Which is a Mixture of Legal Problem Solving – Law Assignment Help

Assignment Task:

Task:

This assessment task is described as a report, which is a mixture of legal problem solving (i.e. a systematic application of law) and critical analysis (i.e. an evaluation of specific laws and related implications for individuals, society or law). It requires you to apply international human rights law to a contemporary human rights issue to determine whether, and if so how, particular human rights have been violated and what formal and informal avenues may exist to address these violations, as well as the limitations to these avenues. You can assume the report’s aim is to communicate to a general but legally educated audience.
Given the range of potential human rights violations in the events outlined, you should provide an in-depth analysis and discussion of 1 to 3 rights rather than a superficial account of all the rights. Identify in the introduction which rights you are focusing on in the analysis.
Each report will be structurally and analytically different as students focus on different rights or focus on different aspects.
Do not vest too much attention to the marks in the criteria, as analysis, communication and research are very intertwined. As a general rule, the more research you do, the better your analysis and communication. The more you revise your work, the better your analysis, communication and research.
General Instructions
Generally, this task requires you to:
Identify relevant human rights issues/violations
Understand the factual scenario using the sources provided. You can supplement this understanding through your own research
Choose 1 to 3 human rights to focus on
Research the various legal sources of relevant rights/duties including, but not excluded to, Special Rapporteur Reports, UN treaty committee documents, resolutions of UN bodies and Individual or State-State communications
Keep track of sources you find and their interpretations so that you can synthesise and apply the interpretations
You may need to find specific examples of the human rights violations, for instance, specific instances of unlawful killings or cruel treatment of detainees reported in the Brereton Inquiry Report or Parliamentary Reports or by credible news or NGOs. You might be talking in general about human rights violations, but specific examples allow deeper analysis and application of the law.

• Analyse, and communicate this analysis in a professional manner. You may wish to consider the following:
• The relevant rights and any corresponding duties against the facts provided
• Whether, and if so how, the government/s have violated a human right duty
• Refer to academic articles and international sources to build/improve your application and analysis
• Where relevant, unpack aspects of the law that are under-developed, evolving or ambiguous
• Identify relevant enforcement mechanisms in international human rights law or other relevant avenues
• Communicate whether/how these enforcement mechanisms may work in the situation and what the limitations of them may be
• Consider the viability of formal avenues (i.e. UN mechanisms) as well as informal or soft avenues to influence compliance with human rights
• Integrate, if appropriate, an understanding of the socio-political context i.e. broader/more complex issues in applying or enforcing human rights law in the given scenario. Refer to academic articles and international sources to build/improve your application and analysis
• For instance, you may wish to consider what countries could assert diplomatic pressure and if so how and whether it is likely such pressure will be exerted
• Alternatively, there may already be examples of countries trying to use enforcement mechanisms, and these could be mentioned and explored.
• Specific advice
• Research
• There are instructions and guidance on researching in international human rights law in the podcast ‘1 – Part 3: Introduction to Public International Law’
• You can assume that the factual assertions provided are true (e.g. the events took place) and you should focus on researching relevant laws and any potentially relevant additional facts. The bulk of your research should go towards (a) interpretations/applications of relevant human rights and (b) enforcement avenues.
• The nature of this research essay means that students will need to consult:
• Treaties
• Extraneous, credible interpretation material e.g. individual communications, regional human rights cases, UN reports (such as special rapporteur or general comments, or results from universal periodic reviews etc.)
• Credible NGO reports (such as Amnesty and Human Rights Watch), reputable news sources, parliamentary reports;
• Academic articles, books or book chapters;
• Even if they are focused on a different situation, academic articles and extraneous materials, such as individual communications, often explain and analyse relevant human rights in a useful way or refer to relevant international sources.
• Students should avoid being too reliant on one or two primary or secondary sources. Having a diversity of sources illustrates a higher level of research and enriches your analysis.
• When to cite news articles: While there is high-quality news on the context, over-reliance on news articles has been a common issue when other, far more credible sources, are available. That is, while you can use news reports, it should not be excessive and you should refer to more credible sources when available. Also, news articles should only be used for the ‘facts’ research and they are not appropriate legal sources (e.g. do not cite a news article instead of a human rights treaty, human rights jurisprudence etc.)
• Students need to show that they (a) know of and (b) can cite relevant international law sources (both treaties and extraneous materials interpreting rights).
• Structuring Analysis
• The following dot points provide a guide to how you may structure your report. Please note that there are no specific marks attached to any part of the structure below nor do the points all necessarily need to be addressed nor is there a “correct” structure. Please keep in mind that each right is different and each set of facts/contexts focused upon may also be slightly different. Each student will also differ in which aspects of a right/issues/interpretations they wish to focus on. Part of the challenge of this assessment, and many others, is carving out a report from a broad range of information and laws. The emphasis for the marker is not, at all, on whether the discussion formulaically addresses the aspects detailed below. Rather the emphasis for the marker is on whether the assignment meets the criteria. The marker will not even be aware of the below guide to structure. This is purely a starting point for students in structuring their analysis.
• Part 1- Introduction: identifies the key human rights issues you are focused on in the report, explains the aim of the report and provides a brief roadmap (roughly 4-7 sentences).
• Part 2: Human rights issues/violations (This is not a heading you should use as it does not tell the reader anything important. Use meaningful headings. In other words, the body text to your report will use headings meaningful to what you are discussing)
• Use sub-headings to divide up this part
• Consider the elements necessary to establish with reference to authoritative sources about how these elements have been interpreted and whether similar situations to those in the Brereton report (or parliamentary reports, NGO or news reports etc. that you looked at to identify ‘facts’) have been considered violations.
• Depending on which right(s) you focus on, you may need to address how the right(s) apply in a non-international armed conflict context
• Where relevant, you should include varying interpretations of the rights and justifications for limiting the rights.
• Depending on which right(s) you focus on, you may raise competing arguments about whether a duty exist/should exist and the scope of that duty etc.
• Analyse the facts relevant to each human right chosen, as identified in the reports, and expressly apply the law to the facts. Be wary of being too descriptive i.e. explaining the situation rather than explaining how it is or is not a violation of human rights with reference to primary and secondary sources.
• Be as specific as possible with the facts provided. For instance, if talking about arbitrary deprivation of life, draw on and apply human rights to specific examples of arbitrary deprivation of life.
• In your analysis, allocate words to teasing out more complex points where a lot of interpretation/application is required.
• Conclude whether a provision applies and/or was violated with reference to facts.
• Part 3: Enforcement (This is not necessarily a heading you should use as it does not necessarily tell the reader anything important. Use meaningful headings. In other words, the body text to your report will use headings meaningful to what you are discussing)
• This section may come at the end of the report or it may come after each individual human right that is examined.
• Consider, if any, the relevant enforcement mechanism/s that apply based on the potential violations you have identified (or do not apply but are relevant or which could theoretically apply).
• After you identify any legal/technical avenues for enforcement, you should discuss other avenues that may exist for enforcement and/or critically analyse the limitations of human rights law in this scenario.
• You might, for instance, identify whether international humanitarian law avenues exist for enforcement and consider the likelihood of these being used. Alternatively, you might identify which countries have a close relationship with the state government violating human rights, and what kinds of diplomatic avenues may be open to it/likelihood of it taking these avenues. You may consider what kinds of economic sanctions may apply.
• In a manner specific to the context, critically analyse the limitations of human rights law and/or ways to improve its/their enforceability. This should not be done in a descriptive way, but in a way that engages with the social, political, cultural or philosophical context.
• Ensure you use scholarly sources for this aspect. In other words, academic articles (and NGO reports) will be useful for identifying the softer enforcement mechanisms available and the likelihood such avenues will be taken.
• Explain your reasoning fully, with reference to relevant conventions, cases and scholarly commentary.
• Part 4: Conclusion that summarises key findings of the report (3-7 sentences)
• Word Count, Style and Referencing Requirements
• Reports have an introduction, a body and a conclusion.
• Reports in the legal field must use headings and sub-headings
• No bibliography is required but footnotes consistent with AGLC4 must be used.
• AGLC 4 has clear guidance on how to cite the following:
• Treaties
• Special Rapporteur Reports
• General Comments and other reports from Treaty Bodies
• Resolutions from UN organs including the General Assembly
• Individual Communications
• AGLC 4 does not always have good guidance on international sources outside of these categories. In these cases, you follow as closely as possible the following section of the AGLC- Part IV- International Materials – Rule 9.2 Official Documents of the UN
• AGLC 4 has clear advice on citing legislation from other countries
• Word count:
• Assignments should be a maximum of 2,500 words, not including footnotes. Footnotes should only contain citations for scholarly sources, cases, treaties, etc.
• If you would like to write less than 2500 words, there will be no penalty but you cannot exceed the word count.
• You must note the word count at the start of your assignment. Words in excess of the limit will not contribute to your mark. If you misrepresent the word count in this statement, markers will be told to deduct points from your total grade as an academic integrity issue. Markers will decide with the UC what the points should be and this will be noted on your submission. Lying about the word count number would also contribute to a finding of minor or major academic integrity if combined with e.g. plagiarism, collusion or other misrepresentations.
• Additional points regarding referencing and style:
• Write in paragraphs (around 3-7 sentences). Writing in paragraphs will improve the cohesiveness of your work. Each paragraph should contain sentences that are related to the same very specific topic or idea. Generally, your paragraph should contain one topic sentence that outlines/summarises the specific idea or theme the paragraph is dealing with. This sentence may fall at the start, middle or end of a paragraph.
• Avoid overly long or complicated sentences
• Where possible and suitable, write in the active not the passive voice: Passive example- The human rights owed to Y were breached by X. Active: X breached the human rights owed to Y. X’s duties are…
• Human rights issue: Myanmar’s coup, arrest of Aung San Suu Ki, and detainment of lawyers
• Background
• Myanmar borders with Thailand, Laos, Bangladesh, China and India. The country has a recent history of repressive military control, civil wars and internal armed conflicts and struggles with systemic poverty. In particular, Rohinga people have been the subject of state violence and discriminatory policies and actions since Myanmar gained independence from the British in 1948. Mostly, Myanmar has been military-controlled as largely a one-party state. Myanmar has often excluded itself from global affairs and been excluded by other countries and international institutions.
• The current constitution in Myanmar (the Constitution of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, 2008) aims to create a multi-party democratic system of governance involving independent courts whereby politicians represent civilian interests. After the 2010 national election based on the new 2008 constitution, a more democratic government was formed and a new President was sworn in who freed political prisoners. The new President allowed an oppositional political to form, the National League for Democracy party (NLD), which was and is led by Aung San Suu Kyi. During the 2015 election, the opposition, i.e. the NLD party led by Aung San Suu Kyi, won enough seats in parliament to form a government. Despite this, the military in Myanmar, referred to as the Tatmadaw, continued to have significant political and legal influence partly due to the design of the country’s constitution.
• In November 2020, Suu Kyi’s NLD party won a significant amount of seats in Parliament (315 of the 440 seats in the lower house and 161 of the 224 seats in the upper house equalling about 83.2% of seats up for election).
• Myanmar’s Military alleged that there were widespread voter irregularities and claimed to have found 8.6 million individual cases of voter fraud. On the 28th of January, Myanmar’s election commission (the Union Election Commission) rejected allegations by the Military finding that there were no election errors large enough to impact on the credibility of the election outcome. The accusations of fraud made by the Military have not been supported by journalist investigations and have been dismissed by human rights organisations including the Asian Network for Free Elections following its investigation of the election. However, human rights organisations did observe ways in which the election process could be improved.
• On the 1st of February 2021, the Myanmar Military’ declared a state of emergency in Myanmar alleging that the recent election involved large-scale voter fraud. The Myanmar Military is led by Min Aung Hiaing.
• Declaring a state of emergency allows for the transferral of all power to the military from the parliament. The Military used articles 417-419 of the Constitution as the legal basis for its takeover; however, the processes set-out to declare such an emergency have not been followed. On the day the coup started, the military arrested Aung San Suu Kyi. In the week that followed, the Military arrested the members of the Union Election Commission (UEC) and reformed the UEC with new military-appointed public officials.
• Since the military coup on the 1st of February 2021, the Military has killed hundreds, and arrested thousands, of people engaged in protesting the coup.
• Arrests of Lawyers
• Myanmar’s military has increasingly arrested lawyers representing people who have been imprisoned for protesting the coup or who are members of the NLD. Most recently, Myanmar’s military has arrested six lawyers.
• Some of the lawyers have been arrested and charged under s 505A of Myanmar’s Penal Code.
• 505. Whoever makes, publishes or circulates any statement, rumour or report,— (a) with intent to -cause, or which is likely to cause, any officer, soldier, sailor or airman, in the Army, Navy or Air Force to mutiny or otherwise disregard or fail in his duty as such; or (b) with intent to cause, or which is likely to cause, fear or alarm to the public or to any section of the public whereby any person may be induced to commit an offence against the State or against the public tranquillity; or (c) with intent to incite, or which is likely to incite, any class or community of persons to commit any offence against any other class or community, shall be punished with imprisonment which may extend to two years, or with fine, or with both.
• Exception.— It does not amount to an offence, within the meaning of his section, when the person making, publishing or circulating shy such statement, rumour or report has reasonable grounds for believing that such statement, rumour or report is true and makes, publishes or circulates it without any such intent as aforesaid.
• Note that AGLC has specific style guidelines for how to cite legislation and similar such instruments from other countries.
• Arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi
• As mentioned, Aung San Suu Kyi is the leader of the NLD in Myanmar. In November 2020, her party won the majority of votes. She was widely considered the de facto leader of Myanmar, but technically she held positions as a state counsellor and member of Myanmar Parliament. In February 2021, she was arrested at the same time as the Myanmar military declared the state of emergency in 2021.
• Aung San Suu Ki’s lawyer is named Khin Maung Zaw.
• The full range of charges against Aung San Suu Ki and the legal bases are, at the time of writing, somewhat unclear. It is believed that there are 7 charges against her. Credible journalist reports indicate that the charges include: criminal charges for illegal importation and possession of radio devices (walkie talkies) and for inciting public disorder, corruption charges based on claims she illegally accepted $600,000 in cash and 11kg of gold, and charges for breaking Natural Disaster Management Law by allegedly not following COVID-19 restrictions while campaigning.
• On the 26th May 2021, it was reported that Aung San Suu Kyi has only had access to her lawyer twice and for 30 minutes to discuss the court cases. It is unclear where she is being held.
• On the 14th June 2021, Aung San Suu Ki’s trial began. Journalists and the public were barred from the proceedings. However, the Myanmar Military released photos of the trial. It appears that several witnesses have been called by the prosecution. The trial is expected to finish on the 26th July, and more details are therefore likely to be released about the charges and the trial.
• For your report, you need to provide a human rights analysis of one or more of the issues raised in or stemming from the coup. For example, you may wish to consider the 2020 election process, the coup itself, the arrests of protesters to the coup, the arrests of lawyers, or/and the arrest of Aung San Suu Kii. A reminder that you only need to consider 1 to 3 relevant human rights and not all human rights that are potentially relevant. Structuring your report, i.e. deciding what your scope will be and what to elaborate upon, is part of the challenge of the assessment. However, opportunities exist in tutorials and consultations to discuss your approach.