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ANZSIL Perspective
We are proud to publish the ANZSIL Perspective. It is hoped that these Perspectives will generate discussion and contribute to thoughtful debate on major issues of international law.
Please see the current call for Perspectives.
Latest Perspectives
EDITORIAL: Edition 32
WELCOME to our 32nd edition of ANZSIL Perspective with excellent perspectives on Authors’ Rights...
Authors’ Rights as Human Rights
A September 2022 decision of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), Safarov v...
Defending Crimes of Aggression in Miami
At the International Bar Association (IBA) Conference last month in Miami, much talk was on...
Almarzooqi v Salih: High Court Rules that Mahr under a Sharīʿa Law-based Contract is Enforceable in New Zealand
For the first time in New Zealand (NZ), the High Court in Almarzooqi v Salih [2022] NZHC 1170...
Remembering and celebrating the contributions of Moana Jackson (10 October 1945 – 31 March 2022)
This perspective may be unlike prior published perspectives to which you are accustomed....
Submit a Perspective
ANZSIL Perspective is open to submissions from authors of any background. Articles are assessed for publication in line with the submission guidelines.
Please see the current call for Perspectives.
Past Perspectives
EDITORIAL: Edition 31
WELCOME to our 31st edition of ANZSIL Perspective with an excellent perspective by Simon Levett on The Shifting Protections of War Correspondents under International Law, a spotlight on H.E. Judge Antonio Augusto Cançado Trindade and two book reviews Since Edition 30, we’ve...
The Shifting Protections of War Correspondents under International Law – the example of Israel and the Palestinian Territories and South-East Europe
Journalists are continually subject to harm or the threat of harm during their reporting in foreign wars. The US based Committee to Protect Journalists states that at least 24 journalists have been murdered in 2022 so far globally. The surge in armed groups such as...
SPOTLIGHT: H.E. Judge Antonio Augusto Cancado Trindade
It was in the early days of June, while on a visit to my native country Trinidad and Tobago, that I learned about the sad passing of Judge Antonio Augusto Cançado Trindade. Although I never met the learned Judge in person, as a sitting Member of the International Court of...
BOOK REVIEW: Who saved Antarctica? The Heroic Era of Antarctic Diplomacy by Andrew Jackson (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021)
The legal regime governing Antarctica has always been a subject of interest to Australian and New Zealand international lawyers, both in and outside government. Much has been written on the sovereignty claims and the treaty regimes governing the Antarctic, including the...
BOOK REVIEW: Secondhand Time by Svetlana Alexievich
Few books help us understand Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as well as Second-Hand Time, authored by the Ukrainian-born Belarusian writer Svetlana Alexievich (London, Fitzcarraldo Editions 2016). Based on hundreds of interviews, it collects the voices of many individuals on the...
New Technologies in the Global Battlespace: themes emerging from the IPSIG/Law and Future of War workshop held on Friday 13 May 2022
By Catherine Thornton and Kirsty McRuvie (Kevin Hu, Unsplash) The workshop ‘New Technologies in the Global Battlespace’ was held by the International Peace and Security Interest Group (ISPIG) of ANZSIL and the University of Queensland’s Law and Future of War Research...
Terror in the time of Polio and COVID-19: The intersection of violence and contagion in Afghanistan
Badakhshan, Afghanistan (Unsplash - Joel Heard) In the first months of the Taliban’s violent takeover of Afghanistan last year, media reported widely on the chaotic withdrawal of US and allied forces, and the rapid escalation of the Taliban’s violence. The Taliban has targeted...
Edition 30: Editorial
WELCOME to our 30th edition of ANZSIL Perspective with excellent perspectives by Karin M Frodé, Azadah Raz Mohammad and Andrea Olivares Jones on Terror in the time of Polio and COVID-19 and by Catherine Thornton and Kirsty McCruvie on the IPSIG/Law and Future of War workshop...
EDITORIAL – Edition 29
WELCOME to our 29th edition of ANZSIL Perspective with an excellent perspective by Neil Boister on Trust in Translation: Diplomatic Assurances, the New Zealand Supreme Court, and Extradition to China and a book review from Tamsin Paige On Tyranny and the Global Legal Order by...
Trust in Translation: Diplomatic Assurances, the New Zealand Supreme Court, and Extradition to China
In 1606 in the République, Jean Bodin argued that it was wrong to render up the guiltless to a sovereign who wished to punish them, but right to render up the guilty. Today guilt alone is insufficient for extradition. The 1989 judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in...
BOOK REVIEW: On Tyranny and the Global Legal Order by Prof Aoife O’Donoghue
While the question of tyranny and how the law creates and supports tyranny in society arises frequently in research, including my own, until this delightful new book there has been no comprehensive treatment of the concept. In On Tyranny in the Global Legal Order, O’Donoghue...
Edition 28 Editorial
WELCOME to our 28th edition of ANZSIL Perspective with an excellent contribution by Dr Jane Kelsey on the protection of Māori data sovereignty and governance in New Zealand’s negotiations of Digital Trade rules, and a book review by Dr Alison Pert of Gareth Evans’ publication...
Waitangi Tribunal Forces NZ Rethink on Digital Trade Rules
The Waitangi Tribunal issued its final report on the six-year Inquiry into the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), and its successor the Comprehensive and Progressive agreement for TransPacific Partnership (CPTPP), in November 2021. The Tribunal’s statutory role is to...
Book Review: Gareth Evans, Good International Citizenship: the Case for Decency (Monash University Publishing, 2022)
Long ago in a galaxy that now seems far, far away, Gareth Evans was Foreign Minister in the Hawke-Keating Labor governments. In that capacity, he promulgated “good international citizenship” as a central part of Australian foreign policy – the idea of being a...
EDITORIAL – Edition 27
WELCOME to our first edition of ANZSIL Perspective for 2022. It is a bumper edition with two fascinating articles on universal jurisdiction by Kiran Menon and Dr Melinda Rankin, and an instructive book review by Monique Cormier. As Russia launches a military invasion of...
On Some Recent Universal Jurisdiction Contexts and Cycles
It could be argued that the progress of universal jurisdiction has been defined by cycles, in that it has had periods of relative dormancy, at least in terms of profile, and phases of resurgence. The mere claim that there can exist a ‘universal criminal jurisdiction’ albeit for...
From Pinochet to Anwar R.
Non state actors, particularly witnesses and victims of atrocity crimes, have long played a critical role in holding those most responsible for crimes against humanity to account. In January this year, German judges in the Higher Regional Court of Koblenz found Anwar R., a...
Book Review: Kai Ambos (ed), Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Article-by-Article Commentary (4th ed, Beck/Hart, 2022)
Anyone who has researched, studied or practised in the field of international criminal law will be familiar with Triffterer’s Commentary on the Rome Statute. First published in 1999, the volume is now in its fourth edition, and is the first with Kai Ambos as sole editor. The...
Editorial: Edition 26
Many of our readers are winding down for the year with their summer reading. We hope that this edition’s Perspectives will become valued additions to your lists. This month we have Monique Cormier, John Morss and Alberto Alvarez-Jimenez. ANZSIL Perspectives has grown this year...
The International Legal Implications of AUKUS: A Poor Precedent for Non-Proliferation
We don’t yet know very much about the AUKUS trilateral security partnership beyond the announcement that its ‘first major initiative… will be to deliver a nuclear-powered submarine fleet for Australia’. This news triggered a wave of commentary on the diplomatic, security and...
A Review of ‘To the Uttermost Parts of the World’ by Martti Koskenniemi
At some 1100 pages plus, Uttermost Parts is a heavyweight contribution in several senses of the word. This review will broach the following questions: What is Koskenniemi trying to achieve, and has he succeeded? What do writers and teachers of international law have to...
The New Zealand Supreme Court and the UN International Law Commission: A Dialogue on Subsequent Conduct in the Interpretation of Contracts and Treaties
“The written word is unalterable”. F. Kafka. The Trial The New Zealand Supreme Court (NZSC) in Bathurst Resources Limited v L & M Coal Holdings Limited recently explored the issue of evidence of subsequent conduct in the interpretation of contracts. Generally, the role of...
Meet the new members of the ANZSIL Perspective editorial team
Caroline and Alberto join the editorial reviewers Dr. Caroline Foster is Acting Director at the New Zealand Centre for Environmental Law (NZCEL) at the University of Auckland Law Faculty. She recently completed a new monograph Global Regulatory...
Editorial: Edition 25
In this edition we welcome two new members of the editorial team and two new sub-editors. You can read their profiles in this edition and online on the ANZSIL Perspective web page here. Once again, we have an excellent contribution to ANZSIL Perspective. This month’s...
Small States and Law of the Sea ‘Litigation’ Against Greater Powers
Are small States making increasing – and strategic – use of law of the sea dispute settlement mechanisms against greater powers? In cases such as Philippines v China, Timor-Leste v Australia, Ukraine v Russia and Mauritius v UK, States with relatively limited power have been...
Editorial: September 2021
Welcome to the SEPTEMBER 2021 issue of ANZSIL Perspective. As we continue to battle with lockdown and the spread of the Delta Variant to COVID-19, I am delighted to present two excellent Perspectives on international frameworks for structural change in North Korea and a...
What International Frameworks Would Effect Structural Change in North Korea?
Introduction How is it that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, a fairly isolationist State under some of the world’s harshest sanctions, having experienced two transitions of power, one extreme drought and famine, and one global pandemic, still exists? The answer,...
Global Deforestation is an issue of International Concern, and a Transnational Law Response could be the Solution
Forests are essential to our planet’s ability to sustain life. Deforestation results in loss of vital ecosystems and biodiversity, and increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, accelerating climate change and undermining our planet’s resilience. Illegal logging is a...
Editorial: Edition 23
Welcome to the JULY 2021 issue of ANZSIL Perspective. My editorial team and I hope you have been enjoying the excellent panels and presentations at the ANZSIL 2021 Conference. We are pleased to publish the latest insightful contribution to the ANZSIL Perspective . Our online...
The Importance of Flexibility in Regulating Lethal Autonomous Weapon Systems
The debate on the development and use of lethal autonomous weapon systems (LAWS), which will also be referred to as weapon systems, has been going on for several years now. A LAWS, as defined by the International Committee of the Red Cross, is ‘a weapon that can select (i.e....
Frequently asked questions
Do you accept submissions from law graduates or masters students?
Yes. ANZSIL Perspective is pleased to consider articles from authors of any background. Articles are assessed for publication in line with the submission guidelines, available here.
Are you accepting applications to join your editorial board?
ANZSIL Perspective is not currently accepting applications to join its editorial board.
Is there a word limit for article submissions?
Articles should not exceed 1,500 words.
Is there a publication charge for accepted articles?
No. ANZSIL Perspective does not charge a submission fee or publication fee.
Get in Touch with the Editor
ANZSIL Perspective is pleased to hear from its readership and answer any questions from prospective contributors. We aim to respond within three business days.