EDITORIAL

Dear Readers,

It is a pleasure to introduce the second issue of the 50th Volume of the Military Law and the Law of War Review. As already mentioned in my editorial for the first issue, 2011 has been a particularly demanding year in terms of the editorial process.

In the second half of the year the International Society for Military law and the Law of War actively supported the launch and selection process of the 2012 Ciardi Prize – A tri-annual prize offered by the Ciardi Foundation in Rome in memory of Professor Giuseppe Ciardi, Honorary President of the International Society for Military law and the Law of War. The Prize is normally awarded during the Society’s Congress, which takes place every third year. In 2012, the Ciardi Prize was conferred during the Society’s 19th Congress, held in Québec City (Canada) on 4th May. I had the pleasure to sit among the five jurors tasked with reviewing the works submitted and deciding the winner. The Prize went to Steven Dewulf – lecturer at the University of Antwerp (Belgium) – for his monumental volume on the crime of torture in international law. In addition, Frederik Naert’s outstanding book on the international law aspects of the EU’s security and defence policy was awarded with a special mention for its comprehensiveness and carefulness of analysis.

As mentioned in my first editorial, the Review is expanding its reach within the academic realm, while maintaining its close ties with practitioners. One of our goals is in fact that of getting together around the Review a group of talented scholars with different backgrounds, who may be ready to contribute with articles and comments or willing to peerreview papers. This ‘community of experts’ could inter alia encourage younger generations of scholars and practitioners to contribute to the Review and expand the Review’s appeal to other potential contributors, being also a valuable source of ideas, information, news and fruitful debate – all essential elements for the success of a scholarly journal. A clear example of this process is the opening section of this issue, which is dedicated to the analysis of the recent Al-Skeini and Al-Jedda decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. The names of authors (Frederik Naert, Francesco Messineo, Kjetil Mujezinovic Larsen, Anne-Marie Baldovin and Heike Krieger), the variety of the topics covered (which avoid overlap and complement each other) and the academic substance of the contributions collected in this Agora, speak for themselves. In respect of the aforesaid goal, the organization of this special section looks paradigmatic.

Exemplary in terms of internationalization is the ‘Case-law and Recent Developments’ Section, which includes contributions on very different subject matters and orientated by different perspectives. Otto Spijkers comments the very recent decision on the Srebrenica case by the Hague Court of Appeal, while Alfons Vanheusden, W. Hays Parks and William H. Boothby reflect on the possible use of expanding bullets in military operations following the 2010 Review Conference of the International Criminal Court. The section ends with a report of the 2011 NATO Legal Conference, held on 24-27 October 2011 in Portugal. It is followed by a section on the Beijing International Conference on International Humanitarian Law and Peace Operations of 9-13 November 2011, which contains a report of this conference as well as Lt. Gen. Liu Jixian’s keynote speech on the practice of international humanitarian law by the Chinese Armed Forces. Lt. Gen. Jixian is Vice President of the China Academy of Military Sciences, Vice President of the China Law Society, and President of the China Military Law Society. Due to the prominent role played by Gen. Jixian within the Chinese military legal community and the highly pertinent content of his speech, we are honoured to have the opportunity to publish his contribution in our Review, also in the hope of attracting future contributions from China and from Chinese scholars. The fact that the Review for the first time and exceptionally publishes a piece in Chinese, along with its translation in English, takes the number of languages used in this issue to three (English, French and Chinese).

We also publish an article by Radidja Nemar on the critical issue of the command responsibility in case of acts of torture committed by subordinates vis-à-vis the US and British jurisdiction over national troops abroad. This article in many ways complements the one by Magne Frostad in the first issue. The book reviews by three brilliant young scholars, namely Maia Titberidze, Stefano Saluzzo and Ilia Siatitsia conclude this second issue with some insightful analysis of the relationship between Jus ad Bellum and Jus in Bello, the use of torture during the Bush Administration, and the application of international humanitarian law in modern warfare, respectively. I trust that our readers will enjoy this second and last number of the Review’s 2011 Volume.