Highlights from the Office of the Chief State Law Adviser (International Law)

Abstract

It is again a privilege for the Office of the Chief State Law Adviser (International law) at the Department of International Relations and Cooperation to share some of its activities during 2011 with the wider international community. In a year in which the use of force by states – and the legal limits thereof – once again taxed international lawyers the world over, the law advisers of the office were often reminded of the conditions for self-defence set out in beautiful prose in the 1841 letter of the United States Secretary of State, Daniel Webster, to the British Minister in Washington, relating to the destruction of the vessel The Caroline. The famous ‘Webster formula’ listed a number of conditions that must be present for legitimate self-defence against a threat, amongst others that ‘no moment for deliberation’ must remain.