The Obama administration's strongest case for intervening in Syria rests on the global security risks posed by the regime's suspected use of chemical weapons, says CFR's John B. Bellinger.

Any external military intervention in Syria in response to government use of chemical weapons will require persuasive arguments to prove legitimacy, says CFR's Matthew Waxman.

The government of the United Kingdom published its position on August 29, 2013, about the legality of military action in Syria after the chemical weapons attack in Damascus on August 21.

Whether NSA leaker Edward Snowden is extradited to the United States will hinge more on diplomatic relations than international legal considerations, says expert Stephen Vladeck.

In the era of globalization, policymakers are increasingly debating the proper role of international law, and a group of legal scholars have embraced transnationalism, the idea that growing interconnectedness should dissolve international boundaries. But that approach is at odds with basic American principles.

Jerome A. Cohen says the Communist Party's sustained efforts since June 4 to influence China's courts for its own ends may be easing, but judicial independence is still a long way off.

Both the Bush and Obama administrations have concluded that the use of drones to kill al-Qaeda leaders is permissible under both U.S. domestic law and international law.

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The UN Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) was passed on March 28, 2013, and seeks to regulate and limit trade in arms in circumstances of human rights violations. Unfortunately, it will have minimal effect on the Syrian conflict. Syria's own vote against the treaty, along with Iran's and North Korea's, sounded the death knell for a universally applicable treaty to limit small arms, ammunition, and conventional weapons technology.

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Grounded in a realistic assessment of technology, Matthew C. Waxman and Kenneth Anderson outline a practical alternative with which to evaluate the use of autonomous weaponry that incorporates codes of conduct based on traditional legal and ethical principles governing weapons and warfare.

Thomas Bollyky writes about how national patent laws are affecting pharmaceutical cost differentials around the world.

In 2009 the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Center of Excellence (NATO CCD COE) asked a panel of international law experts to "apply standards of international law to a virtual battlefield." The panel released this report on March 28, 2013, as "an expression of opinions of a group of independent experts acting solely in their personal capacity."

Dr. Jendayi Frazer writes, "The ICC has fallen from high ideals of global justice, accountability," discussing the recent Kenya elections.

UN Special Rapporteur on Human rights and Counterterrorism Ben Emmerson released this statement on March 14, 2013, following his meetings in Pakistan with victims of drone strikes.

Due to the 9/11 attacks and the continued threat posed by international terrorism, the United States claims it is "currently at war with al-Qaeda and its associated forces," a conflict that extends beyond traditional battlefield settings to any country that is "unwilling or unable" to take action itself. The United States reserves the right to conduct targeted killings, although only against "senior" members of al-Qaeda who "pose an imminent threat the United States of America." Although the U.S. military has a vast array of tools in its arsenal, the primary vehicle for its targeted killings program are drones, which have been used in over 95 percent of the 420—and counting—targeted killings over the last decade.

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With the passing of International Human Rights Day, Jerome A. Cohen says China still has no effective means of enforcing the rights enshrined in its constitution. Yet, once again, new Communist Party leaders reignite hopes for bringing government and the party under the rule of law.

Kenneth Anderson and Matthew C. Waxman say some view automated technology developments as a crisis for the laws of war. But provided we start now to incorporate ethical and legal norms into weapons design, the incremental movement from automation to genuine machine autonomy already underway might well be made to serve the ends of law on the battlefield.

Matthew C. Waxman argues that international law still plays a powerful role in justifying or delegitimizing the case for military action. Just like in the Cuban missile crisis, the United States needs to present a plausible case for self-defense in order to strike Iran.

Jeffrey H. Smith and John B. Bellinger III say that because a nuclear-armed Iran is a real threat to the United States, the president does have reason to argue for his constitutional authority to use force against Iran, but legislative approval would give him stronger legal and political ground to do so.

Harold Koh, Legal Advisor at the U.S. Department of State, gave these remarks at the USCYBERCOM Inter-Agency Legal Conference in Maryland on September 18, 2012.

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange gave these remarks at the Ecuadoran Embassy in London on August 19, 2012. This transcript was published in The Independent.