Corporate Pillage of Conflict Commodities

Abstract:Since the end of the Cold War, the illegal exploitation of natural resources has provided the means and motivation for armed violence in countries as diverse as Myanmar, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Iraq. To date, no businessperson or company has been held accountable for trafficking in these conflict commodities, despite the fact that corporate willingness to trade with brutal armed groups is a prerequisite to modern resource wars the world over. This talk plots the advantages and challenges involved in prosecuting commercial actors for pillaging natural resources from war zones, using the war crime of pillage as applied after Nuremberg as a template.  
Speaker: Professor James G Stewart has spent the past fifteen years working in international criminal justice, as either a practitioner or a scholar. He joined the University of British Columbia Law Faculty in August 2009, after spending two years as an Associate-in-Law at Columbia Law School in New York. At present, he works as a Senior Legal Advisor (part-time) to judges of the Appeals Chamber of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. Over the course of his time at the Wall Institute, Professor Stewart will be writing a book on the theory of complicity as part of his broader inquiry into the relationship between commerce and atrocity.University Centre, Seminar Room (307), 6331 Crescent Road, Vancouver