Jack Matlock: Ukraine Crisis Should Have Been Avoided

Jack Matlock: Ukraine Crisis Should Have Been Avoided

Jack F. Matlock, Jr. May 27, 2022 An avoidable crisis that was predictable, actually predicted, willfully precipitated, but easily resolved by the application of common sense, writes Jack Matlock, the last U.S. ambassador to the U.S.S.R. We are being told each day that war may be imminent in Ukraine. Russian troops, we are told, are […]

Joint Article by Chinese and Russian Ambassadors: Respecting People’s Democratic Rights

Joint Article by Chinese and Russian Ambassadors: Respecting People’s Democratic Rights

The embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the United States of America 10 December 2021 This Joint Article was published on ”The National Interest”. Qin Gang is the Chinese Ambassador to the United States. Anatoly Antonov is the Russian Ambassador to the United States. We publish it here on The Transnational because we believe it is a historic document both because of China-Russia cooperation which is increasing rapidly and because it makes […]

Rogue states sanction the International Criminal Court

Rogue states sanction the International Criminal Court

Richard FalkTFF Associate 1 July, 2020 This post is a slightly modified version of an editorial contribution to TMS – Transcend Media Service – June 22-28, 2020 Sanctioning the International Criminal Court, ICC Even Orwell would be at a loss to make sense of some of the recent antics of leading governments. We would expect […]

Respecting international law: A practical argument

Respecting international law: A practical argument

Illustration by Shenuka Corea By Richard Falk, TFF Associate March 12, 2020 Prefatory Note International law – as so much else of value – has fallen on hard times, violated and ignored, where applicable and needed. Although this is a deplorable state of affairs as the planet burns and vulnerable people suffer from ecological hazards […]

Evasions, accidents, engagements, and fulfilment: An autobiographical fragment

Evasions, accidents, engagements, and fulfilment: An autobiographical fragment

By Richard Falk, TFF Associate March 16, 2020 Prefatory Note This post is something new for me, an autobiographical fragment written at the request of an online listserv as a suggestive model for academics at the start of their careers as diplomatic historians. I publish it here on my blog. It was found unsuitable for […]

Lies, the Bethlehem Doctrine, and the illegal murder of Soleimani

Lies, the Bethlehem Doctrine, and the illegal murder of Soleimani

By Craig Murray January 31, 2020 In one of the series of blatant lies the USA has told to justify the assassination of Soleimani, Mike Pompeo said that Soleimani was killed because he was planning “imminent attacks” on US citizens. It is a careful choice of word. Pompeo is specifically referring to the Bethlehem Doctrine of Pre-Emptive Self […]

Revisiting the Earth Charter

Revisiting the Earth Charter

By Richard Falk October 13, 2019 Prefatory Note: The following essay will appear as a chapter in Peter Burden & Klaus Bosselmann, eds., The Future of Global Ethics (Edward Elgar, 2018),  with the title: Revisiting the Earth Charter 20 Years Later: A Response to Ron Engel Ron Engel has articulated an insider review of the Earth […]

The law against aggression

The law against aggression

By Jonathan Power July 30, 2019 In 2010 the signatory states of the International Criminal Court, established to prosecute war crimes, convened a conference to add aggression to the list of crimes the court could try. (See the Rome Statute here, the relevant provisions and definitions of the concept of “aggression” are described in Article […]

Global Justice in the 21st Century

Global Justice in the 21st Century

By Richard Falk July 23, 2019 I make no claim to approach this book with an open mind. Making a fuller disclosure, I acknowledge with some pride that I have endorsed Justice for Some even before it was published, and my blurb appears on its back cover. Beyond this, two months ago I took part in […]

Remembering the World Court Advisory Opinion on Israel’s Separation Wall After 15 Years

Remembering the World Court Advisory Opinion on Israel’s Separation Wall After 15 Years

By Richard Falk July 20, 2019 On July 9, 2004 the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague issued an Advisory Opinion by a vote of 14-1, with the American judge the lone dissenter, as if there would have been any doubt about such identity even if not disclosed. The decision rendered in response […]