The Foreign Service Journal, April 2010

A P R I L 2 0 1 0 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 11 fare” denotes the abuse of the law and legal systems for strategic ends or, more generally, use of the law as a weapon of war. “It is vital to understand that the legal war can be just as perilous as the physical battle, and we must work across political and ideological lines to facilitate an adequate response,” says Brooke Goldstein, director of The Lawfare Project. “The goal is to edu- cate the public about attempts to dis- tort and misapply human rights law, to mobilize resources and bring inter- ested parties from a broad spectrum of views together in a common forum.” The first organization of its kind, The Lawfare Project’s focus is limited to three areas: legal efforts to thwart free speech relating to issues of na- tional security and public concern; at- tempts to delegitimize and diminish the sovereignty of democratic states; and legal maneuvers that unduly frus- trate the ability of democracies to de- fend against terrorism. The March 11 conference was co- chaired by former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau; Irwin Cotler, a member of Parliament and former Canadian minister of justice; and Dean of the Columbia Law School David Schizer. A bipartisan group of panelists from the political, legal, judi- cial and counterterrorism fields in- cluded Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gabriela Shalev, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, for- mer Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton, New York Daily News owner Mort Zuckerman and Wall Street Jour- nal editorial board member James Taranto, among others. The event kicked off an ongoing ini- tiative to be followed by similar meet- ings in the U.S. and abroad. The organization’s Web site, www.thelaw fareproject.org , tracks instances of lawfare and is an online resource for information on the subject. — Jennifer Thompson and Susan Brady Maitra Those Who Live in Glass Houses Writing in The Times of London on Feb. 24, diplomatic correspondent Catherine Philp reports that the State Department has selected Philadelphia- based architecture firm Kieran Tim- berlake to build a new U.S. embassy in Britain. Construction will begin in 2013, with the ribbon-cutting cere- mony set for 2017. The current facility, which opened in 1960, was designed by Finnish- American architect Eero Saarinen. Lo- cated in central London’s Grosvenor Square, the embassy’s neighbors have long reviled it as a concrete behemoth. Washington’s decision to abandon the site came after more than 100 residents of theMayfair neighborhood took out a full-page advertisement in The Times to oppose post-9/11 security restrictions, which they contended would leave the area more vulnerable to attack. The new mission’s estimated bil- lion-dollar price tag would make it one of our most expensive, exceeding even Embassy Baghdad. And that figure does not include the 17.5-percent value added tax that the United King- dom levies on all buildings — which Washington, claiming diplomatic ex- emption, has refused to pay. In the process, it has racked up some 32 mil- lion pounds (nearly $50 million) in un- paid congestion charges and other fees, prompting Ken Livingston, the C YBERNOTES 50 Years Ago... I t is encouraging to note that, despite the temptation to feel that the same [bureaucratic] battles are being fought over and over again, some progress is actually made. Today, for in- stance, there is general acceptance of the principle that the am- bassador is the leader and coordinator of all official activities in the country to which he is accredited. — From “Ancient History” (editorial), FSJ , April 1960.