Supreme Court, Military Commissions and International Law

In two recent postings on the SCOTUSBLOG (United States Supreme Court Blog.) the issue of the degree of attention the Court pays to foreign nations legal views are discussed. The issues arise in Medellin v. Drake and Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (brief.) In the Hamdan brief, a total of 271 parliamentarians from British and the European Community asked the Court to act swifly on an appeal on the legality of the commissions under U.S. military law and the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners. Medellin involves the enforceability of Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, which provides that detained foreign nationals to communicate with their national consulate. Several foreign governments and amici curiae groups have filed briefs. Amici I , Amici II, European Union.