The European Court of Human Rights (European Court), increasingly known as “the conscience of Europe,” together with the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly, were the first intergovernmental organizations to reveal information about the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) “black sites.” These “black sites” were secret prisons established around the world, outside of U.S. territory, by the George W. Bush administration and run by the CIA to detain suspects termed “high value,” and their existence was repeatedly denied by the U.S. and Polish Governments. The Soros funded Open Society Justice Initiative, filed the application with the European Court on behalf of Abd al-Nashiri on May 6, 2011, arguing that Poland had been complicit in his rendition, detention, and torture at a CIA black-site prison within the state.

On December 18, 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU or the Court) issued its judgment of the case Fag og Arbejde (FOA) v. Kommunernes Landsforening (KL).1 The CJEU’s decision is notable for being the first in which the Court directly rules on the question of whether discrimination based on body weight is prohibited under European law. Finding that there is no general prohibition on obesity discrimination in the employment context, the Court of Justice of the European Union nevertheless considers that in some cases, obesity can be a cause of disability. As a result, unequal treatment of obese persons could be a violation of the protections of non-discrimination enjoyed by persons with disabilities.

On December 10, 2014, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the United Nations Convention on Transparency in Treaty-based Investor-State Arbitration, also known as the Mauritius Convention on Transparency, which was prepared by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL). The Mauritius Convention is intended to provide states with an efficient mechanism for applying the UNCITRAL Rules on Transparency in Treaty-based Investor-State Arbitration (Transparency Rules) in investor-state arbitrations arising under investment treaties concluded before the Transparency Rules’ effective date of April 1, 2014. The Mauritius Convention was opened for signature on March 17, 2015, in Port Louis, Mauritius.

At its sixty-sixth session in 2014, the International Law Commission completed its final report on the obligation to extradite or prosecute and submitted it to the United Nations General Assembly for consideration at its sixty-ninth session.1 The report concluded the Commission’s work on a topic the General Assembly had long considered important in states’ efforts to cooperate in the prevention of impunity for crimes of international concern.2 The Commission addressed the implementation of the obligation; gaps in the existing conventional regime; the priority between the obligation to prosecute and the obligation to extradite, and the scope of the obligation to prosecute; the relationship between the obligation with erga omnes obligations or jus cogens norms; the customary international law status of the obligation; and other matters of relevance from the general framework created in 2009 for the Commission’s consideration of the topic.