Military necessity is governed by several constraints: an

attack or action must be intended to help in the military defeat

of the enemy; it must be an attack on a military objective,
[1]
and the harm caused to civilians or civilian property must be
proportional and not excessive in relation to the concrete and
direct military advantage anticipated.
First, any attack must be intended and tend toward the military
defeat of the enemy; attacks not so intended cannot be justified
by military necessity because they would have no military
purpose. Second, even an attack aimed at the military
weakening of the enemy must not cause harm to civilians or
civilian objects that is excessive in relation to the concrete and
direct military advantage anticipated. Third, military necessity
cannot justify violation of the other rules of IHL.
Protocol de Cloture (final act)
a summary of the proceedings of a diplomatic conference and
usually includes a reproduction of the texts of treaties,
conventions, recommendations and other acts agreed upon by
the plenipotentiaries attending the conference.
Asylum
a refuge granted an alien by a sovereign state on its own
territory.
a temporary refuge granted political offenders, especially in a
foreign embassy.
A combatant is a person who takes a direct part in the
hostilities of an armed conflict. If a combatant follows the law
of war, then he or she is considered a privileged combatant
and upon capture, he or she will qualify as a prisoner of
war under the Third Geneva Convention (GCIII).
In international armed conflicts members of
military/paramilitary forces are called "combatants" and
cannot be prosecuted for lawfully fighting
The Act of State Doctrine states that every sovereign state is
bound to respect the independence of every other
sovereign state, and the courts will not sit in judgment of
another government's acts done within its own territory.
Under the Act of State doctrine, the courts of one State will
not question the validity of public acts performed by other
sovereigns within their own borders, even when such courts
have jurisdiction over a controversy in which one of the
litigants has standing to challenge those acts.
Universal jurisdiction allows states or international
organizations to claim criminal jurisdiction over an accused
person regardless of where the alleged crime was committed,
and regardless of the accused's nationality, country
of residence, or any other relation with the prosecuting entity.
Crimes prosecuted under universal jurisdiction are considered
crimes against all, too serious to tolerate jurisdictional
arbitrage.
Double criminality (also known as dual criminality) is a
requirement in the extradition law of many countries. It states
that a suspect can be extradited from one country to stand trial
for breaking a second country's laws only when a similar law
exists in the extraditing country.

Double criminality is a crime punished in both the country

where a suspect is being held and a country asking for the
suspect to be handed over or transferred to stand trial. It is also
known as dual criminality. Double criminality is a requirement
in extradition procedures as extradition is allowed only for
offenses alleged as crimes in both jurisdictions. For purposes
of determining double criminality in an international
extradition case, the court must look to proscription by similar
criminal provisions of federal law or, if none, the law of the
place where the petitioner is found or, if none, the law of the
preponderance of the states.
Doctrine of Specialty is a principle of International law that is
included in most extradition treaties, whereby a person who is
extradited to a country to stand trial for certain criminal
offenses may be tried only for those offenses and not for any
other pre-extradition offenses. Once the asylum state
extradites an individual to the requesting state under the terms
of an extradition treaty, that person can be prosecuted only for
crimes specified in the extradition request. This doctrine
allows a nation to require the requesting nation to limit
prosecution to declared offenses.
STATE CONTINUITY
According to this doctrine, the policies, procedures and forms
of Government does not change the legal identity of a State.
Every new Government succeeds to the rights and obligations
of the predecessor Government. It protects the contracts,
treaties and liabilities that are undertaken by the previous
Government. It gives stability to the State and strengthens the
relations between States.
The doctrine by which a states identity as an international
legal person persists notwithstanding unconstitutional or even
violent changes in its government. As a result, a state generally
continues to owe and accrue international legal obligations
notwithstanding such changes.
Proportionality
In armed conflict, the principle is used to judge first, the
lawfulness in jus ad bellum of the strategic goals in the use of
force for self-defense, and second, the lawfulness in jus in
bello of any armed attack that causes civilian casualties.
The expected deaths and injuries to civilians or damage to
civilian objects must not exceed the anticipated military
advantage.

Attentat clause
A political offence exception (or exemption) is a proviso
which limits the obligation of a sovereign state under
an extradition or mutual legal assistance treaty or statute. Such
provisos allow the state whose assistance has been requested
("the requested party") to refuse to hand over a suspect to
or to gather evidence on behalf of another state ("the
requesting party"), if the requested party's competent
authority determines that the requesting party seeks assistance
in order to prosecute an offence of a political character.
Under the clause, it is not political offense to murder or make
an attempt at the life of the head of state and consequently, the
perpetrator is subject to extradition

Sovereign equality is the concept in which

every sovereign state possesses the same legal rights as any
other sovereign state in international law.
BELLIGERENCY
the state of being at war or in conflict; specifically :
the status of a legally recognized belligerent state or
nation.
this concept deals with a situation of armed conflict,
particularly internal armed conflict, within the territory of a
State. The recognized belligerent force acquires international
personality, directly possessed of rights and obligations in
international law. But this is only for the purposes of the
hostilities. Its recognition is provisional in nature and limited
to the duration of the hostilities from which it results.
Right of Legation
The right of the state to send and receive diplomatic missions,
which enables states to carry on friendly intercourse.
Refugee
Article 1(A)(2) of the 1951 Convention defines a refugee as an
individual who is outside his or her country of nationality or
habitual residence who is unable or unwilling to return due to
a well-founded fear of persecution based on his or her race,
religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a
particular social group. Applying this definition, internally
displaced persons (IDPs) including individuals fleeing
natural disasters and generalized violence, stateless individuals
not outside their country of habitual residence or not facing
persecution, and individuals who have crossed an international
border fleeing generalized violence are not considered
refugees under either the 1951 Convention or the 1967
Optional Protocol.
Deportation
the removal from a country of an alien whose presence is
unlawful or prejudicial.
Extradition
In international law, the process by which one state, upon the
request of another, effects the return of a person for trial for a
crime punishable by the laws of the requesting state and
committed outside the state of refuge.
Arbitration
Came from the Latin word arbitrari which means to give
decision, is a process by which parties to a dispute submit their
differences to the binding judgment of an impartial third
person or group selected by mutual consent.
Self-determination
Includes the right of a people of an existing State to choose
freely their own political system and to pursue their own
economic, social, and cultural development. As such it does
not, in light of the current state of international law, impose on
all States the duty to introduce or maintain a democratic form
of government, but essentially refers to the principle of
equality of States and the prohibition of intervention which are
already part of international law.

Uti Possidetis
A term used in International
Law to indicate that the parties to a particular treaty are to re
tain possession of that which they forcibly seized during a war.
A treaty ending a war may adopt the principle of uti possidetis,
the principle of status quo ante bellum (Latin for "the state of
things before the war"), or a combination of the two. Upon a
default of any treaty stipulation, the doctrine of uti possidetis
prevails.
Effective occupation is the control of free newly
discovered[1] territory exercised by a power with no sovereign
title to the land, whether in defiance or absence of a proper
sovereign.
Effective Occupation is a principle in international law that
territory and other property remains with its possessor at the
end of a conflict, unless otherwise provided for by treaty.
Territorial sea. This is measured 12 nautical miles from the
baseline, the coastal state is free to set laws, regulate use, and
use any resource. Vessels were given the right of innocent
passage through any territorial waters, with strategic straits
allowing the passage of military craft as transit passage, in that
naval vessels are allowed to maintain postures that would be
illegal in territorial waters.
Statelessness
In international law, statelessness is the lack of citizenship.
A stateless person is someone who is "not considered as a
national by any state under the operation of its law".
Some stateless persons are also refugees.
Reparation
It is a principle of international law that the breach of an
engagement involves an obligation to make reparation in an
adequate form." (1) Reparation is a principle of law that has
existed for centuries, referring to the obligation of a
wrongdoing party to redress the damage caused to the injured
party.
Torture
For the purpose of this Convention, the term "torture" means
any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or
mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes
as obtaining from him, or a third person, information or
a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has
committed or is suspected of having committed,
or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any
reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or
suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the
consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person
acting in an official capacity.

IHL v HR

Humanitarian law is concerned with the EFFECTS of war, not

its legality. It applies irrespective of who started the war or
who is the attacker.
Jurisdiction of ICC
The mandate of the Court is to try individuals rather than
States, and to hold such persons accountable for the most
serious crimes of concern to the international community as a
whole, namely the crime of genocide, war crimes, crimes
against humanity, and the crime of aggression, when the
conditions for the exercise of the Courts jurisdiction over the
latter are fulfilled.

On the issue of EDCA

Locklear said EDCA would be helpful in providing better
military capability as the Philippines confronts China's
aggression in disputed waters in the South
Aside from increased rotational presence of U.S. forces,
Locklear said upgrade of existing Philippine military facilities,
like airport runways and harbors, would be possible through
EDCA.
"It is in our national interest to have a peaceful, prosperous
Philippines, to have a stable security environment including
maritime domain, air domain
ISSUE: EDCA violated Article 18, Section 25 of the
Constitution, which requires concurrence of Senate on
treaties.
The SC stood firm on its finding that EDCA is not a form of
treaty, but rather a valid executive agreement that former
president Benigno Aquino III was allowed to enter into with
the US under the Constitution, to implement the earlier
Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) and the Mutual Defense
Treaty (MDT)

EDCA did not go beyond the framework. The entry of US

troops has long been authorized under a valid and subsisting
treaty, which is the Visiting Forces Agreement. Reading the
VFA along with the longstanding Mutual Defense Treaty led
this Court to the conclusion that an executive agreement such
as the EDCA was well within the bounds of the obligations
imposed by both treaties
Diplomatic Immunities and privileges
1. Personal inviolability
*Republic Act 75 - AN ACT TO PENALIZE ACTS
WHICH WOULD IMPAIR THE PROPER
OBSERVANCE BY THE REPUBLIC AND
INHABITANTS OF THE PHILIPPINES OF THE
IMMUNITIES, RIGHT, AND PRIVILEGES OF DULY
ACCREDITED FOREIGN DIPLOMATIC AND
CONSULAR AGENTS IN THE PHILIPPINES
*UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment
of Crimes Against Internationally Protected Persons
2. Inviolability of premises and archives
3. Right of Official Communication
4. Immunity from local jurisdiction

LECTURES: AUGUST 30
Geneva convention of 1949