There is no conclusive evidence of the Court either impeding or facilitating peace, and we must be mindful that achieving peace in conflict countries will never be easy.

Around Central Africa rebel militia groups are trading wildlife for supplies to fuel their illegal activities. Wildlife poaching is of huge national and international concern as the current rate of poaching is placing African elephants at a risk of extinction within the next ten years.

The legal classification of cross-border armed conflicts between State and non-State parties has become increasingly complex as such conflicts do not fit into the neat typology of international armed conflict (IAC) or non-international armed conflict (NIAC).

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) faces major challenges in its decision to turn against members of its former advocate and the subsequent lack of cooperation from the RPF, would turn out to be a major obstacle for Rwanda's reconciliation process in the years to come.

Twenty years ago, in April 1994, South Africa held its first democratic elections after forty years of apartheid. Decades of segregation, injustice and suppression came to an end as the rainbow nation was born under the leadership of Nelson Mandela. South Africa was set on the right path, but equal rights were merely the foundation - not a guarantor - for equal economic opportunities.

Since February this year, Venezuela has been in an extreme state of upheaval. Even for a country like Venezuela with extreme polarization and lively political debate, riots of this magnitude are uncommon. What started as a demonstration by a group of students in the south-west of the country claiming for more security at universities, has transformed into the worst political violence the country has experienced in more than twenty years.

As declared by Russia Today, Russian troops were deployed to Crimea ‘only to protect human rights’. The Crimean issue unfolding at present was compared to the secession of Kosovo, and daring to deny the illusory similarities between these two wildly different conflicts is described as ‘rewriting the rulebook’ on the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine.

Ten years after its establishment in Arusha, Tanzania, the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights is still hampered by shortcomings that would render any court ineffective. Whilst the willingness to establish a human rights court on a continent victim to devastating crimes against humanity is commendable, the Court is characterised by

This article deals with the premises that ought to be considered when analysing developments in China. It then goes on to suggest why one ought not to be disappointed, but be cautiously optimistic of the reforms laid out in the Third Plenum concluded on 12th November 2013.

Over the past week, Lithuania, Nigeria, Chile, Chad and Saudi Arabia were elected unopposed to five non-permanent member seats in the UN Security Council. Only a few hours later, Saudi Arabia, though hardly a state celebrated for its human rights record, rejected its seat