. Exploring digital coloniality & computational methods.
📅 Deadline: March 31, 2026
➡️ leibniz-ios.de/en/knowledge...

Targeted charges against Duterte at the ICC Having held a week of hearings at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, judges will now decide if former president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Roa Duterte, will go to trial for crimes against...

🇵🇭 #Philippines - Having held a week of hearings at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, judges will now decide if former president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Roa Duterte, will go to trial for crimes against humanity.

www.justiceinfo.net/en/155870-ta...

#RodrigoDuterte #ICC

Even by Marko's standards, this is 'Prompt'.

The American-Israeli Strikes on Iran are (Again) Manifestly Illegal After weeks of threats, the United States, joined by Israel, has launched military strikes against Iran. It remains to be seen whether these strikes will be fairly limited, or are the opening of an ex...

Unsurprisingly, Marko has already written something… /3 www.ejiltalk.org/the-american...

Rio Police Chief & Congressman Convicted in Assassination of Socialist Rio Councilwoman Marielle Franco The court found that the former Chief of Rio de Janeiro Civil Police Rivaldo Barbosa, Brazilian Congressman Chiquinho Brazão, and his brother, Rio State Auditor General Domingos Brazão, were responsib...

"Today, the Brazilian Supreme Court announced that they had convicted the masterminds behind the assassination of socialist Rio de Janeiro City Councilwoman Marielle Franco guilty on all counts."

massive news in Brazil today, writeup by @mikeelk.bsky.social

paydayreport.com/rio-police-c...

Very important point

Hi Nikki,

Thank you very much for confirming which is really appreciated.

Hi Nikki,

Hope you are well.

This talk sounds really interesting, and I was possibly going to recommend it to some of my final year ICL/J students. Is the time of the event South African Standard Time (UCT+2)?

To start the academic year @uctlaw.bsky.social A/Prof Holly Porter (University of Cambridge) will be speaking on "Rebel Sex: male combatants and desire in coercive circumstances”.

Register below to join us online

forms.office.com/Pages/Respon...

@cclas2025.bsky.social @calsza.bsky.social

Sudan: ‘Hallmarks of genocide’ found in El Fasher, UN investigators detail mass killings and ethnic targeting The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) carried out ethnically targeted killings, widespread sexual violence and enforced disappearances during their late-October takeover of El Fasher in Sudan’s Darfur region...

The UN Independent Int'l Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan: the Rapid Support Forces carried out ethnically targeted killings, widespread sexual violence and enforced disappearances in #ElFasher, Sudan, bearing "hallmarks of genocide" against the Zaghawa and Fur communities.
news.un.org/en/story/202...

Promises, Processes, and Pitfalls of International Criminal Justice Today - www.humanrightshere.com/post/promise...

UN approves 40-member scientific panel on the impact of artificial intelligence over US objections The U.N. General Assembly has voted overwhelmingly to approve a 40-member global scientific panel on the impacts and risks of artificial intelligence, with the United States strongly objecting.

"UN approves 40-member scientific panel on the impact of artificial intelligence over US objections" apnews.com/article/un-u...

In Trump’s war on global justice, court staff and U.N. face terrorist‑grade sanctions Trump’s sanctions on U.N. expert Francesca Albanese and the International Criminal Court froze assets and disrupted war crimes investigations. The clash is part of the broader campaign by his administ...

Francesca Albanese and various judges and prosecutors of the International Criminal Court "now sit on the U.S. Treasury Department’s Specially Designated Nationals list, alongside suspected al Qaeda terrorists, Mexican drug traffickers and North Korean arms dealers".

www.reuters.com/investigatio...

France dumps Zoom and Teams as Europe seeks digital autonomy from the US European governments are moving away from U.S. tech giants, opting for domestic or open-source alternatives.

Around Europe, governments and institutions are seeking to reduce their use of digital services from U.S. Big Tech companies and turning to domestic or free alternatives.

⚖️How should international law handle accountability for harmful cyber & AI operations?
The ESIL-supported event "𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗧𝗲𝗰𝗵𝗻𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗜𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗟𝗲𝗴𝗮𝗹 𝗔𝗰𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗻𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆" will convene scholars and practitioners in Perugia to tackle the question in October 2026.

Discover more at lnkd.in/dNEAKVyT

Fela Kuti becomes first African to get Grammys Lifetime Achievement Award Award for late Afrobeat pioneer and political radical is the 'anti-establishment being recognised by the establishment'.

Award for late Afrobeat pioneer and political radical is the 'anti-establishment being recognised by the establishment'.

Beyond Residual Functions: The IRMCT, the ‘Stateless Eight’, and the Human Rights Obligations of Security Council Subsidiaries On 10 December 2025, the Security Council once again debated the future of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT). As in previous sessions, delegations diverged sharply in...

The morning residual mechanism pre-yoga read:
www.ejiltalk.org/beyond-resid...

Universal Jurisdiction as Justice: the Lumbala trial in question The trial of Lumbala before a Paris court ended last year with a heavy conviction. It raises issues relating to universal jurisdiction trials in an even more acute manner, given that the defendant ref...

From @justiceinfo.bsky.social: “The trial of Congolese Roger Lumbala before a Paris court ended last year with a heavy conviction. It raises issues relating to procedure and principles of law observed in universal jurisdiction trials” www.justiceinfo.net/en/154432-un...

Justice Update – Survivors @ The ICC We sat down with torture survivors from Kenya, Venezuela and Ukraine to ask them what their experience engaging with the International Criminal Court and seeking justice is. Check out all the backg…

OUT NOW 🎙️
How do survivors see the International Criminal Court?
At the ASP last year, we sat down with three survivors of torture: Oleksandr Maksymenko from Ukraine, Elizabeth Atieno from Kenya, and Venezuelan Luis Carlos Díaz

www.asymmetricalhaircuts.com/episodes/jus...

This quote by Ha'aretz journalist Nir Hasson is my opinion one of the most profound things written about the way many Israelis experienced Gaza since October 2023

A great opportunity for students from Palestine to undertake fully-funded masters programs at QUB: www.qub.ac.uk/Research/GRI...

Call for papers AfterlifeConference.pdf | Powered by Box

What are the afterlives of atrocity tribunals?

What do contested legacies mean for afterlives of defendants, judgements, witnesses, and archives?

See this fascinating and exciting #CallforPapers from Mark Drumbl, Maria Elander, and @rachelkillean.bsky.social !

wlu.app.box.com/s/ubi9i56841...

Episode 149 – Might versus Right in Venezuela ? with Brian Finucane and Ignacio Jovtis Maduro kidnapped by the US – what are the implications for accountability for human rights violations in Venezuela and for peace and security in Latin America. With Brian Finucane and Ignacio…

There's much commentary on Venezuela Maduro and international law. We focus on potential accountability routes, after examining illegality of US actions + immunity issues. www.asymmetricalhaircuts.com/episodes/epi... Thanks @bcfinucane.bsky.social and Ignacio for making time.

You can (and should) be able oppose dictatorship and drug trafficking while also opposing:

- violations of intl law
- human rights violations
- kidnapping
- the theft of natural resources
- illegal war
- violent regime change

What 🇺🇸 is doing in #Venezuela is all of the above.

This might be a good moment for Europeans to quickly start thinking about how much we care about international law banning offensive warfare when
it doesn't happen in our immediate neighbourhood, and the affected country is not a democracy.

This! 👇

Thank you very much for your kind words on my piece.

Artificial Sanctions: Potential Implications of US Sanctions on the ICC’s use of AI and Digital Evidence [Benjamin Thorne is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Criminal Law at the University of Reading] Almost 3 weeks into Donald Trump’s second term as US President and one could have been forgiven fo…

While I was never a fan of Project Harmony for a variety of reasons, namely its encroachment with Microsoft, as well as broader concerns about AI (not all digital evidence obviously), this is a good recap by @benjaminthorne.bsky.social of the impact of sanctions on evidence gathering / preservation