The initial proposed amendments reveal much about where states stand vis-à-vis the treaty’s content, and parallel processes such as negotiations toward a treaty on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Natural Disasters are instructive about the fights to come, including during the upcoming April PrepCom. It’s clear that, while enthusiasm for the treaty remains high, opposition to a strong and effective convention on crimes against humanity is slowly increasing, and proponent states and civil society will need to redouble their efforts to maintain the current positive trajectory. More signals may become apparent today and on Oct. 12, as the United Nations General Assembly’s Sixth (Legal) Committee meets to set dates for the first negotiations in 2028, an agenda that has drawn a surprising degree of interest from states.

State Proposals: Signs of Hope for a Progressive Convention – and Signs of Risk

In April, states had their first opportunity to submit formal amendment proposals to the International Law Commission’s (ILC’s) draft articles, which serve as the zero draft of the convention. There were 66 proposals representing 71 states, the European Union, and the Holy See. Proposals came from all U.N. regional groups, though unevenly (Africa Group 10, Latin American and Caribbean 9, Asia-Pacific 13, Western Europe and Others 26, Eastern Europe 14).

Although 94 states and six regional groups intervened during the opening plenary session of the first PrepCom in January, only 61 states intervened on the treaty’s substance during the Working Group of the Whole meetings that were part of PrepCom, paralleling the 66 proposals submitted pursuant to the April 30^th deadline. Our discussions with states have revealed a range of reasons for this dropoff, including lack of capacity and the inability to get the requisite approvals from capitals within the short timeframe between the end of the PrepCom in January and the April 30^th deadline.

The preamble and sections on definitions, victims and witnesses, prevention and general obligations drew the most proposals. Overall, the proposals track the Sixth Committee, PrepCom, and Working Group of the Whole discussions (see our March article), as well as civil society proposals, including those of the American Branch of the International Law Association’s Study Group on Crimes against Humanity, which one of us (Leila) chaired. Most proposals supported and sought to advance the draft articles. A handful of states, however, including China, Egypt, the Russian Federation, and Turkey, rejected fundamental aspects of the text. They have consistently opposed the convention since the ILC took up the topic in 2013 and clearly have not changed their views. Notably, only one state, Japan, joined the group of treaty opponent states in its April 30^th submission.

On the preamble, progressive proposals included a Martens Clause, requiring the assumption of protection irrespective of an individual’s status under international treaty law (Colombia). Others added protections for Indigenous status (Australia), and called for integrating a gender perspective across prevention, investigation, prosecution and punishment (Mexico). Côte d’Ivoire and the State of Palestine stressed human rights protections for the accused; Cameroon emphasized technical assistance for developing States; and several states, including Cameroon, Namibia, and Nigeria, recalled the enduring harms of slavery, the slave trade, colonialism, and apartheid. On the regressive side, Algeria, China, Egypt, Iran, the Russian Federation, and Turkey contested the jus cogens status (non-derogable obligations) of crimes against humanity, rejected the Rome Statute definition of crimes against humanity as the basis for Article 2, denounced “unilateral coercive measures,” and urged that priority for territorial or nationality jurisdiction be given to the state where the crime happened or the state of the perpetrator’s or victim’s nationality.

Article 2, the definition, drew the most proposals. Some states urged fidelity to Article 7 of the Rome Statute, which defines crimes against humanity. But many proposed adding offenses to Article 2(1) of the draft treaty, including the slave trade, reproductive violence, forced marriage, recruitment of child soldiers, gender apartheid, starvation, terrorism, grand corruption, colonialism, resource extraction, looting of cultural artifacts, and widespread, prolonged, or severe environmental destruction. The Russian Federation and Nigeria each proposed replacing Article 2 entirely, and several states proposed deleting “other inhumane acts.” On the chapeau — or the umbrella elements of all crimes against humanity (acts when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population pursuant to a state or organizational policy, with knowledge of the attack), Egypt, Turkey, and Iran proposed changing “widespread or systematic” to “widespread and systematic,” and the State of Palestine suggested deleting the requirement that the perpetrator act “with knowledge of the attack.”

Proposed additions to the grounds of persecution included Indigenous status, age, and disability, and several States proposed deleting the requirement that persecution be committed “in connection with any act referred to in this paragraph.” China proposed deleting enforced disappearance. Proposals on Article 2(2) included deleting a clause saying that the definition of forced pregnancy “shall not in any way be interpreted as affecting national laws relating to pregnancy” and replacing “woman” with “person.” Gender proved contentious: some states, in explanatory notes not included in the compiled text, supported the ILC’s decision not to define it, while others proposed reinstating the Rome Statute definition or replacing “gender” with “sex.”

Articles 3 and 4, which focus on state obligations to not commit crimes against humanity and to prevent and punish them, also drew many proposals. Most sought to strengthen the obligations not to commit crimes against humanity and to prevent them, but Iran proposed edits that gutted the obligation, and the Russian Federation and the United Arab Emirates appeared to limit crimes against humanity to armed conflict. Egypt proposed deleting paragraphs 2 and 3 (no exceptional circumstances justify crimes against humanity), and Canada surprisingly proposed that “in situations of armed conflict, international humanitarian law continues to apply as lex specialis,” a suggestion the International Committee of the Red Cross has explicitly rejected. And while most states sought to strengthen the prevention obligation in Article 4, Egypt, perhaps the state evidencing the most hostility to the Draft Articles overall, proposed deleting it entirely.

Many proposals sought to strengthen Article 6 (criminalization under national law), including adding conspiracy, incitement, and common purpose to the modes of liability in Article 6(2); others adjusted the command responsibility language in Article 6(3). Egypt and Saudi Arabia proposed deleting Article 6(4) on superior orders not being a ground for excluding criminal responsibility. On the issue of irrelevance of official position (Article 6(5)), one state proposed referencing the ILC’s Draft Articles on Immunity of State Officials from Foreign Criminal Jurisdiction, and Egypt proposed deleting the entire provision, substituting a new article emphasizing the immunity of “heads of state and government and senior officials.” Argentina, Ukraine, and Côte d’Ivoire proposed barring any amnesty for those responsible for crimes against humanity.

On jurisdiction, many States proposed tweaks to Article 7 on the establishment of national jurisdiction. China and Egypt proposed eliminating universal jurisdiction by deleting paragraph 2, and the Russian Federation, Turkey and Iran sought to give primary jurisdiction to the territorial state or state of nationality. On extradition (Article 13), proposals included giving priority to the territorial or nationality state (Russian Federation), as well as extensively strengthening the text (Germany). On mutual legal assistance (Article 14), Germany proposed a notable data protection provision (France proposed a new Article 16 on the same issue), and Sierra Leone and The Gambia proposed including a new article on capacity building and technical assistance.

On dispute settlement (Article 15), Switzerland and other states proposed strengthening the provision by removing the opt-out, while the Russian Federation proposed weakening it by making recourse to the International Court of Justice optional. Mexico, Portugal, the Nordic countries, Sierra Leone, and The Gambia called for a treaty body to strengthen enforcement.

Finally, states proposed final clauses, which the ILC text omitted, with entry-into-force thresholds ranging from 20 ratifications (Austria) to 60 (Cameroon). Belgium, also on behalf of Estonia, The Gambia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Mexico, Slovenia, and Timor-Leste, proposed prohibiting reservations.

In short, the compilation contains many creative new proposals, many modifications to the ILC’s language, and, from a small number of states, several challenges to fundamental elements of the Draft Articles. Because states may introduce proposals at any point in the negotiations, the compilation, like the ILC draft, is a starting point rather than a final product. Still, it is notable that the Commission’s 2019 Draft Articles continue to attract significant support.

Negotiations on Protections of People in National Disasters – A Signal of Battles to Come?

While the substance of the proposed Treaty on Crimes Against Humanity has been the focus of much attention, equally important are the procedural rules for the diplomatic conference, which will be adopted by the second PrepCom in April 2027. A parallel process in the U.N. General Assembly’s Sixth Committee to negotiate a legally binding instrument on the protection of persons in the event of national disasters (PPED) is likely a harbinger of the challenges to come. In fact, the Sixth Committee secretariat has suggested that the rules of procedure for the PPED negotiating conference will serve as the template for the crimes against humanity conference.

In August 2026, the PPED’s PrepCom met for a little over a week to negotiate and finalize the rules of procedure for its negotiating conference in January 2027. Originally scheduled to conclude on Sept. 4, the final adoption had to be delayed by a week to Sept. 11 to allow sufficient time to agree on contentious issues, in particular on decision-making and civil society participation. Perhaps most contentious was the discussion on decision-making, specifically whether decisions would be made by consensus, and when it was possible to vote. The albatross of consensus is not new to the Sixth Committee, particularly during the long process leading to the adoption of resolution 79/122 setting out the process for negotiating the treaty.

During the PPED PrepCom, the initial rules of procedure had provided that if every effort in good faith to reach consensus had been exhausted, the president of the negotiating conference “shall consult the Bureau [of the Conference] and recommend the steps to be taken, which may include the matter being put to the vote[.]” States raised a range of objections or alternatives to this proposal, from the need to clarify the steps between the efforts to reach consensus and a vote (Syria, Iran, United States), and reliance on other potential precedents from the Tax Convention (Nigeria) or Cybercrimes Convention (Russian Federation). Mexico, long a stalwart for the need to retain the possibility of a vote, called for language clarifying the conference president’s authority in determining whether every effort was made to reach consensus and clarifying/streamlining so that the president then “shall proceed to a vote.”

Ultimately, the language on recourse to a vote was dropped, leaving only the following: “[t]he Conference shall exhaust every effort in good faith to reach agreement on matters of substance by consensus.” The implication of this change is that the U.N. General Assembly rules will apply, which permit a vote to be called once it is clear that achieving consensus is not possible. Mexico delivered an Explanation of Position noting that it does not see this as a precedent for future proceedings, and that they retain the right to raise this issue again when the PPED conference meets in January 2027 to adopt the rules of procedure.

The fixation of some states on the idea of consensus is concerning. As we have argued before, consensus does not guarantee a positive outcome or inevitably produce better results. In fact, a 2004 study by the Sixth Committee Secretariat observed that while consensus may be worthwhile and indeed necessary on some matters, “in other cases it is often time-consuming and results in decisions that provide little added value.” As the proposals outlined above preview, there will be significant debate on many aspects of the convention, and while consensus may be desirable in principle, it will be important for states to vote in order to have a strong and effective treaty that responds to modern needs.

The other issue that proved contentious for the PPED process was related to the approval of applications for participation by civil society representatives not already accredited with the U.N.’s Economic and Social Council. Resolution 80/169, which governs the PPED negotiating conference, mandated that the PrepCom decide on their participation “based on a list prepared by the Secretariat, with due regard to the principles of transparency and equitable geographical representation, and whose work is relevant to the Conference.” While a decision on such a list is usually relatively pro-forma and approved unless a member state formally objects within a set timeframe (though this was not specified), some states, including Iran and the Russian Federation, raised the need to know more about the NGOs on the list to be able to determine “if their work is relevant to the Conference.” Iran for example, noted that this information could include “proper information on the nature, objectives, potential relevance, sources of financing and any conflict of interest, among others.” Ultimately, it was decided that the Secretariat would provide publicly available information related to each organization’s mandate and staffing.

For the process related to the proposed crimes against humanity treaty, the first PrepCom adopted a strong decision on the participation of civil society, which specified that it would be a non-objection process and could take into account transparency, equitable geographical representation (both also in the PPED decision), and gender parity. While we can hope that the relative strength of the decision in the crimes against humanity context will be a bulwark, considering the pushback on civil society participation across the multilateral system, ensuring the inclusion of diverse civil society will require constant vigilance.

What Comes Next?

On the agenda for today and Monday’s Sixth Committee meeting on the proposed crimes against humanity treaty, the only official business on the table is to set the dates for the first negotiations conference in 2028 (anticipated to be in January). However, the speakers list includes, as of this writing, 88 states and entities, indicating a strong level of interest in the agenda item. The focus of these statements may send some signals for what is ahead for the second PrepCom and the negotiating conference. If last year is a guide, we can be hopeful for statements expressing support for the process and the need to keep the momentum moving forward.

Thus far, the number of states opposing the treaty has remained relatively stable over time, but it is slowly increasing due to some changes in governments and the realization of others that the negotiations are ongoing and may in fact result in a new convention. Meanwhile, the number of states supporting the treaty has remained relatively stable as well. This means that treaty proponent states and civil society must redouble their efforts to attract new supporters and to ensure favorable procedural rules for the 2028 diplomatic conference.

The post Hope – and Vigilance – on the Road to a Crimes Against Humanity Treaty appeared first on Just Security.

Bin Attash is accused of conducting surveillance on U.S. carrier passenger planes in Asia before 9/11 to detect security vulnerabilities. He is also accused of training two of the 19 hijackers who killed nearly 3,000 people in the hijackings on Sept. 11, 2001.

The Pentagon did not immediately release the 63-page decision dated Oct. 7, 2026 by Col. Michael Schrama. Portions of it were marked CUI for Controlled Unclassified Information, making some of it subject to review by a security officer and potentially subject to redaction. 

But, based on unclassified passages, the judge found that FBI agents had not done enough to distinguish bin Attash’s interrogations across 10 days in 2007 and 2008 from the previous four years when he was held incommunicado and interrogated, at times brutally, in secret CIA prisons. 

The bin Attash decision was the fifth straight loss in the capital trials at Guantanamo to the prosecution’s plans to use confessions taken by federal agents (working in so-called “clean teams”) because whatever confessions the CIA got interrogating the men were inadmissible. 

Combined, the five decisions by three military judges constitute a sweeping repudiation of the system developed by the George W. Bush administration to turn the page on a legacy of torture by obtaining fresh, lawful confessions from former CIA captives who had been held beyond the rule of law in black site prisons. Rather than finding the statements were clean, each of the judges found they were contaminated for different reasons by the prisoners’ questioning across their years of incommunicado detention.

In the instance of bin Attash, Judge Schrama wrote that federal agents didn’t do enough at Guantanamo to make clear that his participation was entirely voluntary in 2007 and 2008, and that what he had said before could not be used against him. 

In other words, the judge described conditions at Guantanamo like those in the CIA black sites when, the defense lawyers argued, the CIA conditioned its captives to answer questions in exchange for rewards.

At Guantanamo, the judge wrote, the confessions could not be voluntary because “Mr. bin Attash faced a specialized guard force, a team of government interrogators, and questioning in a former C.I.A. black site on topics he had previously been forced to discuss under coercion.”

Agents testified that they went out of their way to make bin Attash comfortable and to emphasize that he was in charge of his interrogations and could speak about whatever he wanted, or not speak at all.

They brought him dates and tea and treats and lead questioner FBI Agent Stephen Gaudin dressed up in a typical Yemeni pantsuit to build rapport with bin Attash. But the judge found fault in the agents’ failure to provide a so-called “cleansing statement” that clearly explained to bin Attash that nothing he told the CIA previously could be used against him. 

Testimony in pretrial hearings showed that the Bush administration lawyers forbade that kind of language, and also prohibited the reading of a classic Miranda-style warning to men who had been held by the United States since 2002 and 2003, and never had been allowed to consult a lawyer.

As for Agent Gaudin’s rapport-building techniques, the judge noted that the evidence showed the CIA also gave bin Attash “tea, soda, fresh kebab, bread, and figs to secure his cooperation during interrogations.” Rather than turn a page on the torture, the judge concluded that the circumstances at Guantanamo constituted “environmental continuity” that “effectively maintained the coercive psychological pressure established by the CIA.”

The other three defendants in the 9/11 case who had their statements excluded were: 

• Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who is accused of being the mastermind of the 9/11 plot. 
• Mustafa al-Hawsawi, who is accused of sending funds to the hijackers at the behest of Mohammed.
• Ammar al-Baluchi, who is also accused of helping the hijackers with finances.

Prosecutors are appealing the al-Baluchi decision. If overturned, 9/11 case prosecutors would have new law as a basis to ask Judge Schrama to reconsider his rulings in Mohammed, al-Hawsawi, and bin Attash.

Abd-al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is accused of a key role in the Oct. 12, 2000 bombing of the USS Cole off Yemen that killed 17 sailors, was the first former CIA prisoner to have his confession suppressed. Jury selection in his trial is scheduled to start this month. 

His lawyers are also studying the bin Attash ruling. The judge in the al-Nashiri case, Col. Matthew Fitzgerald, has approved a prosecution request to admit the just-excluded bin Attash interrogations, and use them against al-Nashiri at the Cole trial. Al-Nashiri’s lawyers may ask Judge Fitzgerald to reconsider his decision.

Bin Attash is described in al-Nashiri’s charges as a key player in the Cole bombing, although he has never been charged for the attack. Guantanamo’s military commissions have a different, more liberal legal standard than the one used in regular federal courts for using third-party statements as evidence, even if it’s intermingled with otherwise inadmissible self-incrimination.

The post Guantanamo Dispatch: All Four Defendants’ Confessions Are Now Suppressed in the 9/11 Case appeared first on Just Security.

1. What troops could be ordered to do at each stage of the elections process, and
2. What the repercussions of such orders could be. 

Importantly, there are a variety of orders which could be issued that, while not blatantly illegal per se, would severely disrupt the mechanics of elections and undermine the country’s democratic principles. Here, we outline the election process and important red lines for troops to be aware of in a deployment situation. Above all, there is one rule that all members of the armed forces must remember: in a democracy, any domestic deployment happening on or around an election is suspect. 

Examples of Illegal or Anti-Democratic Orders

“The President has declared a national emergency, protect this polling site.” 

As noted previously in this series, 18 U.S.C. 592 bars an officer from keeping “troops or armed men at any place where a general or special election is held” unless such force is “necessary to repel armed enemies of the United States.” A declared national emergency to protect polling sites would most likely not satisfy this standard. National emergencies trigger a defined set of laws, not unencumbered presidential authority. An emergency declaration from the president does not override constitutional dictates exclusively giving states and Congress the authority to administer elections nor would it override the Supreme Court’s decision in Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer (1952) that prohibited the governmental takeover or seizure of critical infrastructure without congressional approval. As a result, an officer who issues such an order would likely be subject to all the penalties listed in § 592, including up to five years in prison, in addition to potential court-martial consequences such as dishonorable discharge. Protecting a polling site is also likely a violation of the Posse Comitatus Act since “protecting” is traditionally a law enforcement function, not one permitted to be undertaken by armed military personnel. Invoking the Insurrection Act might address the Posse Comitatus Act problem, but it would not override Section 592. Further, polling sites are state, not federal property, which means that troops’ presence cannot be justified by the “protecting federal property” argument invoked during the 2025 Los Angeles National Guard deployment. 

“Seize these voting machines, they have been hacked by [foreign power].” 

This is another example of a likely illegal order. Though the “foreign power” language may seem to authorize legitimate troop involvement, Section 593 bars any member of the armed forces from interfering “in any manner with an election officer’s discharge of his duties,” and it contains no national security exception. Also, voting machines are owned or leased by state election authorities, meaning that if the federal government seizes the machines, it is taking a state’s property. Under the Tenth Amendment’s anti-commandeering doctrine, the federal government cannot force state officials to hand over, operate, or certify machines in a certain way, and though there is no case law directly on point, would likely have difficulty physically seizing the machines under this theory. An attempted seizure under eminent domain would immediately face court challenges. If the military tried to seize voting machines under a criminal law theory, it would also likely run afoul of constitutional and statutory prohibitions on the military acting in a law enforcement capacity. Though phrased in a manner that may appear legal or may seem to have a compelling purpose, this order would most likely be illegal and members of the U.S. military would likely have a duty to disobey. Seizing voting machines would break their legal chain of custody, which could make it more challenging to certify election results. Further, Americans could view the requisitioning of voting machines as a sign of a military takeover, which may cause unrest. 

“There is a protest on [Highway name] near [central location], block off the street until law enforcement can intervene.” 

Though ostensibly not directly connected to the election, this order would also be anti-democratic and most likely illegal. If the military blocks off a major road to a polling site, leading to massive backups and potentially hours of traffic, many Americans may simply choose not to vote. Making voting more inconvenient could suppress voter turnout, and blocking access to polling places does exactly that. Absent an invocation of the Insurrection Act, this order would also likely be illegal under the Posse Comitatus Act, which bars using federal troops to “execute the laws” except where the Constitution or an Act of Congress expressly authorizes it. Troops controlling who may travel where, in response to a protest, is a classic law enforcement activity – which is to say, executing the law. That civilian law enforcement officers are on the way does not change the analysis either. The analysis centers on the troops’ conduct, which here would constitute enforcing the law. A highway closure in an area with many voters from one political party or demographic could also suppress that population’s vote by preventing them from casting their ballot, undermining a free and fair election. 

“Transport these paper ballots from [location A] to [location B].” 

Though seemingly innocuous, this is also likely an illegal and anti-democratic order. First, picking up ballots from polling sites would be a straightforward violation of §§ 592 and 593 – troops cannot be ordered to polling places to assist with election administration. Also, moving ballots from one location to another places the ballots at risk of manipulation or damage. As outlined above in the voting machine scenario, preserving chain of custody is paramount for managing ballots and voting equipment. Even if the ballots are entirely unchanged while in military custody, the fact that they left state control could lead voters to question the election result. 

“Deploy to [Swing County] in October in response to civilian unrest.” 

Any federal deployment to respond to civilian unrest should be consistent with statutory exceptions to Posse Comitatus, such as an invocation of the Insurrection Act. Though this may not violate any specific legal prohibitions, all election-year domestic deployment orders should be treated with extreme caution. Though a pre-November order to deploy to a given county may seem unrelated to an election, the presence of armed soldiers in a state or even a smaller voting jurisdiction could significantly depress voter turnout in a primary or in early voting. Americans, for the most part, are not accustomed to being in the presence of armed federal forces as they go about their day-to-day lives, and given recent tragedies, such as the January 2026 killings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti by federal officials in Minnesota, it is possible that some voters would be too frightened or intimidated to vote if the military were stationed, for example, near voting jurisdiction offices, registration locations, or polling places. Such fear could significantly impact voter registration, early voter turnout, and eventual results. Certain eligible Americans may simply decide not to register or vote, feeling that the value of their vote does not outweigh the potential harms of interacting with armed federal troops. 

“Stand guard as votes are being counted to prevent civilian unrest.” 

It is not the role of the federal military to guard state polling sites or vote-counting sites. An order to do so would likely violate Section 592 as well as § 594, which bars voter intimidation, and its civil equivalent 52 U.S.C. § 10307(b). This order not only appears to violate the law but would also call the election results into question and suggest the appearance of a military takeover. Troops must remember that it does not matter whether an order is couched in seemingly positive “guarding,” “protecting,” or “shielding” language — there are still no “general national security” exceptions to any of the above laws. The only exception under § 592 is if armed enemies are physically attacking the United States and, whatever the outer bound of that phrase, it is most likely not satisfied by protest, civil unrest, general security concerns, foreign adversary provocation or misinformation, or any justification other than physical warfare conducted with weapons. Obeying the above order could lead to prison time, fines, losing access to military benefits, and other consequences related to courts-martial. 

“The election may have been stolen by [foreign power], do not allow newly elected members of Congress into the Capitol building.” 

Even if there is credible evidence of election fraud or foreign interference, it is not the job of the federal military to intervene, and certainly not to prevent members of Congress from being formally seated. Under the Constitution, it is entirely the role of Congress to seat its own members and the executive branch and military have no role in this decision-making process. Section 593 bars members of the military from interfering with an election officer’s discharge of their duties. Preventing members of Congress from being seated could be argued to amount to interfering with an election. Importantly, the House of Representatives is not a continuing body, meaning after January 3, the only official member is the Clerk of the House, until the newly elected members are sworn in. Previously elected members cannot hold their seats after that date, meaning that if no one is sworn in, there is quite simply no House of Representatives. With no House, there is no telling what confusion would follow. 

Further, members of the military involved in enforcing this order could face criminal charges under 18 U.S.C. § 2383, which states that 

Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.

Preventing the certification of a lawful election and the seating of members could constitute an insurrection under this statute. 

***

As the above hypotheticals illustrate, a president could issue a range of seemingly unobjectionable orders that undermine the democratic process and run afoul of federal law. Voters may stay home if they fear military presence. Ballots may no longer be trusted if a machine’s chain of custody is broken. Military deployments elsewhere in a city might prevent voters from reaching their polling site in time. There is little to no safe or democratic way for the military to be involved with the elections process. And, importantly, as the next article in the series explains, the costs of doing so would not fall on the election alone: an election-related deployment would do lasting damage to the military itself. 

Authors’ Note: The authors would like to thank Hayley Durudogan for her contributions to this article.

The post Boots Off Ballots: Troops and Elections, In Practice appeared first on Just Security.

A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the last 24 hours. Here’s today’s news:

IRAN WAR

President Trump yesterday said the United States would not attack Iran before the U.S. midterms, and added that the two countries were having “productive discussions.” Despite Trump’s comments, U.S. officials told the New York Times that the military is still preparing options to restart major combat operations. Barak Ravid reports for Axios; Julian E. Barnes and Eric Schmitt report.

IRAN WAR – YEMEN

The Saudi civil aviation authority today said strikes by the Iran-aligned Houthis on Riyadh airport yesterday killed three people and injured several others. The strikes also damaged a Saudi Airlines plane and sent smoke over the airport which caused many airlines to cancel flights to the Saudi capital days before it is due to host a major meeting of global oil chiefs. Timour Azhari and Tala Ramadan report for Reuters.

IRAN WAR – OTHER DEVELOPMENTS

The aircraft carrier U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln yesterday returned to its home port of San Diego, California. The Lincoln left San Diego on Nov. 21, 2025, and nearly broke the record for the longest carrier deployment since the Vietnam War despite facing food shortages and logistical issues since the Iran war began. Jan Ransom and John Ismay report for the New York Times.

Two Iranian nationals accused of being tasked by Iran to carry out hostile surveillance on the Israeli Embassy in London and other significant Israeli and Jewish landmarks today pleaded not guilty to the charges. The pair denied a single offense under the National Security Act, and will remain in custody ahead of their trial due to begin in Apr. 2027. Sam Tobin reports for Reuters.

The Acers, an oil and chemical tanker, late Wednesday was struck by several projectiles, causing casualties, according to maritime intelligence firm Vanguard and U.K. Maritime Trade Operations Agency. Georgi Kantchev reports for the Wall Street Journal.

WEST BANK DEVELOPMENTS

Palestinian Vice President Hussein Al Sheikh yesterday informed French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot that a Palestinian legislative election planned for Nov. 28 will be postponed for several months because of worsening conditions through the Palestinian territories, according to a letter seen by Reuters. The letter said that the assessment “concluded that the anticipated political, security and economic conditions, on which the scheduling of the legislative elections… was based, have not materialized.” John Irish reports.

U.S. Charity Gaza Children Village last month laid out plans to use AI to monitor classroom conversations and flag speech deemed “hateful” or “inciting.” The plans raised ethical, safety, and privacy concerns from some Palestinian and advocacy groups, and at least one of the charity’s partners. Sam Mednick reports for AP News.

RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy yesterday accused the United States of being unwilling to help Ukraine after a Russian bomb attack killed at least 35 people in eastern Ukraine, taking the two-day death toll in the country to over 70. Zelenskyy criticized U.S. efforts to pursue economic ties with Russia while also seeking to mediate the war. Yuliia Dysa and Max Hunder report for Reuters.

Ukraine today struck and partly disabled a data center operated by Russian technology company Yandex, a day after it hit a similar but more significant facility. Yandex said its data center in Kaluga region, southwest of Moscow, had been struck by Ukrainian drones and partly put out of action. Gleb Stolyarov and Darya Korsunskaya report for Reuters.

U.S. special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner will today meet with Ukrainian negotiators and European officials in Miami, Florida to present “new ideas and proposals” to break the stalemate in the war in Ukraine, according to U.S. and Ukrainian officials. One of the ideas is a partial ceasefire that halts attacks on energy infrastructure and grain shipments. Barak Ravid reports for Axios.

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry yesterday said it will recall its ambassador to Ukraine Park Ki-chang, stepping up its protest against Zelenskyy’s recent revelation of a supposedly secret transfer of two North Korean prisoners of war to South Korea. Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi said Ukraine remains open to “constructive dialogue” despite South Korea’s decision to recall its ambassador. Hyung-Jin Kim reports for AP News.

OTHER GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS

German Chancellor Friederich Merz is “deeply outraged” by former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s visit to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s home to celebrate Putin’s birthday this week, according to a German government spokesperson today. The spokesperson said “Putin alone is responsible for the war in Ukraine,” and it is “downright immoral for Mr. Schroeder to attend such a celebration.” Emmanuel Berro and Friederike Heine report for Reuters.

Spiegel magazine today reported that former German spy chief August Hanning had longstanding contacts with former senior Chinese Gen. Wang Jianzheng. Hanning had travelled to China several times, where he knew the former official who had served in China’s embassy in formerly communist East Germany. James Mackenzie reports for Reuters.

Two Latvian men were arrested Wednesday evening after a fence was breached at Royal Air Force Molesworth, according to Counter Terrorism Policing London. The RAF base is used by the U.S. military and NATO for intelligence operations. Cdr. Helen Flanagan said officers were not currently linking it to the incident in RAF Fairford. Helen Burchell reports for BBC News.

U.K. Green Party leader Zack Polanski today vowed to stay on as party leader despite his loss in the by-election for the London seat of Holborn and St. Pancreas. The leader of the Jewish Greens Vivien Lichtenstein said Polanski should resign after the loss and added that it was a “big mistake” for him to have dodged a debate about a party conference motion that declared Zionism a form of racism. Labour MP Sagal Abdi-Wali held onto the seat for the party after former U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer stepped down last month and triggered the by-election. Ewan Somerville and Harry Farley report for BBC News.

The U.K. High Court yesterday was told Thames Valley Police has accepted the warrants it used to search former Prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s homes during his February arrest were unlawful. The items seized in the raid continue to be held by the police, and a further hearing set to take place in 2027 will determine whether the material can be used as evidence. The judge said that the fact the search warrants “were quashed does not bring the investigation to an end or mean that the whole of the investigation is unlawful.” Lucy Manning, Aleks Phillips, and Dominic Casciani report for BBC News.

French student unions today vowed to keep up protests about the underfunding and conditions in French public schools after scoring what they called their first win yesterday when French Education Minister Edouard Geffray said the Education Ministry is in the process of urgently contacting around 3,000 spare teachers who could be sent to schools with the most pressing needs. Student and teacher unions have called for another round of nationwide school strikes next Tuesday. The movement has fueled similar student protests in Belgium. Makini Brice and Dominique Vidalon report for Reuters.

Iraqi National Security Advisor Qasim al-Aboudi on Wednesday told AP News Iraq has rejected Syria’s request to repatriate thousands of suspected Islamic State members transferred from Syrian detention centers to Iraqi custody earlier this year. A meeting had been held between the two countries and the United States. Iraq determined about 400 detainees were not members of Islamic State and can be released and around 50 have already been repatriated. Al-Aboudi added that investigations are underway and “anyone proven to have committed crimes in Iraq will be tried under Iraqi law.” Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Abby Sewell report.

Myanmar’s President U Min Aung Hlaing yesterday met with Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim in Malaysia. The pair held a summit on the repatriation of Myanmar asylum-seekers in Malaysia and investment opportunities in Myanmar. Hannah Beech and Zunaira Saieed report for the New York Times.

A Brazilian Supreme Court Justice yesterday issued an arrest warrant for the brother of presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro, Eduardo Bolsonaro. Bolsonaro lives in Texas, and was sentenced in June to four years in prison in Brazil for lobbying the Trump administration to impose sanctions against members of the Brazilian government and implement higher tariffs on Brazil’s exports during the trial of his father and former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. Mauricio Savarese reports for AP News.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday said that Canada’s future will be decided by Canadians, pushing back against SpaceX CEO Elon Musk’s call for Quebec, Alberta, and Saskatchewan to separate from Canada. Carney said Canadians should be free to live according to their languages and cultures without interference from “foreign governments and large tech firms that think they can tell us what to do.” AP News reports.

Ethiopian Foreign Minister Gedion Timothewos yesterday told the U.N. an “all-out invasion” by Eritrean forces left Ethiopia no choice but to defend itself, according to a letter shared with Reuters today. It is the government’s first official statement on reported incursions by Eritrean troops. Dawit Endeshaw reports for Reuters.

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres yesterday warned that neurotechnologies are advancing so rapidly that governments’ ability to access and manipulate people’s brains could one day pose a threat to fundamental human rights. Guterres warned the technology could lead to arbitrary detentions, the alteration of people’s mental states and infringements on privacy. Jonathan Moens reports for the New York Times.

The Nobel Peace Prize for 2026 was today awarded to South African human rights lawyer Navi Pillay for her efforts to promote peace, human rights, and international law. Pillay has played key roles in international justice, serving on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the International Criminal Court, and chaired the U.N. Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the occupied Palestinian territories. The Nobel Committee said that it wishes to “issue a reminder that the ability to resolve conflicts without force or violence is dependent on the international rule of law.” Emmet Livingstone and Esme Nicholson report for NPR.

Taiwan President Lai Ching-te will say in his national day speech tomorrow that boosting defenses and spending more on the military is not a “provocation,” but a reflection of the Taiwanese people’s hope to maintain peace and freedom, an official said. Yimou Lee and Ben Blanchard report for Reuters.

U.S. AI DEVELOPMENTS

Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike on Wednesday said a recent string of cyberattacks against banks in South Korea may have been carried out by a hacker using Chinese and U.S. AI tools. The firm said the attacker used ARTEX, a recently released open source tool developed in China, and AI tools including Anthropic’s Claude Code. Laura Chung and Pei-Lin Wu report for the New York Times.

Anthropic yesterday told Axios that the company is launching a new cybersecurity initiative designed to bring its most powerful AI models and engineers to companies protecting power grids, water utilities, and other critical infrastructure. The Critical Infrastructure Defense Program will ensure critical infrastructure operators will be able to stop cyberattacks which have been made easier and cheaper to execute due to AI’s development. Sam Sabin reports.

Anthropic CEO Peter Thiel yesterday escalated his attacks on critics of AI and accused former President Obama and Pope Leo XIV of exploiting public fears about AI, according to recordings of his closed-door Antichrist lectures obtained by POLITICO. Thiel sees the Antichrist as a figure who will try to stop the progress of technology and advocate for a “one world government” of regulation. Thiel suggested the pope’s criticism of AI was an attempt to divert attention from the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandals. Calder McHugh reports.

Trump yesterday called anyone who uses “Artificial Intelligence” instead of “Super Intelligence” “THE ENEMY!” The White House has continued using the term AI, such as on the Office of Science and Technology Policy website. Herb Scribner reports for Axios.

U.S. FOREIGN AFFAIRS

The FBI and Justice Department yesterday announced the seizure of scanning and phishing tools used by a group of hackers that officials say is associated with the Chinese government and is believed to be responsible for disruptive cyber operations in the United States and elsewhere. The tools, called “Microscan” and “FishHub,” were used by hackers to scan, phish, and hack targets that included U.S. and foreign critical infrastructure. Safiyah Riddle reports for AP News.

Prosecutors yesterday accused former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores of orchestrating the torture of people held in Maduro’s regime’s custody. The indictment charges the pair with conspiracy to commit torture and alleges they engaged in a conspiracy to inflict “severe physical and mental pain and suffering to repress and punish political opposition.” Avery Lotz reports for Axios.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio yesterday arrived in Portugal. Rubio told reporters that U.S. pressure on NATO allies to increase their defense spending “is not a hostile thing,” and added that the stronger NATO is “the stronger the deterrence is.” Matthew Lee and Barry Hatton report for AP News.

U.S. IMMIGRATION DEVELOPMENTS

Laotian deportee Thongxay Nilakout yesterday left for Laos from South Sudan after he had been deported to the African nation by the United States, an ordeal his attorney said could have been avoided. Nilakout had been detained in South Sudan’s capital Juba since Jul. 2025, but his attorney said Nilakout had been willing to return to Laos before the United States deported him. Deng Machol and Joseph Falzetta report for AP News.

The family of Mexican immigrant Silverio Villegas Gonzalez yesterday filed a wrongful-death claim accusing an ICE officer of “effectively executing” him at close range when he was shot during the Trump administration’s immigration surge in Chicago last year. Gonzalez was stopped in Franklin Park after he dropped off his two young sons at school, and the family’s attorneys said what happened next has become part of a “larger pattern of killings by the federal government.” The legal claim alleges that ICE officers violated the Department of Homeland Security’s use-of-force policy and were encouraged to act recklessly by senior officials who imposed high arrest quotas. Ted Hesson reports for the Washington Post.

New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) yesterday demanded Trump end “all ICE enforcement actions in our city” after an ICE officer shot a man in Manhattan. Early reports said ICE agents surrounded the man and a 5-year-old child in a car before firing multiple rounds, according to Mamdani, and the NYPD said the man was in stable condition. Mamdani spokesperson Dora Pekec said the mayor had not been able to reach the president as of 8 p.m. Thursday. Joe Anuta and Chris Sommerfeldt report for POLITICO.

Nonpartisan government watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington yesterday filed a complaint with the U.S. Office for Special Counsel over a press release made by the DHS about the arrest of a Nigerian man for indecent exposure that claimed he worked for Democratic House candidate for Pennsylvania Janelle Stelson. Deputy Director of ICE Charles Wall said it was “unbelievable that Janelle Stelson would employ an illegal alien to work on a congressional campaign.” A police report said the man had fliers for Stelson in his vehicle, but the DHS did not respond to questions about how it established the man worked for Stelson, which Stelson’s campaign denied. Marc Levy reports for AP News.

The Trump administration is considering using ships to deport migrants to Central and South America on journeys that could take days and cost millions of dollars, U.S. officials told the New York Times. Discussions are still preliminary, but possible ships have been identified, and Defense Department officials have also reached out to companies about ships in Europe. Hamed Aleaziz reports.

Vice President JD Vance yesterday announced it was suspending Microsoft and several other firms from the H-1B visas program, and also took aim at universities that bring international students to the United States on exchange programs. Vance accused Microsoft of abusing the visa program to undercut U.S. citizens from employment. The announcement came hours before Trump awarded the National Medal of Technology and Innovation to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. Seung Min Kim, Rebecca Santana, and Barbara Ortutay report for AP News.

The Trump administration has ordered U.S. diplomats to examine certain visa and travel files from 2020 onward to find instances of people traveling to the United States to give birth, according to a State Department cable sent worldwide on Tuesday obtained by POLITICO. The cable provides guidance on how to handle “suspected birth tourism cases.” Nahal Toosi reports.

U.S. DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS

The NFL yesterday urged the Supreme Court to allow state regulation of prediction markets. The filing told the court that the “laissez-faire” approach federal regulators are taking towards prediction markets could allow “unscrupulous actors to cause mischief, trade on inside information, and harm game integrity.” Greg Stohr reports for Bloomberg.

Michigan’s Attorney General Dana Nessel yesterday filed a lawsuit against Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, alleging the state’s largest insurer used its position to drive up health costs for patients. The suit argues the insurer illegally cooperated with other Blue Cross Blue Shield companies to limit competition. Anna Wilde Mathews reports for the Wall Street Journal.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACTION

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth yesterday said the military will carry out a public execution for the first time in recent history, which will include a livestream. Former Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan was convicted of killing 13 people at Fort Hood in 2009 and is scheduled to die by firing squad on Dec. 3, 2026. The Pentagon called his actions an act of terrorism. Leo Shane III and Mark Satter report for POLITICO.

Trump bought between $1 million to $5 million in debt issued by SpaceX days before the White House announced a new space-travel policy, according to Trump’s latest financial disclosure forms. White House spokesman Davis Ingle said that there are no conflicts of interest with the president’s transactions, and that Trump’s stock-and-bond portfolio is “independently managed” by third-party financial institutions. Cat Zakrzewski reports for the Washington Post.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION LITIGATION

The county board in Arlington, Virginia yesterday filed a lawsuit against Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and the National Park Service to block the construction of Trump’s proposed triumphal arch in the capital. The suit argued that the Trump administration failed to comply with a legally mandated review of the environmental impact of building the arch. Chris Cameron reports for the New York Times.

The DOJ this week presented evidence to a federal grand jury in a case against former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who was a key witness for a congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, sources told the Washington Post. The DOJ has accused Hutchinson of lying to lawmakers when she testified about the events surrounding the attack. Prosecutors have been exploring charging Hutchinson with a civil rights violation, bringing a different case than the simple charge of lying to Congress. The investigation is being led by the Civil Rights Division in DOJ headquarters rather than the U.S. attorney for D.C., Jeanine Pirro, who is not involved. Perry Stein and Salvador Rizzo report.

The Trump administration yesterday filed an emergency application to the Supreme Court asking the justices to intervene again in a case over whether political parties are entitled to the same low-cost TV advertisement rates as candidates in the midterms. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. temporarily paused a lower-court ruling that would have required the Federal Communications Commission to wrap up its review of a new rule to expand who can qualify for lower ad rates. He asked the challengers, a group of Democratic candidates, to respond to the Trump administration’s request to the court by Saturday at 5 p.m. Abbie VanSickle reports for the New York Times.

Did you miss this? Stay up-to-date with our Litigation Tracker: Legal Challenges to Trump Administration Actions.

If you enjoy listening, Just Security’s analytic articles are also available in audio form on the justsecurity.org website.

ICYMI: Yesterday on Just Security

The 9/11 Military Commission and Lessons of Recent History

By Benjamin R. Farley

The post Early Edition: October 9, 2026 appeared first on Just Security.

Erwin Chemerinsky and Aziz Huq discuss the powers and authorities that state and local governments can use to fight back against authoritarianism and serve as a check against federal overreach.

Related Articles:

• “Fight Back: How States Can Counter Authoritarianism” Series, Sept. 21, 2026
• Erwin Chemerinsky and Aziz Z. Huq, Introduction to “Fight Back: How States Can Counter Authoritarianism” Series (Aug. 20, 2026)
• Jessica Bulman-Pozen, Commandeering, Coercion, and Executive Power (Aug. 21, 2026)
• Steven J. Kochevar, States Can Fight Federal Overreach by Protecting State Data (Aug. 26, 2026)
• Fred O. Smith, Jr., Collateral Accountability: The Oldest Check on Federal Lawlessness (Aug. 28, 2026)
• Catherine E. Lhamon, State Imperatives to Protect Civil Rights for All (Sept. 2, 2026)
• Jill Habig, Cities as Nodes of Resistance (Sept. 4, 2026)
• Miriam Seifter, Governors and State Administration (Sept. 9, 2026)
• David L. Noll, State Attorneys General Can Enforce Federal Laws the Executive Branch Won’t (Sept. 21, 2026)

Recent Episodes:

The post The Just Security Podcast: How State and Local Governments Can Fight Back Against Authoritarianism appeared first on Just Security.

The post Just Security’s Artificial Intelligence Archive appeared first on Just Security.

Despite having spent the last 23 years in U.S. custody, the accused mastermind of the attacks, KSM and the three other men, have neither been tried nor convicted for their alleged role in those attacks. Instead, for 15 years, the 9/11 military commission—the supposed law-of-war tribunal responsible for adjudicating his case—has lumbered on in a slow, expensive, and largely forgotten slouch toward ignominy. The tribunals’ excruciating pace is due largely to the United States’ wrongheaded turn to the “dark side” and its embrace of torture in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Seemingly endless pre-trial litigation has flowed from the accused’s years-long torture, the government’s efforts to launder the torture into admissible evidence, and its stalwart determination to preserve the secrecy of a program shuttered nearly two decades ago. Today, those efforts seem beyond misguided and, at a time of increasing American lawlessness, their failures are a timely reminder that justice admits no shortcuts, and that the government fares better when it abides by the law and U.S. principles.

The Dark Side

Less than a week after the 9/11 attacks, President George W. Bush signed a classified Memorandum of Notification authorizing the CIA to undertake a covert program to kidnap and imprison high-value terrorists. Although his memo did not mention interrogation, the U.S. government embraced the directive as authorization to do so. Moreover, the president’s order became the basis for disappearing suspected terrorists (and sometimes their families) into an archipelago of dungeons around the world; denying them access to lawyers, their families, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and the outside world generally; brutalizing them with so-called enhanced interrogation techniques, approved and not; and training them to answer questions posed by American interrogators by repeatedly reminding them of their torture or risk a return to “hard times.” All told, between 2002 and 2008, the United States abducted at least (the CIA did not keep track) 119 people and tortured at least 39 of them—including KSM and his alleged co-conspirators, Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Ammar al-Baluchi, and Mustafa al-Hawsawi. Their incommunicado detention and treatment while in U.S. custody violated both U.S. and international law, including the laws of war.

By early 2006, revelations of the United States’ so-called Rendition, Detention, and Interrogation (RDI) program and ensuing diplomatic backlash, including from countries hosting CIA black sites, forced the United States to wind it down. But in embarking on its global project of disappearances and torture, the United States had failed to plan for the disposition of its victims beyond perpetual incommunicado detention. Indeed, the CIA interrogators sought assurances from CIA headquarters that victims of U.S. torture would never be released. They led several detainees to believe they would never leave U.S. custody or have access to lawyers or the outside world, and one CIA interrogator famously told Abu Zubaydah, the first CIA detainee tortured by the United States, “that the only way he would leave [a CIA black site] was in the coffin-shaped confinement box.” At the same time, it was publicly known that some, like KSM, were in U.S. custody. For example, the 9/11 Commission Report, published in 2004, was littered with citations to the interrogation reports of disappeared detainees. Presumably, along with the CIA’s insistence that at least some of the RDI program enrollees never leave U.S. custody, the Bush administration found the prospect of simply releasing KSM unpalatable. Instead, the military commissions at Guantanamo seemed to offer a neat solution. They could serve as tribunals controlled by the executive branch and subject to its rules about classification, as well as a way to quickly secure convictions and death sentences for accused terrorists. The military commissions could simultaneously deliver justice for the victims of the 9/11 and other terrorist attacks, while avoiding public revelation of the torture program’s brutality that could come from a trial in a regular, civilian court. Thus, in September 2006, the Bush administration transferred 14 “High Value Detainees,” including KSM, from CIA custody to nominal military custody at Guantanamo; all other CIA detainees had been transferred or released from U.S. custody or had died.

The Bush administration’s decision to prosecute by military commission the 14 men transferred to Guantanamo in September 2006 created a problem, however: what evidence to use against the men? Even before transferring the men, the government recognized that statements made by KSM and the others to interrogators while in the RDI program—which the government characterized as a “coercive environment”—would not be admissible even before a military commission. So, it devised a scheme to launder the proceeds of its torture for use at a trial. First, it would transfer KSM and the 13 others to Guantanamo. It would place them in “military” custody and halt their interrogations for several months. It would allow the ICRC to visit them, giving those 14 men their first contact with the outside world since entering U.S. custody years earlier. Then, after about four months, the U.S. government would dispatch FBI-led interagency “clean teams” to re-interview the men and secure new confessions. These “clean” confessions, memorialized in compiled reports known as letterhead memoranda (LHM), would furnish the evidence necessary to convict them before the military commissions. 

In retrospect, the Bush administration’s effort to manufacture admissible evidence through attenuation of torture seems half-hearted at best. KSM and the 13 others were segregated from the several hundred detainees then in military custody at Guantanamo, consigned to a top-secret facility that the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence found was operationally controlled by the CIA and staffed by contractors pretending to be members of the U.S. military. Conditions at this facility were “markedly similar to those at previous” black sites. Absent contact with lawyers or family, a single visit from the ICRC could not transform the incommunicado quality of their detention. And a four-month reprieve from interrogation pales in comparison to years of continuous detention punctuated by periodic reminders of earlier torture and the threat of its renewal should they cease answering American questions. 

At the outset of their “clean” interviews, the FBI agents failed to advise the men that they had a right to counsel. In fact, the agents were instructed to refuse any request for counsel made by the men. Rather than record verbatim the questions asked and answers given, the FBI subsequently reconstructed narratives that they attributed to the men based on their new interviews. Incredibly, even the “clean teams” were polluted by the U.S. torture program. The FBI agents that interviewed KSM and the others in January 2007 had access to the fruits of the detainees’ earlier torture while they prepared to re-interview them and, thus, the new interviews were tainted by that torture. In some cases, the FBI agents involved had even participated in the RDI program by sending questions to the men’s CIA torturers. Worse, others had been deployed to the RDI program itself, becoming temporary CIA employees for purposes of participating in the unlawful detention, torture, and interrogation of the men. Finally, the interviews themselves took place in the former CIA black site at Guantanamo, a location at which several of the men undergoing “clean” interviews had been held and interrogated by the CIA previously. 

Inadmissible Evidence

These and other features of the U.S. government’s efforts to launder the proceeds and victims of torture for trial have now proved to be the undoing of the government’s most important evidence. Since the 9/11 accused moved to suppress their LHM in 2019, judges in both the 9/11 and USS Cole military commissions have thrown out the “clean” statements of all five accused across those two proceedings. In each case, the judges have found that the statements made by detainees to “clean teams” in early 2007 were involuntary. As the Military Judge Matthew McCall found, “The goal of the [RDI] program was to condition [detainees] through torture and other inhumane and coercive methods to become compliant during any government questioning. The program worked.” Likewise, Military Judge Michael Schrama found that the 

explicit intent of [the RDI] program was to break Mr. Mohammad’s resistance and condition him to answer questions. Furthermore, the CIA utilized operant conditioning to instill an enduring fear of the broader U.S. Government . . . , conditioning him to believe that a failure to cooperate fully and spontaneously would result in a return to severe physical mistreatment and a loss of basic amenities.

The RDI program taught its victims that they were “helpless to resist the torture, and that cooperation meant a lessening of abuse and an increase in rewards,” according to Military Judge Schrama. As described by Military Judge McCall, that conditioning persisted for the duration of the accused’s time in the RDI program through “constant reminders, whether directly communicated or contextually inferred, that a failure to cooperate with debriefers and to answer questions the way he had been trained could lead to a return to EITs or a loss of his limited amenities.” Rather than vitiate the defendants’ earlier conditioning, the transfer to Camp VII at Guantanamo reinforced it through similar conditions of confinement and relations with guards and interrogators. Still, the government may have been successful in attenuating the detainees’ torture had it informed them of their rights to counsel and to remain silent, and by assuring them that statements given under torture would not be used against them. That would have been the normal course for the FBI, even when interviewing alleged members of al-Qaeda taken into U.S. government custody overseas. But, “crucially,” the government affirmatively chose to discard its ordinary practice in attempting to launder its earlier torture and prolonged incommunicado detention of these “High Value Detainees.” Finally, the involvement of the FBI and its “clean” agents in the RDI program polluted them, extending the taint of torture notwithstanding the government’s tepid efforts to construct attenuation and manufacture admissible evidence. 

Like the military jury’s extraordinary call for clemency in United States v. Khan, the military commissions’ rejection of the government’s attempts to launder its torture in the 9/11 and USS Cole cases should be read as a warning of the fragility of these cases. The Court of Military Commission Review already affirmed the suppression of the Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri’s LHM in the Cole case 19 months ago. While the government’s interlocutory appeal of the suppression of al-Baluchi’s LHM is pending before that body, its decision in al-Nashiri suggests that the 9/11 prosecution will have to go forward without al-Baluchi’s supposed confession. Indeed, seemingly bowing to this reality, the 9/11 prosecutors informed victim family members that it would not seek interlocutory appellate review of the military judge’s decision to suppress KSM’s LHM shortly after it was handed down; there is little reason to believe it will do differently with al-Hawsawi or bin Attash.

As shocking as the collapse of the government’s trial strategy is some 20 years into this effort, it is hardly surprising. After all, the RDI program was plainly illegal from the outset. The government knew better than anyone of the defects embedded in its effort to manufacture “clean” confessions, and the infirmity of its refusal to provide the men interviewed in early 2007 with counsel. And the government itself rejected the use of LHM in the federal criminal prosecution of Ahmed al-Ghailani, the one “High Value Detainee” brought from Guantanamo to the United States to face prosecution in an ordinary court. All to say that it did not have to be this way. Had KSM been brought to the United States for trial in a civilian court—even after his torture—this case would be long over. Had the government not attempted to manufacture admissible evidence and then fought to use it, years of pre-trial litigation could have been avoided. Had the government not been—and if it did not remain—so dedicated to obscuring its post-9/11 torture, at least a billion dollars could have been saved. Had the government not decided to abandon its principles and discard the law in the wake of 9/11, the United States could have avoided the indelible stain of state-sponsored torture.

In the end, in exchange for breaking and brutalizing men, abandoning its values, and marring its reputation, the United States’ embrace of torture after 9/11 produced little. Torture proved ineffective at obtaining actionable intelligence as the CIA knew it would be. And, for two decades, torture—its consequences and the government’s insistence on obscuring it—has stymied efforts to deliver justice for the victims of terror and their family members.

Altogether, the 9/11 military commission’s rejection of the government’s effort to launder the proceeds of torture is a lesson that securing justice requires more than checking boxes or sophistic legal alchemy. It’s a lesson that adhering to long-held principles and the rule of law is cheaper and more efficacious, in the long run, than discarding them. It’s a lesson we have done our best to not learn over the last 25 years—and one that it’s imperative to learn now, as the U.S. government increasingly, even gleefully, breaches international law and abuses its domestic authority.

The post The 9/11 Military Commission and Lessons of Recent History appeared first on Just Security.

Today, though, world leaders are increasingly focused on narrowly defined national interests and on projecting power. Some scoff at universal principles or values as soft, weak, or impractical in an era of intensifying geopolitical competition and resource scarcity. Elite institutions developing ideas for future foreign policy, like the Council on Foreign Relations’ (CFR) new “Future of American Strategy” initiative, are couching the defense of international law and norms, collective security arrangements, or humanitarianism primarily in terms of national economic or security interests.

Yet, we should not be so quick to give up on dignity. As common ground becomes harder to find across different actors, interests, and alliances, dignity offers a practical way to refocus on something that seems universally understood. In an increasingly diffuse geopolitical power environment, it may offer one of the few ways to build public – and even political – consensus for new commitments to international peace and security or to craft more durable peace agreements that end wars. A range of actors from the Vatican to leading economists are increasingly highlighting the importance of dignity in navigating emerging global challenges, such as artificial intelligence (105 mentions of dignity in Pope Leo’s encyclical, 125 mentions in an essay from economist Gene Sperling) or the climate crisis. Accordingly, other leaders, too, should not shy away from dignity; they should show what might be possible by reasserting that everyone deserves it.

Dignity Matters…

Every major religion has a concept of human dignity; world leaders regularly speak of it; and it resonates across cultures, countries, and languages. Talk of the dignity of work or honoring a loved one’s dignity in dying rarely codes left/right, blue collar/white collar, devout/atheist, or Global North/South. Across traditions, human dignity is widely understood to be our inherent human value or worth.

This is more than just an abstract philosophical concept. The idea of dignity was top of mind when world leaders convened in the wake of World War II to design a new structure to advance peace and prevent future generations from the scourge of world wars. The result, the United Nations Charter, set out to reaffirm faith in “the dignity and worth of the human person.” Just a few years later, in 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was based on a recognition that “inherent dignity” is “the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.”

A “sense of dignity” is where the concept of inherent worth transforms into a lived experience: when we feel respected, valued, recognized, treated fairly, or able to exercise agency. When people feel their dignity is attacked and they are humiliated, it triggers a powerful emotional response in the brain, resulting in feelings of fear, anger, shame, and a desire for revenge. Think of the story and legacy of Mohamed Bouazizi in Tunisia. In 2010, Bouazizi was sick and tired of repeated government harassment and abuse. When authorities confiscated his fruit cart, humiliating him in broad daylight while eliminating his only means to provide for his family, he set himself on fire. His action sparked the Arab Spring. Similarly, a major U.N. study a decade ago showed that degrading experiences with security forces (a.k.a. indignities) were the leading cause of young Africans joining violent extremist groups.

…But Dignity Is Increasingly Disregarded

Today, in conflicts from Palestine to Myanmar, world leaders are embracing rhetoric and actions toward adversaries and opponents that intrinsically rejects their human dignity. For example, Russia has spread racist and dehumanizing propaganda to justify expanded attacks in Ukraine. President Donald J. Trump has called Iranians “animals” and repeatedly threatened to “wipe out” Iran, including by bombing civilian infrastructure. Leaders in Ethiopia and Sudan have referred to those they are fighting as “weeds,” “cancer,” and “insects,” to be eliminated.

In these and other ongoing conflicts, rhetoric is linked to action: state and non-state armed actors alike are increasingly ignoring international humanitarian law (the laws of war) and conducting strikes against infrastructure and areas where large numbers of civilians live, work, and go to school. For its part, the U.S. Department of Defense recently eliminated programs on reducing civilian casualties. All the while, leaders seem oblivious to or unconcerned about the indignities these actions are imposing, which will inevitably fuel new cycles of grievance and violence for years to come.

Throughout history, those in power have often sacrificed the dignity of others in the name of economic and security interests. But its disregard today is designed to be intentional. To some, focusing on the human dignity of others is considered a weakness that misses the “reality” that the only kind of power that matters is hard power or dominance.

Dignity’s Importance for Future Peace and Security

Yet in this context, wars and their consequences continue to compound and the capacities and systems for managing them are collapsing in individual countries and globally. Many of us fear that we are currently headed toward a dangerous future where ‘might is right’ and those with power can do what they want without consequence, never mind the unrestrained violence, injustice, and degradation of human rights that such a world order unleashes. According to a recent poll commissioned by the Rockefeller Foundation, majorities of people around the world want their country to work with others on reducing conflicts and preventing wars.

Changing this current trajectory requires reconnecting the rules and institutions seeking to protect peace and security with the human beings they are meant to protect. A dignity focus illustrates what is at risk and at stake, on a basic human level, when norms weaken, ranging from international laws intended to limit the aggressive use of force to the use of deadly weapons and harm to civilians. Making the connections more explicit between dignity (and indignity), on the one hand, and peace and security on the other, might demonstrate that a universal grounding can guide collective problem-solving. People remain committed to leaders, movements, and institutions that they feel recognize their value (even if that feeling is disconnected from actual policy realities).

On a practical level, refocusing on dignity can make more visible what is prolonging today’s violent conflicts, and it can enhance efforts to promote peace. If dignity is experienced via recognition, agency, fairness, and respect, peacebuilding efforts can create conditions that enable people to better listen, cooperate, compromise, or repair relationships. Fostering a sense of dignity among aggrieved groups has been a key part of some of the most enduring peace agreements of recent decades. The 1998 Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland institutionalized a commitment to human dignity through the “parity of esteem”: formal recognition of the equal standing, identity, and worth of both communities. The concept of dignity was also woven into Colombia’s 2016 comprehensive peace agreement, particularly its emphasis on addressing the marginalization of women and minority groups.

More broadly, a dignity focus can help global leaders manage emerging challenges and threats facing humanity. On AI, for example, there is a growing recognition of the need to make values like dignity explicit in the design of systems and their “alignment,” which in AI parlance refers to ensuring that an AI system’s goals, actions, and internal motivations reliably match human intentions, preferences, and ethical values. That an AI tool responds kindly to a teen telling it about their depression is insufficient in the extreme if it also provides details on how to commit suicide. On climate disruption, as another example, focusing on how dignity changes through the experience of disaster and displacement could improve preparedness and adaptation — not only helping people survive, but helping them retain agency and respect, experience a fair response, and ultimately, rebuild their lives.

Restoring Dignity

At a time when nearly 7 in 10 people polled across 34 countries (in the above-referenced Rockefeller survey) believe conditions in the world have gotten “worse” over the last year, leaders and communities cannot afford to wait for the wreckage of world war proportions to renew an international focus on human dignity. Future policy leaders can take important steps now to ensure that plans and structures incorporate a focus on dignity for near-term as well as long-term foreign policy and international security. Those steps include:

• Engage ethical and religious voices as partners in advancing dignity. Ethical and religious traditions can provide important perspectives about the current trajectory of international affairs that rise above regular punditry. Building on Pope Leo’s leadership, three Catholic Cardinals in the United States released a statement earlier this year “charting a moral vision of American foreign policy” that used the term “human dignity” three times. Similarly, Protestant leaders of the Anglican Communion, the Lutheran World Federation, the World Communion of Reformed Churches and the World Methodist Council earlier this year cited “shared values of dignity and worth of each person” in lamenting the current wars and calling for renewed efforts to constrain violence and strengthen diplomacy and dialogue. These religious leaders represent institutions with vast numbers of followers, especially in the United States where two-thirds of adults identify with a religion. Their moral authority and perspectives on dignity offer a spiritual and popular alternative to the often intellectual and detached debates over when force is justified, how peace is built, and what principles should guide emerging technologies and the international order.

• Incorporate dignity into policy analysis. Alongside political and legal considerations, public institutions that work on security and conflict should increase focus on how new peace and security initiatives promote or undermine the dignity of those affected. There are increasingly rigorous ways to measure this, including in aid programs. At the University of Notre Dame (where one of us, Peter, is affiliated), researchers have been developing new ways to measure dignity within development programs, peace processes, and the design of artificial intelligence. Drawing on the work of conflict resolution expert Donna Hicks, another group of researchers developed and launched the Dignity Index and Dignity Barometer (which used the respected Hart Research group to ensure accurate methodology and a representative cross-section of Americans) to measure dignity within language and how people feel about relations with one another. Using these tools, policy analysts and advocates can and should help bring issues of dignity into more policy conversations.

• Make dignity a key criterion of what peace and security in foreign policy is supposed to support. If solving problems and resolving conflicts requires people to see something of themselves in one another, leaders, policymakers, and practitioners need to get better at noticing and creating the conditions for that to happen. What if, alongside efforts to pursue elite deals and agreements, diplomats and mediators also asked, does this approach enhance or abridge people’s sense of dignity? That could change what foreign policy programs support, from investing more in unofficial “Track II” dialogues of non-state actors to build trust and explore solutions and cultural diplomacy programs that help foster connections across countries, to accounting for how people feel about their own worth during a program intervention intended to build public confidence in an agreement and jumpstart post-war recovery, which could range from maternal care to municipal reconstruction. The aim in each case would be to help restore people’s trust in institutions to avoid recurring cycles of violence. “Dignity over division” could be a powerful theme for the incoming U.N. secretary-general, to the extent she or he focuses more on conflict mediation and peacemaking.

It is not naive to think that a commitment to dignity can once again be a centerpiece for peace and security. Dignity may be big enough, universal enough, and practical enough to do double duty: it might remind the public – and its leaders – why it is in our human interest to stem violence, and it may be a powerful tool to rebuild cooperation that creates the conditions for solving problems that no country or actor can solve alone.

Amid expanding and seemingly intractable wars around the world from Ukraine to Yemen to Iran, world leaders seem to be doubling down on military approaches that only escalate cycles of violence. Clearly, that is not working. By treating – and acknowledging – dignity as both an inherent right and an experience, international leaders may find new ways to halt surging conflict-related violence and meet the global challenges ahead collectively. That is the kind of bold leadership needed to forge peace and security. We all deserve it. And together, we must insist upon it.

The post A Better Path for Peace and Security? Focus on Dignity. appeared first on Just Security.

When I was a legal aid lawyer representing youth clients in New Hampshire, I had clients who were accused of bullying by peers, teachers, or others; clients who were bullied by peers; and clients where the situations were difficult to parse. My youth client docket was not unique. Across the country, all states proscribe bullying in school and related settings through one or more local or state governmental accountability tools, including but not limited to state statute. Primary and secondary school students nationwide are held accountable to refrain from bullying, at the penalty of criminal consequences in a handful of jurisdictions. It seems reasonable to require through one or more governance mechanisms that companionship chatbots, whether designed for companionship specifically or designed for general purpose then used for companionship, do the same. 

Especially as these bots are poised to join classrooms with human students in growing numbers, schools and all other parts of children and teenagers’ lives should be designated “bully-bot free zones,” to draw a standard from the “bully free zone” signs already familiar to students nationwide. 

Currently, about a third of U.S. states have enacted laws that regulate companionship chatbots, and almost all of these laws impose “youth specific” duties in addition to general duties on the controllers or operators of these bots, according to a policy tracker built at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. Several key duties across many of these laws–including that companionship chatbots avoid fostering “emotional dependence” or avoid supporting self-harm–do reflect a commitment to protecting young people from some of the same major risks posed by bullying. However, it doesn’t appear that any enacted companionship chatbot laws have applied, explicitly and comprehensively, an anti-bullying framework to companionship chatbots. 

This piece offers a high-level view of why children and teenagers deserve bully-bot free zones; what bullying by minors looks like; and what bullying by companionship chatbots looks like. Identification of bully-bot behavior or potential is a crucial step for stakeholder consideration of and action toward creating “bully-bot free zones” through statutory and regulatory reform, as well as other governance mechanisms in the public and private sectors. 

Bullies Aggressively and Repetitively Use Power Imbalance to Harm Others

According to federal government resources on bullying prevention, bullying is “unwanted, aggressive behavior among school aged children that involves a real or perceived power imbalance.” Aggressive behavior includes “verbal bullying” like “[i]nappropriate sexual comments,” “[t]aunting,” or “[t]hreatening to cause harm.” A power imbalance may flow from such factors as “access to embarrassing information” used to then “control or harm others.” 

Children and teenagers who are bullied or who are around bullying in their environments are at risk of “many negative outcomes, including increased risks of depression and anxiety, substance use, and suicide.” Because bullying “can be a humiliating experience. Kids may . . . fear that adults will judge them or punish them for being weak” and not report to adults when they’re being bullied. This fear-based silence is understandable but may exacerbate bullying, which is understood by experts as “repetitive” and “emotionally or psychologically damaging” in part because of the repetition and the “continuous[] worries about what the bully will do next.”

Bots Can Be Bullies

Companionship chatbots have been found to do some very worrisome things indeed when interacting with minor users—things that are or could become bullying as the chatbots aggressively use a power imbalance (including but not limited to minors’ “emotional bonds” with them, which includes minors’ “sharing feelings”) to harm children and teenagers. 

Common Sense Media, a leading national youth and family digital safety organization, warns that “[s]ocial AI companions [AI designed specifically for companionship] aren’t recommended for anyone under 18.” This warning flows from findings that these chatbots can harm minors by “[r]einforcing poor decision-making,” “[s]haring harmful or dangerous information,” “[e]xposing teens to inappropriate sexual content,” and “[e]ncouraging harmful behaviors like cyberbullying.” Such encouragement has been found when chatbots “validated [minor] users’ suggestions to seek revenge or bully others, and even helped users plan harmful actions. Rather than modeling empathy, conflict resolution, or positive social norms, these companions sometimes normalized cruelty and retaliation.” 

While the Common Sense warning applies to AI designed specifically for companionship, some experts also have similar concerns about how general-purpose AI chatbots that can provide companionship may harm children and teenagers. These concerns include that these bots “may encourage self-harm or suicide in struggling adolescents,” such as when “an adolescent disclosed his suicidality to ChatGPT (OpenAI). At times, ChatGPT deterred him from seeking help and also provided information on suicide methods. He subsequently died by suicide.” 

Bully-bots do not appear to be the norm for what any given child or teenage user will experience if using companionship AI: “widespread instances of AI systems initiating bullying behaviour [sic.] toward children” has not been found in “peer-reviewed [academic] research.” At a high level, this is consistent with the experience of most minors at school, where being bullied by a human peer also is not the norm. Most kids and teens can get through a school day without being bullied, but anti-bullying laws, regulations, or policies in schools remain necessary. Most children and teenagers can get through a companionship AI experience without being bullied, but anti-bullying bot accountability measures are now necessary. 

Companionship Chatbots Should Be at Least as Accountable as Kindergarteners

This proposal to create “bully-bot free” accountability for companionship chatbots interacting with children and teenagers is grounded in recognition of and respect for the humanity—the privacy, dignity, agency, autonomy, intellectual and creative freedom, and all other legally and morally recognized rights and interests of significant weight—of children and teenagers. This proposal is not grounded in any presumption, explicit or implicit, that these chatbots themselves have any form of humanity or moral claims.

Companionship chatbots are, of course, not actual humans, nor is the proposal of a “no bully bots” accountability standard based on any notion of bot moral personhood. (There are many interesting debates ongoing around such a status, outside the scope of this discussion, such as Anthropic having reserved the question of whether Claude is a “moral patient.”) This proposal aims to respond to the urgent need to identify and implement accountability standards that create ethical, practical, and consistent safety protections for minors who use companionship chatbots, often treating chatbots as “lifelike, quasi-human confidantes.” 

“No bullying” is the proverbial floor, not the corresponding ceiling, for minors’ behavior towards each other, especially during school. When children and teenagers engage with real-life, actual human confidantes or even just classmates, the American legal system aims to ensure that their fellow children and teenagers do not treat them in an unreasonably aggressive or hostile manner. The legal system generally holds minors accountable if they engage in bullying starting at a very young age (elementary school), even though they are developing humans with still-forming cognitive, emotional, and related capacities – developmental traits that can render “no bullying” accountability challenging. 

Human minors should receive the same baseline protection against bullying when they engage with human-like bots. This expectation seems especially reasonable given that many of these bots are designed and operationalized to encourage minor users to develop social, emotional, and similar connections to the bots. There’s a playground justice logic here: if the bots are going to play at being human and encourage actual humans to rely on them, the bots should play by the human safety rules too—and not engage in bullying. 

Stand Up to Bully-Bots 

Especially with back-to-school season underway and kids and teens returning to AI-infused classrooms, state lawmakers and regulators should pursue statutory and accompanying regulatory reform to use state consumer protection and related statutory frameworks to prohibit companionship chatbots that interact with minors as bullies – that is, through “unwanted, aggressive behavior . . . that involves a real or perceived power imbalance” between the minors and the bots. Such laws and regulations of course must be drafted to protect First Amendment and related constitutional protections at the federal and state level, avoiding – as set out in Georgia’s companionship chatbot law, for instance, the requirement of any “content moderation practices inconsistent” with constitutional rights.

In addition, educators, caregivers, and decision-makers in the lives of minors, schools, and communities should empathetically and consistently educate children and teenagers about companionship chatbot bullying. Adults also should encourage minors to bring any concerns or questions about such bullying to trusted humans or institutional resources who can help keep them safe, both in the moment and hopefully in growing a movement to make child and adolescent life “bully-bot free.” 

The post This Back-to-School Season, Create Bully-Bot Free Zones for Children and Teenagers appeared first on Just Security.

A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the last 24 hours. Here’s today’s news:

IRAN WAR

The U.S. Defense Department instructed U.S. Central Command several days ago to conclude preparations for resuming major combat operations in Iran, U.S. officials told Axios. The directive didn’t include a specific date for resuming strikes, but U.S. and Israeli sources say it could happen before the U.S. midterm elections. Barak Ravid reports.

IRAN WAR – YEMEN

Attacks claimed by the Iran-aligned Houthis on two airports in Saudi Arabia yesterday killed three people and wounded 36 others, according to the Saudi General Authority of Civil Aviation. The attacks damaged an airport in the capital Riyadh and one in the southern city of Abha, close to the Yemen border. Summer Said reports for the Wall Street Journal.

Syria is in discussions with Saudi Arabia to send its troops to Yemen to join the counteroffensive against the Houthis, U.S. officials told Axios. The Trump administration has been consulted by both countries and is not opposed in principle to the move. Barak Ravid reports.

IRAN WAR – OTHER DEVELOPMENTS

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth yesterday visited the USS Abraham Lincoln and gave the crew the Presidential Unit Citation, the highest honor a unit can receive. The award is typically reserved for significant achievement in combat, and was given for “40 days of combat operations and an ironclad maritime blockade against Iran in support of Operation Epic Fury.” Konstantin Toropin reports for AP News.

ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR

The FlyDubai co-pilot who allegedly tried to hijack the plane to Tel Aviv told investigators he was motivated to commit the attack because of the situation in Gaza, sources told the Wall Street Journal. Hamam al-Hammami had also sought out airlines and routes that would take him to Israel and almost carried out an attack in July before reconsidering because he cared about one of the crew members on the flight he was scheduled to hijack. Summer Said and Anat Peled report.

WEST BANK DEVELOPMENTS

An Israeli settler attack while Palestinians were harvesting olives near the village of Burqa in the Israeli-occupied West Bank yesterday killed one man, according to the Palestinian health ministry. The Israeli military said both soldiers and settlers had opened fire during the attack, and that soldiers were responding to a report of a Palestinian throwing a rock at a settler but did not say why the settlers were in the area. Mohammed Torokman reports for Reuters.

Top aide to U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, David Milstein, skewed and suppressed multiple reports and pieces of information that were critical of Israel, according to documents reviewed by the New York Times. Milstein’s efforts attempted to present the Israeli government in a positive light to the Trump administration after Trump’s explicit red lines for Israel, which included no annexation of the West Bank. Natan Odenheimer and Adam Rasgon report.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar today said most U.K. diplomats will leave the British consulate in Jerusalem, and said seven would remain “with a very limited scope of activity.” U.K. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband said some staff had been “temporarily withdrawn” for security reasons, but stressed the mission will “work with the Palestinian people.” Adam Goldsmith and James Landale report for BBC News.

RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR

A Russian bomb attack on the eastern Ukraine city of Kramatorsk today killed at least 33 people and injured another 18, according to local authorities. The authorities described the attack as a targeted strike on civilians and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the location as a bus stop. Donetsk region Gov. Vadym Filashkin said a bus with passengers “is an attractive target” for Russia because “one strike can kill as many people as possible.” Dan Peleschuk reports for Reuters.

Russia’s leading AI and technology company Yandex today said Ukrainian drones hit one of their data centers. The attack marks the first major attack on a Russian data hub since the start of the war. Yandex said its core consumer services were not affected, but did not describe the extent of the damage. Gleb Stolyarov and Gleb Bryanski report for Reuters.

Bulgarian President Iliana Yotova yesterday said Russia’s war in Ukraine had led to a “significant deterioration” in security in the Black Sea region. Yotova did not blame Russia for strikes on ships in Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast because there’s an ongoing investigation by Bulgarian authorities. Veselin Toshkov reports for AP News.

Top U.S. and Russian officials, including Special Envoy Jared Kushner and close advisor to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Kirill Dmitriev, have held talks about bringing a U.S. investor into the Nord Stream pipelines that delivered gas to Germany before Russia invaded Ukraine, sources told Reuters. Kushner views doing business as central to restoring peace. John O’Donnell, Gram Slattery, and David Gauthier-Villars report.

OTHER GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS

Russian health regulator Rospotrebnadzor yesterday said the researcher at an anti-plague institution who died from pneumonia had been vaccinated against the pathogens she worked with and that no “emergency situations” had occurred at the lab. The health regulator said two commissions monitoring biological safety had inspected the institute and no emergency situations were identified “during work with pathogenic microorganisms.” Paul Sonne reports for the New York Times.

U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham will today hold talks on tackling cyber-security threats and sabotage with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. Downing Street said deeper co-operation in the face of rising hybrid threats from Russia would be high on the agenda during Burnham’s first official visit to Germany. Jennifer McKiernan and Jessica Parker report for BBC News.

Head of Counter-Terrorism Policing London Cdr. Helen Flanagan today said Royal Navy service member Teddy Young has been charged with spying for an unnamed foreign country. Police said the charges were not related to the recent Royal Air Force Fairford incident. Cachella Smith reports for BBC News.

Maricarmen Abascal, the 87-year-old Spanish woman whose eviction last month sparked mass housing protests that led to an early election, yesterday died, according to the Madrid tenants’ union. Abascal had been in hospital for severe anxiety and exhaustion since her Sep. 23 eviction from her home of more than 70 years. Before her death, Spain’s two largest unions, UGT and CCOO, announced a nationwide general strike over housing issues scheduled for Nov. 11. Pietro Lombardi and Corina Pons report for Reuters; Mireia Merino and David Latona report for Reuters.

Ermiyas Ababu, a commander of the Ethiopian government-aligned Tigray Peace Force today said Eritrean soldiers entered the towns of Adigrat on Tuesday and Idaga Hamus yesterday in Northern Ethiopia. Ababu said Eritrean military officers were conducting surveillance in Idaga Hamus. Separately conflict monitoring group ACLED said Eritrean troops crossed the border at Zelambesa yesterday and Ethiopian military drones targeted them at Guada as they travelled toward Idaga Hamus. AP News reports.

A Human Rights Watch report released yesterday said hundreds of detainees in El Salvador are having simultaneous joint hearings that result in near-universal convictions for gang-related offenses. Lawyers and HRW reported widespread violations of international human rights conventions in these trials. James Wagner reports for the New York Times.

A Chinese militia boat was spotted along with two other vessels off Taiwan’s Pacific coast in August, according to a surveillance report reviewed by Reuters. The sighting is the first of its kind in the area. Yimou Lee reports.

CLIMATE DEVELOPMENTS

The World Wide Fund for Nature Living Planet Report released today highlighted multiple signs of wildlife recoveries, which the WWF said shows conservation can work. The report also found that monitored wildlife populations around the world have fallen by an average of 73% since 1970, and that nature remains in “freefall,” but called the report one of hope. Justin Rowlatt reports for BBC News.

Turkish Climate Minister and president of this year’s U.N. COP31 conference Murat Kurum today said restricting global warming is a matter of survival and too many countries are shirking their responsibilities to cut emissions. Peter Hobson reports for Reuters.

U.S. AI DEVELOPMENTS

A Common Sense Media report released yesterday said some of the guardrails OpenAI included in its ChatGPT for Teens product don’t work as intended and the chatbot poses an “unacceptable risk” to children. The watchdog group urged OpenAI to restrict the chatbot to adults “until it can offer a safe, developmentally appropriate experience.” Barbara Ortutay reports for AP News.

President Trump will today attend a summit meant to empower scientists and position the United States as a leader in breakthroughs driven by “super intelligence,” according to an announcement first shared with Axios. Maria Curi and Alex Isenstadt report.

New company National Compute plans to donate $100 million worth of computing credits to the Trump administration to be used to advance scientific discovery. The credits are expected to be announced today at an event with White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios. Sophia Cai and Katie Roof report for POLITICO.

U.S. FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Former Syrian Gen. Bassam al-Hassan, wanted for crimes against humanity, is being bankrolled and protected by U.S. and Lebanese authorities, a joint BBC News and NPR investigation has found. al-Hassan is being harboured in Lebanon, and was allowed to remain there under an arrangement involving the FBI and other U.S. and Lebanese authorities due to his willingness to provide information about the abduction of U.S. journalist Austin Tice in Syria in 2012, as well as additional intelligence. Sara Obeidat and Josh Baker report.

Former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores are expected to face new charges over the alleged torture of U.S. citizens who were held in Venezuelan government custody in recent years, sources told CNN. An announcement could come as soon as today. Flores’ lawyers today are set to urge a judge to free her from jail and put her under house arrest because she has heart problems. Evan Perez, Hannah Rabinowitz, Kara Scannell, and Jennifer Hansler report; Philip Marcelo and Larry Neumeister report for AP News.

The Trump administration has begun direct talks with Myanmar’s military-installed government, sources told Reuters. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research Michael Vance played a leading role in the outreach, which has focused on shutting down scam centers that target U.S. citizens, but could lead to broader engagement, including on Myanmar’s rare-earth mineral deposits. Simon Lewis reports.

The State Department pressured diplomatic officials from the EU, Canada, and Lithuania to pull out of an international conference on disinformation hosted in Lithuania yesterday and today, called #Disinfo2026, after organizers announced panels warning of the threat posed by U.S. government officials and the country’s influence broadly, according to excerpts of a State Department cable seen by POLITICO. The conference’s sessions such as “foreign information manipulation and interference” bothered the Trump administration. Eliza Gkritsi, Nahal Toosi, and Jack Detsch report.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio yesterday said the Trump administration’s “unapologetic pursuit of national power” offers a model to revive Western power rather than threaten alliances. During a speech on the Pynx in Athens, Greece Rubio added that the course “we take will determine whether the West maintains its place at the head of the world or resigns itself to a future of atrophy and servitude and decline.” Vera Bergengruen and Robbie Gramer report for the Wall Street Journal.

Federal authorities in Florida and Texas yesterday seized over 600,000 gallons of biodiesel bound for Cuba. The special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations in Miami José R. Figueroa said the shipments “reflect a deliberate and coordinated effort to supply” the sanctioned company ENETEC S.A.. David Ovalle and David C. Adams report for the New York Times.

Foreign workers building the new U.S. consulate compound in Milan, Italy, yesterday signed agreements securing payouts averaging $50,400 each for alleged labor abuses while working for U.S. company Caddell Construction. More than 60 laborers, mostly from India, signed the deals to receive their share of the nearly $35 million settlement agreed last month with the company. Colleen Barry reports for AP News.

U.S. IMMIGRATION DEVELOPMENTS

Brazilian Danilo Alves Silva yesterday was charged with multiple felonies for impersonating an ICE officer at a Miami polling site during the Brazilian presidential election on Sunday. Silva is facing felony counts of voter intimidation, conspiracy to commit bribery, and influencing a public servant, alongside two misdemeanors. The polling site was one of about a dozen locations in the United States where Brazilians living abroad could vote in their country’s general election. Laura Chung and Remy Tumin report for the New York Times.

ICE has quietly used a warehouse in Roxbury, New Jersey as a detention facility all summer, sources told NPR. The warehouse was one piece of a one billion-dollar plan by the Department of Homeland Security to detain migrants which would convert warehouses into detention centers. The plan was largely abandoned after it faced backlash and legal challenges from residents and immigrant advocates. An official at a government contractor whose company was approached to convert several of the warehouses into ICE facilities said no one “we spoke to at DHS was for this idea whatsoever. The deputy director told us point-blank that they had pushed back very hard on it.” and that White House Deputy Chief of Staff and Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller “did not want the facilities that were comfortable. He did not want facilities that were humane. We were told point-blank that that was not what the administration wanted.” Jasmine Garsd reports.

DHS yesterday proposed significantly raising fees for international students seeking Optional Practical Training and for applications for program extensions. The current fee is around $500 and typically paid for by the students, but under the proposals schools would have to pay $70,000 for each student seeking OPT and $30,000 for program extensions. Bianca Quilantan reports for POLITICO.

U.S. DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS

House Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) yesterday introduced legislation that would direct the Smithsonian to preserve and display artifacts he said reflect the rise of “governmental propaganda” under Trump. Avery Lotz reports for Axios.

State Attorney Generals representing 39 states and Washington D.C. yesterday signed an amicus brief that urged the Supreme Court to take up a case brought forth by New Jersey which seeks to overturn an appellate court ruling that found federal law regulating commodity trading superseded the state’s gambling laws. The case concerns prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket. Ashley Ahn reports for POLITICO.

Ambassador of the United States to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle pushed Trump donor Eric Deters to transfer her $100,000 that she said she owed American Express before her confirmation as ambassador, according to messages reviewed by the Wall Street Journal. Guilfoyle offered to use her sway as the former fiancee of Donald Trump Jr., but Deters did not pay her. Dana Mattioli, Drew Hinshaw, Rebecca Ballhaus, and Joe Parkinson report.

Leon Botstein, who had ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, yesterday resigned from all his positions affiliated with Bard College. The announcement came the same day the House Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Bard leaders saying that while Botstein was president, he “likely enabled and possibly even participated in” Epstein’s abuse. Vimal Patel reports for the New York Times.

A military judge yesterday excluded the latest disputed confessions of a prisoner accused of conspiring in the 9/11 attacks. The statements were obtained through a program designed by former President Bush’s administration lawyers in 2007 because the defendants’ previous statement to the C.I.A. were considered coerced and could not be used against them. The judge ruled that the agents failed to notify Walid bin Attash that what the C.I.A. extracted from him from 2003 to 2006 in forced interrogations could not be used against him, and also found that when F.B.I. agents brought treats to their interrogation room to gain bin Attash’s cooperation, they were copying a technique sometimes used by the C.I.A. to keep a prisoner confessing. Carol Rosenberg reports for the New York Times.

A group of current and former Lincoln University students yesterday filed a lawsuit against Missouri for nearly $549 million. The suit argues that the state spent decades illegally underfunding the historically black university. The suit will test a 19th century federal law that envisioned equitable public financing for institutions that were created as havens for Black Americans. Alan Blinder reports for the New York Times.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACTION

The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA President Sara Nelson yesterday said the union has safety concerns about Trump’s proposed triumphal arch that will be on final approach to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. Nelson said the arch compounds multiple safety concerns that have gone unaddressed from a deadly Jan. 2025 crash over the Potomac River that killed 67 people. Gary Fields reports for AP News.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is planning a broad federal effort to address vaccine injuries, including a new research clinic at the National Institutes of Health and a new billing code to reimburse doctors for filing reports of serious vaccine side effects, sources told the New York Times. Sheryl Gay Stolberg reports.

Trump yesterday said he will help pay for his administration’s campaign-style advertisements after the Democratic National Committee sued over their use of taxpayer money. The suit accuses Trump of personally directing illegal government-sponsored propaganda. A coalition including nonpartisan watchdog Common Cause filed a separate lawsuit that also alleges illegal misuse of funds. Josephine Walker reports for Axios; Ali Swenson reports for AP News.

Trump yesterday threatened to fire two of his top political consultants, Chris LaCivita and James Blair, if he finds a conflict after reports that they advised a Russia-aligned government ahead of local elections there. Trump on social media said they “do not work for me, other than as outside consultants.” Josephine Walker and Marc Caputo report for Axios.

Did you miss this? Stay up-to-date with our Litigation Tracker: Legal Challenges to Trump Administration Actions.

If you enjoy listening, Just Security’s analytic articles are also available in audio form on the justsecurity.org website.

ICYMI: Yesterday on Just Security

How to Better Enforce the Darfur Arms Embargo

By Mutasim Ali and Yonah Diamond

The post Early Edition: October 8, 2026 appeared first on Just Security.

The catalog below organizes our coverage into general categories to facilitate access to relevant topics for policymakers, researchers, journalists, scholars, and the public at large. The archive will be updated as new pieces are published.

We welcome readers to use the archive to follow climate change developments and generate new lines of analysis. To search headlines and authors, expand one or all of the topics, as needed, and use CTRL-F on your keyboard to open the search tool. The archive also is available in reverse chronological order at the climate change articles page.

IMAGES (left to right): Natural disaster and its consequences (via Getty Images); In this picture taken on September 28, 2022, an internally displaced flood-affected family sits outside their tent at a makeshift tent camp in Jamshoro district of Sindh province (Photo by Rizwan Tabassum/AFP via Getty Images; Trees smolder and burn during the Dixie fire near Greenville, California on August 3, 2021. – Numerous fires are raging through the state’s northern forests, as climate change makes wildfire season longer, hotter and more devastating. (Photo by JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images)

The post Just Security’s Climate Archive appeared first on Just Security.

One such effort is currently being debated by the United Nations Security Council, which is considering whether to extend and expand an existing arms embargo on Darfur, with a vote scheduled for Oct. 8. The Security Council first imposed the arms embargo by adopting Resolution 1556 in 2004, importantly, banning the supply of arms to the Janjaweed, which later turned into the RSF, the militia committing genocide today. Resolution 1591 (2005) expanded the embargo to include all other armed actors in Darfur. The arms embargo, however, remains one of the most underutilized and flouted binding legal instruments—an egregious, yet practically consequential, gap in the international system that has not received the attention it deserves. Plus, the total failure of a decades-long arms embargo further fuels cynicism toward the international system more generally. 

Today, the RSF essentially controls Darfur, and so, the debate at the Security Council has devolved into a struggle between backers of the RSF (which includes the United Arab Emirates) and the SAF (whose supporters oppose expansion of the arms embargo). The United States is pushing for a proposal to expand the embargo to the whole country, maintaining that “a long-term technical rollover of this mandate is not an option.” Although that premise is correct—the status quo embargo is ineffectual and must adapt to present realities—the U.S. focus is misplaced and skips a step that would give the existing embargo teeth. Why should the Security Council expand a (largely symbolic) embargo without first developing the infrastructure needed to operationalize its coverage of Darfur, already a complex territory to monitor? 

We have observed the UAE redoubling its efforts to influence Security Council action on Sudan in recent months. Even the U.S. proposal to expand the arms embargo is suspected to be driven by the UAE’s efforts to reshape Sudan’s dynamics on the ground in favor of the RSF after recent military setbacks. The Trump administration’s credibility on this issue is completely compromised by its perceived allegiance to the UAE, a bias that was seemingly strengthened by the $500 million direct investment made by UAE National Security Adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan in the Trump family’s cryptocurrency venture. 

Rather than the U.S. proposal, the Security Council’s main focus should be ensuring compliance with its existing resolutions that are binding on all U.N. member States. Without compliance, the Security Council loses all credibility and authority. Worse, the false assurance of an empty arms embargo signals to arms suppliers that there are no consequences for fueling the conflict, turning the institution entrusted with maintaining international peace and security into one contributing to destabilization. To avoid this outcome, the Security Council needs to give the current Darfur arms embargo concrete backing so it can halt the supply of arms sustaining this genocidal conflict.

The UAE, the Most Significant Arms Embargo Violator

The independent U.N. body assigned to monitor implementation of the Darfur arms embargo is the U.N. Panel of Experts on Sudan, which has documented significant violations since the start of the conflict in April 2023, including tracing RSF main supply lines to the UAE. But the U.N. Panel of Experts is not equipped to deal with the scope of this mandate, given its paltry resources and merely five independent experts, only one of whom is an arms specialist, all working remotely. Moreover, the Panel’s work, appointments, and logistics entirely depend on the political wrangling of the Security Council, including intensive negotiations delaying extensions to the Panel’s mandate and the dilution of final report findings, likely due to internal pressure by implicated countries. Specifically, as the authors have confirmed in closed-door meetings with U.N. diplomats, the Panel has undergone significant pressure to remove or temper its allegations against the UAE. 

The U.N. Fact-Finding Mission on Sudan (FFM), a separate Human Rights Council-appointed body, further traced RSF supply lines to the UAE, Libya, and other nearby countries, and linked RSF atrocities, including genocidal violence in El Fasher, to such external support. The FFM finding that UAE support played an indispensable role in the RSF’s “capacity to sustain operations” (September 2026 Report, para. 73) echoes intelligence and confidential evidence we repeatedly receive through our engagements with diplomats, investigators, and the intelligence community. It is the lack of sensible monitoring and enforcement that has enabled the UAE to fund a campaign of genocide since 2024 against primarily the Massalit and Zaghawa, non-Arab ethnic groups in West and North Darfur states. Other investigations have further corroborated the UAE’s embargo violations. Given these documented violations, the Security Council should focus on investigating and exposing actors already verified as violators rather than discussing the expansion of a symbolic arms embargo.

While other outside actors have supplied the SAF, including Turkey, Iran, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia, the UAE is the most significant violator of the current arms embargo that applies to Darfur, which is nearly entirely controlled by the UAE’s proxy, the RSF. Moreover, the UAE is consistently identified as the most consequential external actor meddling in the conflict. 

But there are no independent mechanisms in place to officially inspect the documented Emirati cargo shipments via regional airports and off-the-grid airstrips. The lack of appropriate monitoring or enforcement mechanisms partly allows the UAE to deny allegations or to claim its shipments are “humanitarian” in nature, taking a plausible deniability strategy and shielding itself from scrutiny by the U.N.’s highest executive authority. And when the UAE refuses to disclose flight manifests or ships weapons on circuitous routes through dangerous off-the-radar terrain to Darfur, the power of the U.N. Panel of Experts ends there, as it lacks subpoena power and adequate resources to conduct the necessary investigation into these complex arms shipments. 

Recommendations for Arms Embargo Compliance 

Given the cracks in the current system through which arms continue to sustain this conflict, diplomats should consider bringing a case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for arms embargo compliance. They should also lobby the U.N. and the African Union for the establishment of a dedicated illicit arms transfer monitoring institution.

First, States can bring a case to the ICJ to adjudicate State compliance with the U.N. arms embargo, either against the UAE and/or intermediary States, for funneling arms to Darfur. The fact that Sudan, the site of the world’s largest conflict-driven humanitarian crisis, is omitted from the list of ongoing ICJ cases speaks to a deeply systematic injustice. By contrast, the cases addressing contemporary mass atrocities (in Myanmar, Gaza, and two Ukraine cases) are all at advanced stages of proceedings, and they began in 2019, 2023, 2022, and 2017, respectively.

In May 2025, the only case that has appeared before the ICJ in response to the Sudan conflict came and went within just two months. The Court quickly dismissed the case for manifest lack of jurisdiction based on the UAE’s archaic, and increasingly obsolete, Article IX reservation to the Genocide Convention (which gives the ICJ jurisdiction). While there are ample grounds to overturn such unjust reservations evading responsibility under the Genocide Convention, there are other legal bases to bring a different, but indisputably necessary case for Sudan. 

The Darfur Arms Embargo, based on the Security Council’s authority under the U.N. Charter (Chapter VII Article 25), provides such grounds to bring an ICJ case, as Security Council decisions are legally binding on all U.N. member States. Breaches of the Arms Embargo fall squarely within ICJ jurisdiction under Article 36 of the Court’s Statute. The Sudan ICJ case can be further pled and buttressed by the Geneva Conventions, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and even the Genocide Convention. 

The ICJ carries a unique ability to issue urgent provisional measures in short order, which can serve to protect the Sudanese people at immediate risk of genocide. As long as the conflict persists, so does the risk of irreparable harm (standard for provisional measures) to the most fundamental treaties and vulnerable protected groups thereunder. 

An ICJ intervention would have real consequences on the ground and strengthen the rule of law by setting a precedent for arms embargo violations. A binding judicial determination would clarify and expand the factual record, bring additional evidence to light, counter any denials by violating States, hold States accountable for violations, and provide further legal bases for targeted sanctions or domestic legal proceedings against key perpetrators and enablers. A declaratory order from the world’s highest court would give diplomats a concrete avenue for intervention and ongoing response to the conflict. 

States can also take preliminary steps by confronting UAE diplomats privately over their country’s arms supplying and complicity allegations in Sudan or issuing public statements demanding that the UAE comply with the embargo. 

Second, diplomats and international lawyers should push for the establishment of a dedicated international institution to monitor arms embargoes and illicit arms transfers, as the new frontier in international justice and accountability. The burden of investigating illicit arms transfers, cargo flight contents, flight manifests, arms export licenses, and end-use agreements, then tracing arms through serial numbers or other indicia to the insignia of fighters on the ground is well beyond the capacity of NGOs and independent investigators alone. An illicit arms transfer monitoring institution can serve to prevent and hold violators accountable, complementing international criminal prosecutions, which largely address violence after-the-fact. It is clear that domestic systems fail to sufficiently track all illicit arms transfers to high-risk conflict zones used in mass atrocities. An international oversight institution can draw on the International Atomic Energy Agency model and operate through a centralized, remote monitoring headquarters and a rotation of dedicated inspectors in the field, independent of political influence, monitoring key smuggling points of entry, including unannounced on-site visits. 

Alternatively, the U.N. can narrowly circumscribe a monitoring mechanism for the Sudan conflict specifically, which has lacked the necessary international resources and attention it requires. While there remain political obstacles in the way of a peacekeeping force, a U.N.-mandated mission designated to conduct cross-border inspections at high-risk entry points along Sudan’s borders and equipped with advanced technologies to detect suspicious cargo flights can bridge the enforcement gap over the unobstructed supply of weapons sustaining the conflict. 

Simply put, the existing international regimes tasked with addressing the atrocities in Sudan are incapable of effectively ending or reducing the violence. Worse, the processes themselves are actively undermined and violated by malign external actors like the UAE. It is incumbent upon U.N. member States, therefore, to reinforce the international legal mechanisms already in place.

The post How to Better Enforce the Darfur Arms Embargo appeared first on Just Security.

The case originates from a 2018 suit filed by Boulder County, a county in Colorado devastated in recent years by both wildfires and floods. Boulder seeks to impose state tort liability on two large energy producers, Suncor and Exxon, for damages resulting from climate change. Boulder alleges that these companies promoted and sold fossil fuels while misrepresenting their dangers, thereby exacerbating global climate change and ultimately inflicting harm on Boulder’s residents and property. Boulder brings state-law tort claims against Suncor and Exxon, including nuisance, trespass, unjust enrichment, and deceptive trade practices, and seeks compensation and adaptation costs for the local harms caused by climate change. 

Earlier efforts to hold fossil fuel companies liable under federal law have failed. A ruling in Boulder’s favor would allow state judges and juries to decide whether counties and states may impose tort liability on greenhouse gas producers for local injuries. In other words, such a ruling would keep state tort suits open as an avenue for climate litigation. Conversely, a ruling in favor of Suncor and Exxon would close or narrow that avenue, potentially shutting down dozens of similar, ongoing suits. 

The questions before the Court in Suncor are about jurisdiction and federal preemption: first, whether the Supreme Court has statutory and Article III jurisdiction to hear the case; and second, whether federal law should preempt state-law claims seeking relief for local injury allegedly caused by the damaging effects of greenhouse gas emissions.

Monday’s argument offered few clear signals about how the Court will rule, but it revealed where the fault lines lie. The Court’s three liberal judges appeared more supportive of Boulder, while the questions from Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh seemed to favor the energy companies. Justice Samuel Alito’s notable recusal from the case opens the door to a possible 4-4 split, which would leave the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling for Boulder in place, without setting binding precedent. Another possible outcome is dismissal of certiorari as improvidently granted, meaning the Court decides it should not have taken the case in the first place. 

Below, we break down the top takeaways from the oral argument, including: the Justices’ attention to the jurisdictional question; the headwinds facing Suncor’s extraterritoriality and structural constitutional theories; the Justices’ divided views on what room the Clean Air Act leaves for state tort claims; and some Justices’ concerns about the flood of copycat suits. 

Jurisdiction Attracted Attention from Four Justices

At oral argument, jurisdiction occupied a relatively small share of the argument, but Justice Clarence Thomas raised the issue at the outset in his questioning of both Suncor’s and the government’s counsel. Justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson returned to jurisdiction repeatedly, particularly in questioning Suncor’s counsel. With Justice Alito recused, dismissal based on jurisdiction would require two conservative Justices (either Roberts, Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, or Amy Coney Barrett) to join Justices Kagan, Sotomayor and Jackson for a majority dismissing for lack of jurisdiction. 

Before reaching the merits, the Court must decide whether it has the power to hear the case at all, given that Boulder’s case is still pending in Colorado trial court. The Supreme Court may review state-court cases only after final judgement by the state’s highest court. Here, the trial court denied Suncor’s motion to dismiss, and the Colorado Supreme Court agreed that Boulder’s claims could go forward. Suncor is therefore asking the U.S. Supreme Court to step in to what Boulder argues is only an interlocutory appeal, not a final judgment—raising the threshold question of whether the Supreme Court has jurisdiction to do so. 

Suncor argued that the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling nonetheless counts as a final judgement because it ended a separate, “self-contained” proceeding in that court. Boulder responded that the ruling was an ordinary interlocutory appeal that the Court lacks jurisdiction to review, and that Suncor has not suffered the kind of concrete injury required for the Court to hear the case. 

Justice Sotomayor was the most skeptical of the Court’s jurisdiction to hear the case. She noted that Colorado’s Supreme Court heard the appeal under Colorado Appellate Rule 21, which authorizes both writ-type and appellate review, but never articulated which appellate jurisdiction it was exercising. If the Supreme Court was unsure, she asked, “shouldn’t we be certifying this question to the Colorado court instead of us deciding it?” 

Several Justices also questioned whether Suncor had suffered an immediate judicially cognizable injury as a result of the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling, which Suncor’s counsel described as eliminating its central federal defense in the state case, costing Suncor what the counsel called, citing Murphy v. NCAA, “the right to be free from state regulation.” Justice Sotomayor commented, “I don’t know that we’ve ever talked of spending money on litigation as a constitutional injury,” while Justice Jackson suggested that it was “premature” to review Suncor’s defenses “piecemeal,” given that Suncor’s other federal defenses, including personal jurisdiction, remain pending in state court.

The Merits in a Nutshell

On the merits, Suncor and Exxon, supported by the federal government, offer three theories why federal law preempts Boulder’s claims: (1) the Constitution’s structure, through the principles of equal state sovereignty and a bar on state regulation of conduct beyond their borders, preempts state claims based on interstate emissions; (2) the federal Clean Air Act, alongside the Supreme Court’s interstate pollution precedents, preempts state claims; and (3) the doctrine of foreign affairs preemption bars the claims because they interfere with the nation’s conduct of foreign policy. Boulder dismisses each of these preemption doctrines, instead arguing that its claims seeking compensation under state tort law for local injuries do not regulate interstate emissions, conflict with the Clean Air Act, or intrude on federal foreign policy. Of these three theories, the first two dominated the argument. 

Suncor’s Extraterritoriality Theory Faced Headwinds

Suncor’s constitutional argument rested on two “closely related” “principles”: “equal sovereignty” and “extraterritoriality.” Extraterritoriality was especially salient throughout the argument. Suncor’s counsel, Kannon Shanmugam, argued in his opening statement that “the Constitution’s prohibition on extraterritorial regulation precludes a state from extending its law beyond its borders to regulate global conduct with global effects” based only on “attenuated effects” within the state.

Several Justices were skeptical of this assertion. Chief Justice Roberts pressed Shanmugam to concede that an actor in one state can sometimes be held liable for harms that it causes in another. The Chief later pointed the government’s lawyer, Principal Deputy Solicitor General Sarah Harris, to “familiar situations,” such as internet and mass-tort cases, where one state’s courts adjudicate conduct affecting many other states. Justice Kagan asked Shanmugam to explain why ordinary choice-of-law principles would not resolve the dispute. Justice Jackson went further, observing that Suncor’s proposed test for extraterritoriality—which asks whether there are “direct, traceable, and particularized effects” in the state—sounded “very close to a causation standard or test” and asking why the Court should constitutionalize that question. 

Justice Barrett, however, pushed in the opposite direction. She asked Boulder’s counsel to imagine that Colorado’s legislature enacted a law expressly regulating emissions in the other 49 states and then asked whether Colorado could accomplish essentially the same thing through tort law. Her question implied that this, in her view, is what Boulder is attempting here. 

Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson also suggested the Court may not need to reach extraterritoriality at all. Justices Sotomayor and Kagan noted that the parties had not argued, and the lower court had not addressed, the extraterritoriality issue before it reached the Supreme Court. Justice Sotomayor observed that Suncor had raised extraterritoriality only in its reply brief and asked whether it had therefore forfeited the defense. Justice Jackson came at the issue from a different angle, noting that the trial court had already found that Boulder had plausibly alleged causation, that Suncor had not appealed that ruling, and that the litigation had not yet developed enough factual detail to identify the relevant sources of pollution. “Maybe they lose because they can’t actually trace this to any particular source,” she said, suggesting that the Court should wait for the state courts to develop these facts before taking up Suncor’s constitutional theories. Together, these questions suggest that the Court’s liberal Justices may be looking for a procedural off-ramp, resting on what Suncor failed to raise below rather than on the merits of its theories.

Several Justices Were Skeptical of Suncor’s Structural-Constitutional Arguments 

Several Justices appeared similarly dubious about Suncor’s structural-constitutional argument, particularly the claim that the principle of equal sovereignty makes climate regulation an area of “uniquely federal interests that dictate the application of federal [as opposed to state] law.” 

Justice Kagan questioned the basis for Suncor’s claim that this default rule of federal law was a part of the plan of the 1787 Constitutional Convention, asking: “[W]here is the text for that? Where’s the support for that? Where’s the precedent for that? Where’s the anything for that?” Justice Gorsuch also seemed skeptical, asking: “Is there something in the Constitution that prohibits the application of Texas law to a Texas defendant?” Both Justices also seemed frustrated that Suncor’s structural-constitutional and extraterritoriality theories blurred together and were entangled, with Justice Kagan chiding Suncor’s counsel for constantly “switching back and forth between your two theories.” 

Justice Kavanaugh, by contrast, appeared broadly supportive of Suncor but reluctant to invent new constitutional doctrine. He suggested that “we don’t have to reinvent the wheel” because notable statutory interpretation energy precedents—including Milwaukee I, Milwaukee II, Ouellette, and AEP—already established that “this kind of pollution is a federal law matter unless Congress speaks otherwise.”

The Justices Wrestled With States’ Role in Environmental Regulation 

The Justices were divided over what room the Clean Air Act leaves for state tort law. If, as Suncor and the government argued, the Act preserves only suits under the law of the source state, there is no space for Boulder’s claims under Colorado law. Justices Kavanaugh and Barrett seemed receptive to Suncor’s argument, but Justices Barrett and Gorsuch also questioned whether that theory would leave some harms with no remedy at all. 

State courts normally have broader lawmaking powers than federal courts—but a narrow body of judge-made “federal common law” has developed in areas involving strong national interests. The Court once used federal common law to resolve disputes between states over cross-border pollution. But after Congress enacted the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, the Court held that those statutes had displaced that federal common law. A central question in Suncor is whether those federal statutes also displaced state law. 

Suncor argues that interstate pollution is an “inherently federal” area that states have no power to regulate. Boulder responds that states can apply their own law to injuries caused by out-of-state emissions because the federal statutes, while displacing the federal common law, did not similarly preempt state common-law actions for environmental harms. 

Justice Kavanaugh was highly critical of Boulder’s position that the Clean Air Act “resurrected” state tort law after displacing federal common law. He called it an “all-time elephant in mousehole in terms of what Congress would have done there,” invoking the legal presumption that Congress does not make major policy changes without clear language. Justice Barrett agreed with Suncor that it “can’t possibly be correct” that when Congress enacted the Clean Water and Air Acts, “state law somehow sprung into effect” in an area long held to be exclusively federal. 

Even so, Justices Barrett and Gorsuch appeared open to at least some residual state authority over environmental regulation. Justice Barrett suggested that state authority may have existed all along, in which case the Clean Air Act would not have needed to affirmatively “authorize” state tort suits for states to retain such authority. Both Justices also pressed the government on whether its theory would leave a regulatory gap whenever the Clean Air Act does not give Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) authority over a particular environmental harm, such as greenhouse-gas emissions. When Harris, the government’s counsel, replied that no federal common-law causes of action would exist in such situations, Justice Gorsuch noted the anomaly that position would produce: federal common law provided a cause of action before Congress passed the Clean Air Act, but afterward “nobody can sue at all,” even where the Act gave EPA no authority to address the harm.

The Justices were clearly grappling with the scope of federal and state common law in the environmental context and the extent to which each has been displaced by the Clean Air Act. Neither Justice Gorsuch nor Justice Barrett seemed fully persuaded by either side’s broad theories, and their votes may prove pivotal to the outcome of the case. 

Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kavanaugh Appeared Receptive to Suncor’s Consequentialist Arguments

Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kavanaugh—who have both sought to reorient the Court’s jurisprudence toward the nation’s history and tradition—seemed more concerned about the potential consequences of ruling against Suncor than with Boulder’s historical claim that tort claims of this kind have traditionally been a matter of state law.

Chief Justice Roberts raised concerns about the volume of litigation that may follow a favorable ruling for Boulder: “if you prevail,” the Chief Justice observed, “the next day, a municipality in every single state will file a lawsuit, they’ll probably copy your pleadings, and then there will be at least 50 . . . different cities” bringing similar suits. Boulder’s counsel responded that there are many examples where “a course of conduct causes mass liability across the nation,” and that courts have “deal[t] with them . . . through litigation,” citing litigation over asbestos and opioids. 

The Chief Justice pushed back on the asbestos analogy, noting that “there’s always going to be greenhouse-gas emissions affecting every state . . . [s]o it’s not as if anything other than your litigation is going to address it.” Justice Kavanaugh worried that this class of litigation “is going to bankrupt …these various defendants and certainly other defendants out there.” Boulder’s counsel responded that States have traditionally had authority to apply their own tort law against actors who cause harm within their borders. Justice Kavanaugh replied that, in such circumstances, state law would not apply unless “specifically preserved” by the Clean Air Act. 

Looking Ahead

The argument left several paths open. With Justice Alito recused, the Court could split 4-4, leaving the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling for Boulder in place; it could dismiss for lack of jurisdiction; or it could reach the merits and decide whether federal law forecloses state-law climate suits like Boulder’s. Justices Gorsuch and Barrett will be the key votes to watch, and even if a majority of the Justices agree on the outcome, they may reach it through different routes, leaving a fractured set of opinions. The Court’s ultimate decision will shape the fate of Boulder’s suit and dozens of similar suits nationwide. 

The post Key Takeaways from <i>Suncor v. Boulder</i> Oral Argument: Jurisdiction, Preemption, and the Proper Role of State Tort Law in Addressing Climate Change appeared first on Just Security.

Globally, the number of people over 60 is increasing, as is their proportion in populations. People are living longer thanks to improvements in public health, education, and poverty reduction. Declining fertility rates are shaping age structures in unprecedented ways. In less than 25 years, by 2050, the number of people over 60 will roughly double from 2020 levels and will make up more than 20 percent of the global population. The majority of older people already live in low- and middle-income countries; these nations are the least prepared for changes already underway. 

U.S. partners and allies that are unprepared for such demographic change may face growing health and social spending as their populations age, leaving fewer resources for other priorities, including defense. Shrinking labor pools could slow economic growth (AI’s impacts in labor and aggregate productivity remain unclear.) And rising rates of chronic disease risk overwhelming health services. “Global aging abroad may contribute to changes in U.S. alliances, global stability, and conflicts,” the GAO wrote.

But population aging does not have to be a threat. Experts predict that longer lives can contribute to financial growth across many sectors, when adequate policies and systems are in place. When people can live longer in good health and contribute on equal terms, societies can reap dividends from an older population. Countries can prepare and respond better to crises and disasters. Those benefits extend beyond borders: thriving economies and stable nations make stronger trade and security partners for the United States. 

Most Countries Lag in Adapting to Demographic Changes 

However, most countries have yet to adapt their health, employment, long-term care, and other systems to ensure longer lives are healthy lives. 

Around the world, older people face bias in employment, exclusion from civic life, and barriers to healthcare and services, as well as financial and physical exploitation and abuse. They are disproportionately impacted in disasters and humanitarian crises. Older women, who typically live longer than men, face multiple forms of discrimination, lower earnings, and greater caregiving duties over the course of their lives, leaving them more likely to live in poverty and poor health in later life. 

These harms undermine both individual and societal well-being. A recent U.S. Census Bureau report, An Aging World 2025, makes an “urgent call” for countries to respond to the challenge of creating a society where the “older population is healthy, thriving, and engaged.” Global health investments should include primary healthcare systems that can provide a continuum of care across the life course, including to prevent and manage non-communicable diseases, the leading cause of death worldwide. Long-term care is also crucial, particularly high-quality care for older people who want to age at home. Home- and community-based systems of care not only support autonomy and choice, but are cost-effective and bring social dividends. 

In addition, with the increasing frequency and severity of climate-related disasters and persistent conflict and displacement crises, national and global emergency preparedness and response must adjust to changing populations. Confronting agism, which persists in the workplace, social discourse, the media, healthcare, the legal system, and beyond, is also crucial to ensuring equal opportunities and quality of life for older people. 

Seek and Use Input from Older People

To get the analysis right and plan for the future, policymakers should seek and utilize input from older people and the organizations that represent them. For example, in collaboration with my organization, HelpAge USA, the National Academy of Medicine sought input and insights from older people in seven countries on how to implement its ambitious 2022 Global Roadmap for Healthy Longevity. In addition, we work together with national partners to ensure that older people living in protracted conflicts and disasters in Ukraine, Ethiopia, Venezuela, and beyond actively participate in humanitarian response planning at the highest levels. 

Demographic change is a complex, transnational phenomenon that will require not only a thorough assessment of its implications for U.S. interests, but also global leadership to ensure that countries find ways to collaborate and approach opportunities and challenges together. A worldwide phenomenon in an interconnected world will require coordination and cooperation across borders.

For starters, to enable coordination across the U.S. government and provide the necessary leadership for its outreach abroad, Congress should authorize an ambassador-at-large for global population aging and older people, and appropriate sufficient funds for the office to provide both cross-agency guidance and international diplomatic leadership. Effective and efficient use of U.S. foreign assistance also requires understanding and responding to new demographic realities. Humanitarian, food, health, and other foreign assistance should specifically take into account the requirements of older people. 

Global population aging is inevitable. Congress should act on the GAO’s findings and authorize a dedicated leader so that the United States is prepared to capitalize on the opportunities ahead.

The post Why the U.S. Must Prepare for Rapid Global Population Aging – and How appeared first on Just Security.

These laws, most of which have been in force for more than 150 years, unmistakably convey Congress’s intent to bar any kind of military interference in American elections. Even so, in 1968, the Office of Legal Counsel asserted in a short, conclusory memo that Section 592’s prohibition on troops at the polls does not apply if the president has invoked the Insurrection Act. The Insurrection Act is the most important statutory exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, allowing the president to use federal military forces to execute the law in certain emergency situations. 

The OLC memo, which was prepared during the chaotic months leading up to the 1968 presidential election, contains no meaningful legal analysis. Instead, its authors point only to a forthcoming opinion that would lay out OLC’s arguments and evidence in detail. Yet if that larger memo was ever produced, it has never been made public or even been referenced in any publicly available OLC documents.

The memo is wrong on many counts. To start, it disregards basic and well-established rules of statutory interpretation. When two statutes come into conflict, the later-in-time statute normally controls, and the specific normally displaces the general. The Insurrection Act was last substantively amended in 1874, but Congress revised Section 592 in 1909, removing its exception permitting troops to “keep peace at the polls.” Section 592 is also an election-specific restriction, while the Insurrection Act is a more general emergency authority. These factors indicate that Section 592 serves as a narrow limit on domestic military deployment, rather than the Insurrection Act permitting an intrusion on voting rights. 

The OLC memo, however, simply sidesteps the conflict between Section 592 and a president’s use of the Insurrection Act to deploy troops to the polls. It does so by claiming that Section 592 does not apply when the president invokes the Insurrection Act because the “legislative history [of Section 592] shows, in effect, that the prohibition[]… [was] primarily intended” to restrain “subordinate military or civil officers” and not to “restrict the power of the president.” In two recent pieces published in Lawfare (available here and here), Natalie Orpett, Molly Roberts, and Loren Voss explain in detail that OLC’s characterization of the legislative history behind Section 592 is exactly backwards. 

As Orpett, Roberts, and Voss show, Section 592’s legislative history shows that Congress intended it as a direct response to actions taken by high-level administration officials acting under the supervision of the president. What is now Section 592 was enacted in early 1865, during the final months of the Civil War, following the systematic, presidentially-directed use of federal military forces to interfere in elections in the border states—Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware—throughout the four-year conflict. The bill’s principal author and sponsor, Senator Lazarus Powell of Kentucky, even described it as a direct constraint on the president. 

The historical circumstances that prompted Congress to enact Section 592 reinforce this reading. Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware were the four slave states that stayed in the Union during the Civil War but nonetheless contained significant pro-Confederate and/or anti-war populations. These four states’ ties to the Union were tenuous, and the Lincoln administration took drastic measures to ensure it did not lose control of them. In Maryland, federal troops stationed at polling places regularly screened voters (at a time when ballots were color-coded by party affiliation) and rejected those likely to vote for anti-war or pro-Confederate candidates. In Kentucky and Delaware, troops conducted similar screenings at polling locations, turning away voters who held ballots of opposition parties. The military also arrested many opposition candidates in Kentucky, placing some in military confinement until after the election was over.

To justify these and other wartime actions, the Lincoln administration relied extensively on claims of emergency authority. Missouri was placed under martial law for nearly the entire conflict, from August 1861 through March 1865. In a proclamation issued on September 24, 1862 (and not rescinded until August 1866), Lincoln additionally made “all rebels and insurgents, their aiders and abettors, within the United States, and all persons discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting militia draft or guilty of any disloyal practice affording aid and comfort to rebels against the authority of the United States” subject to martial law. Kentucky, too, was placed under martial law between July 1864 and October 1865—a period that notably encompassed the 1864 presidential election. What’s more, insofar as Confederate military forces, raiders, and guerrillas were operating in or threatening these border states, military operations within them also fell within the scope of Lincoln’s April 15, 1861 invocation of the Insurrection Act. 

When Congress enacted Section 592, it was aware of both the military’s actions in the border states and the Lincoln administration’s relevant invocations of emergency powers. Congress also knew that the bulk of the candidates and voters the military suppressed in these states either opposed the war effort or actively sympathized with the Confederacy. Yet Congress determined that, even in these extreme circumstances, the president had gone too far. 

Section 592 was thus a direct congressional repudiation of a president’s exercise of emergency authority in the middle of the most significant crisis this country has ever faced. Understood in its proper context, Section 592 stands for the proposition that placing troops at the polls is so dangerous and unacceptable that it is forbidden even in the midst of a war on American soil, and even in areas where the president has invoked emergency powers in order to prosecute that war. The statute’s text permits troops at the polls only when a polling location has become a literal field of battle, and military force is “necessary to repel armed enemies of the United States.” 

Apart from this single, narrow exception—which is necessary both as a practical matter and in recognition of the president’s inherent constitutional authority to repel sudden armed attacks—there is no emergency override for Section 592’s prohibition on placing troops at the polls. On the contrary, the law was designed precisely for emergencies, to ensure that future security crises would not lead to crises for American democracy.

The post No Emergency Exception: The Ban on Troops at the Polls Was Built for Crises appeared first on Just Security.

A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the last 24 hours. Here’s today’s news:

IRAN WAR

President Trump yesterday said no one knew who is running Iran during the war. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei on Sunday said the United States knows who Trump’s counterpart is and how the decision-making process in Iran works. Gram Slattery and Kanishka Singh report for Reuters.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance yesterday told Reuters that Iran must make a “meaningful” reduction in its nuclear enrichment capacity to satisfy U.S. demands and end the war. Vance said the United States remained open to an agreement, but questioned why Iran needed 60% enriched fuel if they don’t want a nuclear weapon. Jacob Bogage reports.

IRAN WAR – YEMEN

Saudi Arabia’s General Authority of Civil Aviation yesterday said attacks by the Iran-aligned Houthis damaged two airports near the border with Yemen in the kingdom. The agency said three people were wounded. Yemen’s internationally recognized government today said the Houthis targeted an airport in Aden, Yemen, where the government is currently located. Jon Gambrell reports for the Wall Street Journal.

Yemen’s government forces yesterday posted videos showing their armed forces driving armoured cars over Houthi fighters as they recaptured areas around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait on Monday. A Houthi statement said the videos were proof of war crimes and showed the “true nature of the Saudi regime and the forces it has mobilized from extremist factions.” Edward Carron reports for Reuters.

IRAN WAR – OTHER DEVELOPMENTS

Trump during a rally speech on Monday said about Iran, “let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego,” and has faced significant backlash for the comments. The White House yesterday insisted Trump was misunderstood, and an argument that the Iran war was worth enduring to protect Americans came out sounding like an invitation to attack two California cities. Avery Lotz reports for Axios.

U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) yesterday said the U.S. Defense Department denied him access to Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. Murphy described the refusal as part of a U.S. government effort to conceal the impact of the Iran war. Timour Azhari reports for Reuters.

Texas Republican Senate nominee Ken Paxton last month privately lamented the impact of the Iran war and gas prices on his campaign in a meeting with a group of donors and lobbyists, according to audio obtained by Axios. Andrew Solender and Stef W. Kight report.

Counter-terror police yesterday said a 22-year-old U.K. national has been arrested on suspicion of preparation of terrorist acts in connection with an incident close to Royal Air Force Fairford. Senior national coordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing Vicki Evans said the investigation remains live and police are continuing to “pursue multiple lines of enquiry.” The man is the seventh arrest in connection to the incident, but no one has been charged. Henry Moore reports for BBC News.

ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR

Israelis today marked three years since the Oct. 7 attacks. A vigil was held in Kfar Aza, where Hamas militants killed dozens of Israelis before taking 19 hostages back to Gaza. Rami Amichay and Mahmoud Issa report for Reuters.

RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy today said Russian missiles and drones targeted Ukraine’s energy sector in Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities overnight, killing at least 19 people. The attacks came after Zelenskyy yesterday said the latest Ukrainian intelligence suggested Russia was preparing a “massive attack” in Ukraine. Head of the Cherinihiv Regional Military Administration Viacheslav Chaus said a missile struck an apartment building in the northern city of Pryluky and there were reports of dead and injured. Head of the Kyiv Regional Military Administration Tymur Tkachenko said the broader Kyiv region was also subject to strikes. Olena Harmash reports for Reuters; AP News reports.

Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev yesterday said two commercial vessels were struck by drones in the first attack on shipping in Bulgaria’s exclusive economic zone in the Black Sea. The origins of the drones are under investigation, but Zelenskyy blamed Russia for the strikes. Radev said the attacks were a blatant “violation of international law and maritime law.” Vice-Admiral Rumen Nikolov of the Maritime Administration Executive Agency today said Bulgaria has halted its search for the missing crew. Veselin Toshkov reports for AP News; Alex Lefkowitz reports for Reuters.

Presidential Commissioner for Ukrainian Sanctions Policy Vladyslav Vlasiuk yesterday said Russia imported more than 176,000 tons of petroleum products from South Korean ports in July and August. The supplies made up 31% of Russian fuel imports in August according to Vlasiuk, and eased the impact of a fuel crisis caused by Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian oil refineries. Vlasiuk provided statistics and figures first seen in a Guardian article, and South Korea’s Foreign Ministry response to the article said the Korean government “supports and actively participates in global efforts to end the war,” and is strictly enforcing export controls against Russia. Tom Balmforth and Joyce Lee report for Reuters.

OTHER GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS

The World Health Organization today said it has requested information from Russian authorities on media reports of a second laboratory employee with pneumonia of undetermined cause, and further information to clarify the cause of the severe pneumonia and the pathogen that prompted public health measures. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russia had properly informed WHO about the incident and urged caution when it came to using media reports as a reference for the situation due to “false information.” Jennifer Rigby, Shubham Kalia, Andrew Osborn, and Dmitry Antonov report for Reuters.

Germany’s Far Right AFD member Tobias Rausch yesterday was sworn in and elected as president of Saxony-Anhalt’s parliament. Rausch’s election represents the first time a far-right politician has been elected to lead a state legislature since 1945. The AFD won 39 out of 83 seats in the east German state, but a total of 48 lawmakers anonymously voted Rausch into the position, meaning he received the support of some members of mainstream parties that have officially refused to work with the AfD. The minister president will be decided in December, which controls the executive branch in the state. Christopher F. Scheutze reports for the New York Times.

Azerbaijan’s Media and Broadcasting Council today said that allegations of an Azerbaijani connection to the German case against former Intelligence Chief August Hanning were false. The council said the intent of the disinformation is to “damage Azerbaijan-Germany relations.” Nailia Bagirova reports for Reuters.

CLIMATE DEVELOPMENTS

Interpol today said a two-month international crackdown of environmental crime across Latin America and the Caribbean led to 233 arrests and uncovered links between large-scale Amazon deforestation and 161 companies across several continents. The operation identified 60,000 hectares of illegally cleared forest, and in one investigation originating in Colombia, 11 foreign companies were suspected of involvement in clearing more than 52,000 hectares of protected Amazon forest. Steven Grattan reports for AP News.

Indigenous and civil-society organizations in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan region today criticized the national government for failing to attend its first court proceedings in their class action lawsuit seeking to hold the government responsible for the haze engulfing the province caused by forest fires. The suit claims the government was negligent for failing to prevent and adequately deal with forest and land fires that burn every year. Judges adjourned the case until Oct. 21. Soepriyadi Gunawan reports for Reuters.

AI DEVELOPMENTS

Two South Korean megachurches and a cybersecurity firm today said they are investigating suspected cyberattacks that may have exposed the personal data of hundreds of thousands of congregants, with evidence suggesting AI may have been used in the attacks. Cybersecurity company Oasis found data, attack records, and account information on an overseas server containing information linked to the churches, and the alleged attacks included signs that AI tools were used. Joyce Lee reports for Reuters.

U.S. CHINA DEVELOPMENTS

North Korea today criticized the United States over its arms sales and military support for Taiwan, and accused the United States of fueling tension in the Taiwan Strait. The state news agency broadcast said the United States should “think twice whether it is ready to stand in frontal confrontation” with China over Taiwan. Joyce Lee reports for Reuters.

The Trump administration has discussed beginning reciprocal nuclear site visits with China and plans to continue pushing for possible in-person meetings in the coming months, sources told CNN. The discussions have been informal and preliminary, and the idea was initially raised by the Chinese while meeting U.S. officials this year. Kylie Atwood and Davis Winkie report.

U.S. FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Lt. Gen. Benjamin Watson yesterday issued an order prohibiting U.S. soldiers stationed in Japan’s Okinawa prefecture from drinking alcohol, and gave them a month-long curfew while they undergo discipline training. Lance Corp. Devin Jacob Ballard is suspected of killing Anna Yagi in the capital of Okinawa, Naha. Ballard denied the allegations. John Geddie reports for Reuters.

The United States yesterday issued a démarche to Russia that said Russia’s failure to disclose details about the death of the plague lab worker runs counter to its international health obligations, U.S. officials told the Wall Street Journal. Trump said he has a call scheduled with Russian President Vladimir Putin “soon” about the issue, and said he would share more U.S. intelligence today. Michael R. Gordon, Robbie Gramer, Vera Bergengruen, and Thomas Grove report.

Trump yesterday framed the French protests over underfunding for public schools as evidence of France’s “out of control mass migration” and Islam. Neither migration nor religion spurred the protests. French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez today said he requested a pause on the use of stun grenades for policing student protests until the facts of Monday’s incident in Lens, where a 15-year-old’s hand was blown off, had been clarified. Ashley Ahn reports for POLITICO; Maia Davies reports for BBC News.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio yesterday said the Trump administration was open to expanding security cooperation with Iceland during his visit to the island. Rubio praised Iceland for allowing the United States to “project power using your land, your air, your sea.” Vera Bergengruen reports for the Wall Street Journal.

Rubio today said that “strong and model NATO ally” Greece and the United States are launching new counterterrorism information sharing between their law enforcement agencies. Rubio said Greece was particularly exposed to the threats posed by mass migration and human trafficking. Ivana Sekularac, Angeliki Koutantou, Lefteris Papadimas, and Jonathan Landay report for Reuters.

Trump yesterday framed the French protests over underfunding for public schools as evidence of France’s “out of control mass migration” and the spread of Islam. Neither migration nor religion spurred the protests. French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez today said he requested a pause on the use of stun grenades for policing student protests until the facts of Monday’s incident in Lens, where a 15-year-old’s hand was blown off, had been clarified. Ashley Ahn reports for POLITICO; Maia Davies reports for BBC News.

U.S. IMMIGRATION DEVELOPMENTS

The shock gloves ICE agents could soon use worked so powerfully during a military exercise that participants felt intense pain, stopped fighting immediately, and feared additional exposures, according to a previously unreleased Army study. ICE leaders were aware of the findings before signing a $16.7 million contract to purchase 6,000 pairs of gloves in August, according to records shared with AP News. ICE has called the gloves “distraction and de-escalation devices.” Ryan J. Foley reports.

The Justice Department on Monday said the department filed 40 denaturalization actions for citizens accused of crimes in federal courts across the country between Aug. 21 and Oct. 2. Attorney General Todd Blanche said the filings are part of the “largest denaturalization effort in modern history.” A DOJ spokesperson told Axios that the department has filed more than 200 denaturalization complaints since the Trump administration made denaturalization a priority, and remains on track to meet its objective of 250 cases by the end of October. Avery Lotz reports.

A Trump-appointed federal judge on Monday accused ICE officers of lying, lacking proper training, and fabricating records to cover up illegal arrests. The ruling condemned the agency’s tactics when it mistakenly arrested two Hispanic men, including a U.S. citizen, and said their actions formed part of a “troubling” pattern by ICE to justify erroneous arrests. Luis Ferré-Sadurní reports for the New York Times.

U.S. DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS

The Department of Homeland Security has investigated more than 150 organizations as part of its efforts to scrutinize nonprofits that they claim may be helping noncitizens illegally register to vote, according to internal government documents reviewed by the New York Times. The documents reveal that the DHS has considered deploying undercover agents to investigate the organizations. Madeleine Ngo, Richard Fausset, and Alexandra Berzon report.

Massachusetts man Jacob D. Miller yesterday pleaded guilty to charges of importing and selling plutonium obtained from Russia and mailing the material, as well as other toxic hazardous substances, according to the State Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts. Because of Miller’s previous felony convictions, he faced charges for possessing ammunition and explosive materials. Christine Hauser reports for the New York Times.

Former C.I.A. officer David J. Rush in court yesterday admitted to a $145 million scam involving luxury real estate and providing sensitive intelligence to a foreign government official. The new details of his crimes surpassed what had previously been known, as authorities accused him of stashing hundreds of gold bars in his home. Devlin Barrett reports for the New York Times.

Lawyers of former U.S. Olympian David Hearn yesterday urged the Interior Department and DOJ inspector generals to examine the flawed installation of an “American flag blue” liner at the bottom of the Washington Reflecting Pool and the prosecution case that accused Hearn of destruction of property. The lawyers alleged “incompetence and wrongdoing” in both the DOJ and Interior Department. Andrew Goudsward reports for Reuters.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACTION

The White House yesterday told POLITICO that Trump would not reimburse the federal government for taxpayer-funded advertisements promoting Trump and his administration ahead of the midterms. Cheyanne M. Daniels reports.

Did you miss this? Stay up-to-date with our Litigation Tracker: Legal Challenges to Trump Administration Actions.

If you enjoy listening, Just Security’s analytic articles are also available in audio form on the justsecurity.org website.

ICYMI: Yesterday on Just Security

Just Security’s Russia–Ukraine War Archive

By Clara Apt and Tess Graham

The post Early Edition: October 7, 2026 appeared first on Just Security.

The catalog below organizes our collection of articles primarily about the war into general categories to facilitate access to relevant topics for policymakers, researchers, journalists, scholars, and the public at large. The archive will be updated as new pieces are published.

We welcome readers to use this catalog to follow the unfolding situation and generate new lines of analysis. To search headlines and authors, expand one or all of the topics, as needed, and use CTRL-F on your keyboard to open the search tool. The archive also is available in reverse chronological order at the Russia-Ukraine War articles page.

The post Just Security’s Russia–Ukraine War Archive appeared first on Just Security.

The Pentagon did not immediately release the 51-page decision dated Oct. 2, 2026 by Col. Michael Schrama. Portions of it were marked CUI for Controlled Unclassified Information, making some of it subject to review by a security officer and, potentially, redactions. 

But, based on unclassified passages, a key basis of the judge’s suppression ruling was a decision by the George W. Bush administration to not let federal agents give a Miranda-style warning to the prisoner when they questioned him across four days in January 2007 at Guantanamo Bay. 

At the time, al-Hawsawi, a Saudi citizen, had been held prisoner by the United States for nearly four years, mostly in solitary confinement by the CIA, which treated him brutally. Once he was transferred to U.S. military custody in Guantanamo, the Bush administration sent agents as “clean teams” to question him and other former CIA prisoners to try to obtain untainted confessions from them. 

He is the third defendant in the long-running terrorism case to have his statements suppressed. Judge Schrama has yet to rule on a challenge by the fourth, Walid bin Attash, who allegedly helped train some of the hijackers.

“Crucially, the FBI agents deliberately chose not to give Miranda warnings or any equivalent rights advisement,” the judge wrote in his Oct. 2 decision. “Furthermore, they failed to provide a cleansing warning informing Mr. Hawsawi that the statements he had previously made under coercion to the CIA could not be used against him.”

“To a person who has experienced years of operant conditioning, a simple assertion of a ‘blank slate’ by agents of the same government is wholly insufficient to sever the psychological tether of prior coercion,” Judge Schrama wrote. 

“Operant conditioning” was the term used by psychologists who were hired by the CIA to develop an interrogation program for suspected al-Qaeda terrorists: The CIA started off using violent “enhanced interrogation techniques” that instilled fear in the captives, and then impressed upon them that they could be punished if they did not continuously cooperate across years of questioning by representatives of the U.S. government.

The al-Hawsawi decision was also the fourth time a military judge rejected the Justice and Defense Departments’ effort to obtain fresh, lawful confessions from former CIA captives who had been held out of reach of U.S. courts in black site prisons between 2002 and 2006.

The first, most sweeping decision threw out the interrogations of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri in the summer of 2023. Al-Nashiri is accused of a key role in the Oct. 12, 2000 bombing of the USS Cole off Yemen that killed 17 sailors. Col. Lanny Acosta Jr., an Army judge, concluded that al-Nashiri was so broken by the time he was questioned in 2007 that his ability to not incriminate himself was “intentionally and literally beaten out of him years before.” Prosecutors appealed that decision and lost.

Then in April 2025, an Air Force judge, Col. Matthew McCall, threw out the confessions of Ammar al-Baluchi. Like al-Hawsawi, al-Baluchi is accused of sending funds to the men who hijacked passenger planes on Sept. 11, 2001 and killed nearly 3,000 people. Prosecutors appealed that decision to the U.S. Court of Military Review, a Pentagon panel, which has yet to rule.

Then last month, Judge Schrama suppressed the 2007 statements of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who is accused of being the mastermind of the 9/11 plot. Prosecutors chose not to appeal the judge’s ruling to try to preserve a June 2028 trial date.

For years, prosecutors have been defending the use of the 2007 “clean team” interrogations as their best evidence in the 9/11 case, which started with five defendants but now has four after one was ruled to be mentally unfit to stand trial.

The idea was that, at trial, federal agents could testify to what the defendants told them in what they described as consensual interviews. With these now unavailable, prosecutors will likely have to pursue their case with financial documents, transcripts of wiretapped conversations, and other statements attributed to some of the defendants.

In the instance of al-Hawsawi, two FBI agents, Abigail Perkins and James Fitzgerald, met with him in January 2007 at a lock-up called Echo II at Guantanamo. He had been brought to them blindfolded and in shackles similar to those used by the CIA in his previous years of detention and rendition. Then, with an ankle shackled to the floor, they showed him documents that appeared to link him to money transfers to some of the hijackers. 

They testified in lengthy pretrial proceedings that al-Hawsawi voluntarily answered their questions and understood that he could have asked to be returned to his solitary cell at the military prison any time he wanted.

By then, he had been in custody for nearly four years and been held overseas in six different CIA prisons, starting with one known as Cobalt in Afghanistan. CIA employees described this location as a dungeon or resembling a Nazi concentration camp. There, he was brutally interrogated, sometimes naked and sometimes in a diaper, according to a narrative in Judge Schrama’s ruling. 

In one instance, al-Hawsawi was kept awake for 24 hours and then interrogated for the next 14 hours, nonstop with “continuous rotational sessions consisting of water-dousing, walling, attention grasps, facial holds, facial slaps, cramped confinement, and psychological pressures.” A CIA interrogator offered the opinion that the “water dousing,” which was not approved, had the same near-drowning effect of waterboarding, the judge wrote.

The judge also found that al-Hawsawi was subjected to an “unduly rough body cavity search” in November 2003 that left him bleeding.

But Judge Schrama’s decision did not dwell on the question of whether there was torture. Rather, he found that those who designed and carried out the “clean team interviews” in 2007 failed to meet the legal principle of attenuation, essentially getting an untainted confession after a coerced one. 

Prosecutors argued that the law enforcement agents’ conversational-style interviews with the future defendants met the attenuation standard of a change in time, change in place, and change in identity of the questioner. 

None of the men had been charged at that point, and none had been allowed to consult an attorney. 

For al-Hawsawi in particular, the government’s claim that his circumstances had changed was less credible because of the venue of his 2007 interviews: Camp Echo II. As a prisoner of the CIA, from November 2003 to April 2004, al-Hawsawi had been held and questioned in the same compound of small huts, each with a cell inside and space for interrogation. It was this decommissioned black site near the prison camps where the Defense Department held military detainees.

“A detainee who is shackled, transported to a former CIA black site, and intentionally kept ignorant of both his right to remain silent and the inadmissibility of his prior coerced confessions, cannot be said to be making an ‘essentially free and unconstrained choice,’” Schrama wrote. 

Not only did Bush administration officials affirmatively decide to omit rights advisements, they also chose not to record the new interviews. 

Instead, the agents who conducted them wrote narrative accounts of the men’s admissions on “Letter Head Memorandum” and then testified that they believed the defendants cooperated voluntarily, and in some instances even bragged about what they had done. The memos were never signed or reviewed by the defendants. They would only see them much later after prosecutors included them in pretrial discovery.

The post Guantanamo Dispatch: Another Confession Is Ruled Inadmissible in 9/11 Case appeared first on Just Security.

The United States may repeat that mistake in its assessment of China’s artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities. As the country awakens to the risks of AI, a debate rages over whether to pause or pace the technology’s development—that is, to halt or slow the rate of progress in AI to develop better mechanisms to control it. “Pause AI development,” Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) demanded of the chief executives of eight AI companies this summer. “It is not too late to avoid disaster.” On the other end of the political spectrum, tech billionaire Elon Musk endorsed Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei’s call to pace frontier AI development in three words: “Dario is right,” he wrote on X in September. 

But others disagree with this view, usually arguing that American AI development should not be slowed because of China. The thinking is that if the United States paces its AI development, China’s own AI sector will surge ahead and unacceptable consequences will follow. Therefore, the United States, should continue to move quickly. People making this argument include President Donald Trump—who insists that “whoever wins AI, wins”—and House Speaker Mike Johnson, who cautions that with hasty regulation “we will lose the race to China,” and Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang, who has flatly declared that “China is going to win the AI race.”

The China argument has taken on decisive significance. But the argument is flawed in ways reminiscent of the flaws animating Washington’s feverish perception of a missile gap during the Cold War. It both overstates China’s capabilities and misreads the actual risks that would be incurred in the unlikely eventuality that China does pull ahead. 

China Can Pace, Not Surpass

Yes, Chinese companies have trained AI models that observers describe as being mere months behind those of the United States. But the evidence points toward China at best being able to pace, not surpass, the United States.

A nation’s AI power can be divided into three pillars: computing power, algorithms, and data. Across them, the resources available to the United States and its allies outpace those that are available to China. 

Take computing power, which can be used to train or service AI models—where the United States enjoys a clear lead. The United States has at its disposal computer chips that are far superior to those of China and possesses in aggregate roughly ten times as much computing power as China does. That advantage alone could prove decisive. It caps the resources that China has available to train or serve its own AI models. And it even stymies China’s ability to leverage its undeniably potent energy-generation capacity to bolster its AI sector, as its own chips are up to two and a half times less energy efficient.  

That advantage should prove enduring. Barring a Chinese takeover of Taiwan, the United States appears likely to outpace China in its ability to build computing power: my coauthored book shows that the United States and its allies—who are deeply enmeshed in U.S. technology supply chains—together dominate the high-technology ecosystem required to build this power; their companies generate 84 percent of global high-technology profits and generate 64 percent of global value-added in high-technology sectors. The gargantuan financial system of the United States has meanwhile deployed investments toward the AI buildout that for now greatly outmatch those of Beijing. And even if grassroots opposition impedes data center construction in the United States, that will not stop U.S. companies from building data centers outside the country.  

China does possess both the talented AI researchers to create training algorithms and the data on which to train models. But the United States competes with or outcompetes China on both. The United States employs 42 percent of the world’s top AI researchers to China’s 28 percent—even though China now produces nearly half of them—and has a continued knack for attracting and keeping China’s most talented researchers in Silicon Valley. The one pillar on which China may have an advantage is data, where Beijing could compel the release of vast quantities of data to its own AI labs. Yet so far, that data has not offered China a lead over the United States. And as American AI labs embed their models across more industries and perfect their training algorithms, the amount of data they are exposed to—and can train off—will naturally and quickly grow.  

Surfing in America’s Wake

Why then have Chinese models performed so well? It helps that China is second only to the United States in all three pillars of AI power. But the more important reason is that China’s AI industry has skillfully surfed in the wake of the American AI ecosystem. Evidence from the U.S. government, the AI labs, and external observers all point toward Chinese labs having trained their own models off the intelligence of the models of the United States through a process known as distillation, where a less sophisticated model is improved by training off the outputs of a more sophisticated model. However, China’s surfing has only been sufficient for it to, at best, closely trail the United States: China has never held the AI frontier—since 2023, Chinese models have trailed the best American models by roughly seven months on average, and China’s surfing strategy means that it is likely that U.S. pacing will slow China as well.  

The Race Is Not the Risk

Even in the unlikely event that China does temporarily surpass the United States, the consequences of that alone may not be as catastrophic as many suggest. AI on its own is powerful, but it has not yet been shown that having a slightly better AI model grants decisive economic or military advantages—for instance, a well-deployed weak AI model could be more effective than a poorly-deployed strong AI model. The truly grave concern is that AI models may soon be able to improve themselves—a process that Amodei says “is starting to happen across the industry”—which could in the next decade ignite an intelligence explosion and grant substantial powers to whoever is possessing them. But a recursive self-improvement loop of this nature could just as quickly result in either the United States or China losing control of the models they develop, transcending their geopolitical competition and threatening both countries. It is this risk that has sharpened discussions of AI pacing in the United States. In short, the version of China’s AI takeoff that is most likely to harm the United States is also the version that is most likely to harm China. If China approaches that threshold, it is therefore plausible that it too may choose to pace; if it doesn’t, it may enjoy substantial advantages, but it may also lose control of the technology to its own detriment.

During the Cold War, the fear engendered by the missile gap prompted the U.S. to escalate the nuclear race with the Soviet Union, and the two sides were soon brought dangerously close to the precipice; today, a similar fear about China could accelerate the U.S.-China AI race. To be sure, the stakes of that race may not be as high as those of the nuclear race during the Cold War, and indeed a full AI pause may not be wise. But arguments in the United States against a pause should not fall into the same analytical trap of the Cold War: competing to the point of blindness, underestimating its own strengths and a rival’s weaknesses, charging toward the realization of a promethean technology whose risks it does not yet appreciate. That is a cycle that history has taught us to be wary of. We should avoid it.

The post Fear of China’s AI Is the New Missile Gap appeared first on Just Security.

The negotiations on the final text were a rare but promising example of U.N. members working with common purpose on a sensitive political issue toward the goals of international peace and stability.

“Sea level rise may threaten our coasts, our homes and our ways of life. It does not threaten our legal rights, entitlements or existence as States,” said Surangel Whipps Jr., Palau’s president, speaking on behalf of the 39 members of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). 

Ambassador Tania Romualdo of Cabo Verde and Ambassador James Larsen of Australia co-facilitated the negotiations, and I led negotiations on the declaration’s legal elements. Here, I analyze the declaration, offer a perspective on its contribution to law and policy, and share personal reflections arising from the negotiations. All views are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Australian government.

The Threat of Sea-Level Rise 

Sea-level rise is a profound threat to international stability. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has predicted sea levels will rise at minimum between 11 and 22 inches (0.28 – 0.55 meters) by 2100, but those levels could be closer to 79 inches (2 meters) by 2100 due to ice sheet dynamics.

According to the U.N. Secretary-General, even lower-end scenarios would leave many significant portions of low-lying coastal zones and small island developing States uninhabitable without extraordinary adaptation. There would be catastrophic impacts on global security and economic stability resulting from States losing portions of their territory, entire economic sectors (fishing, farming, mining, tourism) vanishing, overwhelming adaptation and infrastructure repair costs, and mass migration. 

The International Community’s Response 

Up until very recently, the international community’s response had been limited. The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) and AOSIS had largely driven the international legal debate, including through their landmark declarations on maritime zones and statehood (PIF declarations here and here, and AOSIS declarations here and here).

These groups jointly advanced the interpretation that a State would continue to exist under international law even if all of its territory were inundated. Its maritime zones, including its territorial sea and its exclusive economic zone, and the rights and entitlements that flow from these zones, would likewise not be impacted. Outside the landmark 2024 treaty between Australia and Tuvalu, how to practically confront and operationalize these principles was unaddressed. But at least as a matter of law, affected States would continue to be members of the U.N., to have continuing rights over large swathes of the ocean, and maintain ongoing treaty rights and obligations.

These principles started to gain serious traction internationally only in 2025, when the U.N.’s International Law Commission (ILC) backed the PIF and AOSIS interpretations. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) also confronted the issue in its 2025 climate change Advisory Opinion. 

What really mattered, however, was how States outside PIF and AOSIS would react. Only their response would either affirm the positions as existing law, or as reflecting State practice, and so drive and consolidate the development of customary and treaty law. 

Up until the adoption of the U.N. declaration in September, this was not clear. The General Assembly in 2025 recognized the ILC’s “valuable contribution” but stopped short of endorsing its conclusions. In response to the ICJ’s opinion, the General Assembly went further, including by affirming statehood’s continuity in the face of sea-level rise in a resolution it passed in May. However, eight states voted against the resolution, with 28 abstentions. This was progress, but it was not definitive.

The New Declaration and Its Implications 

The new sea-level rise declaration changed the landscape. Not only is it normatively progressive, but it was agreed by consensus: by all 193 Member States. This has important implications politically, and for the development and consolidation of international law. 

The declaration underscores deep concern about sea level rise as a “real and lived experience for many,” especially small island developing States. It foregrounds climate change as the cause, and advocates for adaptation and mitigation, based on the best available science and knowledge. It commits States to strengthen scientific observation, and to develop better interoperability between data collected by U.N. agencies.

Threats to critical infrastructure (for example, ports, energy, telecommunications) and to economic sectors (tourism, transport and insurance markets) are underlined. The declaration recognizes the impacts of sea-level rise on culture and cultural heritage. It acknowledges that, in some cases relocation – either internally or across borders – may be required where it is voluntary, preserves dignity, and is consistent with international law. For this, it enshrines a new term: “mobility with dignity.”

The declaration makes a substantial contribution to the clarification of international law on at least three levels. 

First, it makes plain that international law is the foundation for responses to sea-level rise, and it affirms the need for “legal stability, certainty, and predictability.” The declaration reinforces the role of key treaties, including the U.N. Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS), the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the Paris Agreement. Given the geopolitical environment, and number of non-parties participating, this is notable.

Second, the declaration advances the international community’s position on the stability of maritime zones in the face of sea-level rise. The ICJ’s opinion was that UNCLOS does not require States to update their charts or lists of geographic coordinates depicting baselines and the outer limits of their maritime zones, once established in accordance with the Convention, in the context of coastline changes caused by sea-level rise. 

The declaration takes a logical, but legally significant, next step of affirming that once States establish baselines in accordance with UNCLOS, they can “accordingly maintain their maritime zones in the face of physical changes resulting from sea level rise, without prejudice to the State’s ability to update them.” This position represents a political consensus of the international community on a subject of long-running debate over the last decade.

Third, and most critically, the declaration crystallizes the international community’s position in favor of continued statehood. The ICJ said that the loss of a constituent element of a State – i.e. territory – “would not necessarily entail the loss of its statehood.” The ambiguity of its position was criticized by Judges Peter Tomka and Bogdan Aurescu – from opposite ends of the debate – in separate opinions. Judge Tomka said the Court should have been more prudent given that “territory has been indispensable to the concept of a State.” In his opinion, the Court’s statement was a “precocious leap of legal reasoning against the backdrop of silence from many, if not most, States.”

The declaration breaks the silence asserted by Judge Tomka. States affirm 

the presumption in favour of continued statehood, and in this respect underscore the continuity of statehood in the face of sea level rise, as well as sovereignty, sovereign rights and responsibilities, and membership of the UN of such States, consistent with international law.

This is the first clear indication from all U.N. Member States that the concept of territory is not viewed as an essential element of continued statehood in the context of sea-level rise. Importantly, it also addresses Judge Aurescu’s criticism that the ICJ was silent on maintenance of U.N. membership. 

The Declaration answers the concern put by Tuvalu to the General Assembly that “our rights under international law cannot be allowed to sink with our sinking islands.” But in the words of Timor-Leste, it “should mark not the conclusion of our effort, but the beginning of stronger international cooperation and coordinated implementation.”

Reflections 

What was clear from negotiations was that all States wanted to get to a position of supporting the declaration. That included the Permanent Five members of the Security Council, as well as other States that had recently obstructed consensus on security, climate, and other topics in U.N. forums. This did not mean negotiations were easy, or that difficult compromises were not made to reach agreement. But the goodwill created an important foundation for success, especially as the mandate was for a consensus declaration. 

Through the negotiations, it was also apparent many countries were working within their systems to develop and advance their legal positions so that they could support the declaration. Most States had not had to confront these legal questions until now. That States could play catch-up so quickly, given the fundamental questions of statehood and law of the sea involved, offers hope for other fast-moving global challenges, like the governance of emerging technologies. 

For small low-lying island States, the Sea Level-Rise Declaration affirms their permanent membership of the international community, come what may. For all States, the declaration creates predictability – and with this, it strengthens peace and stability – as the contours of land change in the Pacific and other regions.

The post Landmark UN Declaration on Sea-Level Rise Offers Legal Certainty and International Stability appeared first on Just Security.

– Brown v. Hartlage, 456 U.S. 45, 54 (1982)

In promising that he would pay every adult citizen of the United States a “dividend” of $5,000 if the Republican Party retains control of the Senate and House in the 2026 mid-term elections, President Donald Trump potentially has violated multiple federal criminal statutes that criminalize buying or coercing votes. He has done so, moreover, in his unofficial, political capacity, and thus cannot claim immunity under Trump v. United States if that promise was unlawful. Given the stakes for American democracy, Trump’s $5,000 promise deserves careful analysis, rather than being swiftly dismissed as just normal political speech.

As we discuss below, the starting point for such an analysis is Trump’s assertion that the power to make this payment is personal to him: he asserted “only I can make this promise to you.” Trump subsequently publicly confirmed his belief that it is unnecessary for Congress to approve this payment. In terms, then, Trump has conditioned the $5,000 payment on the re-election of a Republican Congress, while at the same time making clear his position that no action by that new Congress is necessary for the payment to be made. This is not the typical “campaign promise” protected by the First Amendment, where a candidate pledges that, if elected, he or she will work to bring about a policy change to benefit some or all voters: this is instead a naked promise of money, to be paid if and only if the election comes out a certain way. Accordingly, this pledge must be analyzed under 18 U.S.C. § 597, which makes it a federal crime to “make[] or offer[] to make an expenditure to any person, either to vote or withhold his vote, or to vote for or against any candidate,” as well as under 52 U.S.C. § 10307(c), which provides that it is a criminal offense for anyone to “knowingly or willfully pay[] or offer[] to pay … for voting ….”^[1]

Moreover, as we also argue, because Trump has suggested that this payment is a “dividend” already due the American people, his assertion that it will be paid only if a Republican Congress is re-elected—and not otherwise—on its face appears to constitute “coerc[ion] … for the purpose of interfering with the right of such other person to vote or to vote as he may choose,” in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 594.^[2] And the coercive nature of this new “promise” is highlighted by the fact that Trump already has promised to pay all Americans (other than “high income” individuals) a $2,000 “tariff dividend”— but now to get their promised “dividend,” the voters will have to reelect a Republican Congress.

Nor is any potential criminal exposure here limited to the president: the same federal criminal statutes also apply to the administration’s political appointees who have ratified and amplified the president’s promise. All have joined in advancing a promise that deserves scrutiny as a potential “corrupt bargain” of the type forbidden by federal law.

I. The Promise Must Be Analyzed Under the Prohibitions of Federal Criminal Law.

Many commentators, including distinguished experts on election law, have asserted that the president would have a “strong First Amendment defense” to any assertion that his $5,000 promise poses issues under federal criminal law. To be sure, campaign promises by candidates pledging that, if elected, they will work to enact policies that may benefit all or some voters—ranging from tax cuts, to funding of programs, to direct government grants to citizens—have long been held to be at the core of political speech protected by the First Amendment. But to conclude that those precedents are controlling here would be, we submit, to misread what Trump actually has said.

In his speech at the first night of the 2026 Republican Midterm Convention, Trump announced:

But what we’re doing is because we’ve done so well, and because our country is making so much money that only I can make this promise to you, and here is my promise. If the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them, because of our tremendous economic success… In history, we’ve never had anything like what’s happening, but because of our tremendous strength and success economically, I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000. Very much like a successful company will do a cash distribution to its shareholders, or like last year when I gave our great members of the military 1,776.

This promise of a “Trump Dividend” does not fall within the type of “campaign promises” protected by the First Amendment. As the Supreme Court explained in Brown v. Hartlage, “The fact that some voters may find their self-interest reflected in a candidate’s commitment does not place that commitment beyond the reach of the First Amendment.” ^[3] But the Court also made clear that the First Amendment does not protect all pledges of benefits by candidates: “[A]s a State may prohibit the giving of money or other things of value to a voter in exchange for his support, it may also declare unlawful an agreement embodying the intention to make such an exchange.”^[4] Thus, “the precise nature of the promise, the conditions upon which it is given, the circumstances under which it is made, the size of the audience, the nature and size of the group to be benefited, all might, in some instance and to varying extents, bear upon the constitutional assessment.”^[5]

The “constitutional assessment” here must begin with a salient fact not present in Brown: Trump is not a candidate in the 2026 midterm elections. Thus, unlike candidates ranging from Huey Long—who proposed to institute a “share-our-wealth” plan^[6]—to Andrew Yang—who promised to institute a universal basic income if he were elected president—Trump’s pledge of $5,000 is not a campaign promise related to his election, since he is not running for office. Rather, Trump, speaking at a Republican Party convention as leader of his Party, promised to make this payment if other Republicans are elected. And he stated, “only I can make this promise to you . . . .”

Furthermore, the $5,000 promise is unrelated to any action by those to be elected—i.e., the new Congress—or even the supposed institution of any new policy by the president following the mid-term elections. The campaign promises protected under Brown are those “to be achieved through the normal processes of government,”^[7] including through new legislation: thus, for instance, both Long and Yang made clear that they would seek legislation permitting the payments to the public that they promised. But Trump’s pledge rests on no such “normal processes.” It is not part of a new legislative initiative that Trump has proposed to put before Congress, nor does it involve any action by Congress at all; indeed, it does not appear that Trump even discussed with members of Congress that he intended to make this pledge, and some have made clear they are opposed. It is thus not a “campaign promise” to take future action by those who are campaigning, i.e., the Republican candidates for Congress.^[8]