Call for papers: Symposium on Peacekeeping in the Asia-Pacific: Gender equality, Law and Collective Security. 19-20 April 2012

The Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law (APCML) Melbourne Law School, and the Centre for Gender Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) invite submissions for a symposium to be held at the Melbourne Law School 19-20 April 2012.
The symposium will bring together military, police and civilian participants in peace support operations, academics, researchers, government officials and local leaders from post-conflict societies, primarily from the Asia-Pacific region, to discuss their perspectives on and experiences with incorporating a ‘gender perspective’ into peacekeeping operations, as required by Security Council Resolution 1325 (2000). It will be the first time that this topic is explored in a scholarly symposium in Australia and coincides with the development of an Australian National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security.

Call for Papers Deadline: Monday 21 November 2011. The call for papers can be downloaded here.
Further details on the Symposium will be posted in coming months but please do not hesitate to contact either APCML Director Gerry Simpson on g.simpson@unimelb.edu.au or the Symposium convenor Dianne Otto on d.otto@unimelb.edu.au for further information.

Public Lecture: The Legacy of the Eichmann Trial - Thursday 13 October 2011
Speaker: Professor Devin Pendas

A global media sensation at the time, the Eichmann Trial is often credited with creating global  awareness of the Holocaust. It is less clear what its legal legacy has been. Given that critics like Hannah Arendt accused the Israeli government of politicizing the trial for memorial purposes, it is worth pondering the interaction of law and memory in the trial's legacy. Did the trial create global Holocaust memory? Did it do so at the price of distorting the law? Does the trial have a legal legacy independent of its role in shaping Holocaust memory? The trial's ability to shape memory was inextricably bound up with its legal character, and both have established powerful, though not unproblematic, precedents for what has come to be called transitional justice.

Professor Pendas' research focuses on war crimes trials after World War II, particularly on West German Holocaust trials. He is currently working on two projects: a history of Nazi trials in German courts in all occupation zones from 1945 to 1950, to be published by Cambridge University Press; and a synthetic history of law and mass violence in the modern period.

Professor Pendas is Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies at Boston College Law School. He is also a faculty affiliate and co-chair of the German Study Group at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University.

Date: Thursday, 13 October 2011
Time: 6:00 - 7:30pm
Venue: Room 109, level 1, Address: Melbourne Law School (185 Pelham Street, Carlton)

Contact: Cathy Hutton +61 3 8344 4775

RSVP: law-apcml@unimelb.edu.au

Course: Command and Staff Operations Law Course - 4-14 October 2011
Nominations are now open for the APCML Command and Staff Operations Law course. The two week course will be held at HMAS Penguin, NSW.
The objective of this two week course is to raise the awareness of commanders and their staff about key operations law issues that impact on contemporary military operations.

For more information and a nomination form please click here: http://www.apcml.org/courses.php

Conference: Military Law in a New Dimension: Armed Forces Deployed against Transnational Crime and Terrorism -26-28 August 2011
The Melbourne Law School will host a major international conference on military engagement in the context of transnational crime and terrorism.

The conference is organised by the Armed Forces Law Association of New Zealand in conjunction with the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law at the University of Melbourne, the Lieber Society of the American Society of International Law, the Center for Australian and New Zealand Studies, Georgetown University, Washington DC and the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand.

Key note speakers are Professor Neil Boister of Canterbury University and Commander Chris Griggs (Royal New Zealand Navy) Deputy Director of Legal Services – Operations in the New Zealand Defence Force.

Papers are to be presented by a mixture of practitioners and academics on topics as varied as the military as law enforcers, combating piracy, and cyber-crime, and will also include regional case-studies on ensuring civil stability in the face of terrorism and transnational crime.   

Public Lecture - 'Terrorist': Diasporic Emotions, Sense of Justice and International Criminal Classification' - Wednesday 20 July 2011

Invitations are now open to a forthcoming Public Lecture presented jointly by the APCML and the International Institute of Law and the Humanities (IILAH) as part of the Affective States of International Criminal Justice symposium to be held at Melbourne Law School, 21 - 22 July 2011.

Professor Ghassan Hage, Future Generation Professor of Anthropology and Social Theory at the University of Melbourne, will speak on 'Terrorist': Diasporic Emotions, Sense of Justice and International Criminal Classification'.

Professor Hage works in the field of comparative nationalism, racism and multiculturalism. His most well-known works are White Nation (2000) and Against Paranoid Nationalism (2003). He is currently working on an ARC-funded ethnographic project on emotions towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict among Arab-Muslim immigrants in Australia, France and the US.

Please see the attached flyer for further details.

Date:               Wednesday, 20 July 2011

Time:               6.00 - 7.15pm

Venue:            Lecture theatre G08, ground floor, Melbourne Law School (185 Pelham St, Carlton)

RSVP:              law-apcml@unimelb.edu.au

Ending the Era of Nuclear Weapons: Legal and Humanitarian Imperatives for Nuclear Disarmament - Tuesday 5 July 2011
A forum on the humanitarian impact of the use of nuclear weapons, with discussion on the legal issues surrounding disarmament, and a review of the way forward for states to contribute to the reduction and eventual elimination of nuclear arsenals.
Speakers include former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, Hiroshima survivor Junko Morimoto, Professor Ramesh Thakur (ANU), Dr Tilman Ruff (ICAN) and Dr Helen Durham (Australian Red Cross).
Contact: Pip Ross: pross@redcross.org.au
Select to view the flier.

Symposium: Military Justice in the Modern Age 4 -5 November 2011
On 4 and 5 November 2011 the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law will host an international symposium at the Melbourne Law School to mark its 10th anniversary. The Call for Papers is attached can be downloaded here Call for Papers.
The idea behind this symposium is to explore issues concerning military justice from a comparative perspective. The symposium will be organised according to the following three themes:

• Military justice under attack?
  For example constitutional and human rights challenges to military justice
• Comparative perspectives on military justice
  Including perspectives from countries with a separate military justice system and those which incorporate military justice within the civilian courts
• Contemporary issues concerning military justice
  For example, jurisdictional issues surrounding military justice, the appropriate design of a military justice system, case studies or empirical analysis, analysis of the civilianisation of military justice

The organisers intend to publish the papers presented at the workshop as an edited book. We regret that we cannot offer travel or accommodation expenses for participants at the symposium.

If you are interested in presenting a paper at the symposium or contributing to the planned book, please send a 250 word abstract and a short CV no later than Monday 20 June 2011 to Alison Duxbury a.duxbury@unimelb.edu.au.

If you have any questions about this symposium please contact Alison Duxbury or Matthew Groves matthew.groves@monash.edu.

International Institute of Humanitarian Law Newsletter
The latest newsletter from the International Institute of Humanitarian Law has been released in English. You can download the newsletter from the IIHL website
Select to view the newsletter

Construction begins on the ADF Military Law Centre and Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law
16 March 2011

Parliamentary Secretary for Defence, Senator David Feeney yesterday turned the first sod for the construction of a new purpose-built Australian Defence Force Military Law Centre at Victoria Barracks in Paddington, Sydney.

Senator Feeney welcomed the new Centre. The facility will house both the Australian Defence Force (ADF) Military Law Centre and the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law.

“This new Centre will bring the finest teaching and training to Australia’s Defence Force Officers and officers from around the Asia-Pacific region. It will build on the good work already achieved by the Centre over the past 10 years,” he said.

“The new Military Law Centre will also host the military node of the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law, a very successful partnership between Defence and Melbourne University which started in 2002,” Senator Feeney said.

These legal centres will continue to train future ADF legal officers and other officers from the Asia-Pacific region in facets of military and international law. There will be a special focus on the rule of law. Over the last decade the role of the Military Law Centre has expanded to take into account the developing needs of the wider ADF. For instance, the Military Law Centre now delivers outcomes relating to legal training of generalist officers as well as specialist officers.

The purpose of the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law is to facilitate cooperation among military forces of the Asia Pacific Region in the research, training and implementation of the laws governing military operations.

The Centre recognises the Hon Dr. Mike Kelly’s vision and commitment to the creation of this important training institution.

For more images of the event, go to: http://adfmedia.smugmug.com/Feeney.