In the case of Luis Medina Cantalejo

I would like to take this opportunity to request that the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) initiate an investigation against the egregious conduct of Luis Medina Cantalejo of Spain - which, in my opinion, amounts to a Crime Against Humanity (see here) as contemplated by the International Criminal Court Rome Statute. Luis Medina Cantalejo of Spain presided as the referee over the Australia v Italy game, and made a (hopelessly bad) decision that resulted in Italy beating Australia.

Allow me to present my case:

[JURISDICTION]

The ICC has jurisdiction for this case, seeing as both Australia and Spain are signatories to the Rome Statute.

Article 5(1)(b) states that the ICC shall have jurisdiction over Crimes Against Humanity (as articulated in Article 7), and Article 12(1) states that "[a] State which becomes a Party to this Statute thereby accepts the jurisdiction of the Court with respect to the crimes referred to in article 5."

Now if the ever-venerable, erudite public international law academics of the world get their arses in gear and come up with a definition for 'Crime of Aggression', then I'm sure charges could be substantiated under that as well!

Furthermore, there is no Article 98 Bilateral Immunity Agreement (BIA) (which America is so fond of - but see Opinio Juris), so it simply becomes a question of complementarity - ie: Will Spain elect to initiate its own prosecution of this man? Well, if Spains utter disregard for Australia over the Christopher Skase incident is any indication, I would advise that we Australians should not hold our collective breath... so it comes down to prosecuting him by way of the ICC.

[ELEMENTS OF THE CRIME]

Article 7(1)(k): Crime against humanity of other inhumane acts

[Elements]

1. The perpetrator inflicted great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health, by means of an inhumane act.

Exhibit 1 - as evidence of serious injury to mental health, I would like to present... myself. Oh, and 20 million other Australians. See, for example, this photographic evidence and this one too.

3. The perpetrator was aware of the factual circumstances that established the character of the act.

Sure he was... he's a 'professional' referee. No excuse.

4. The conduct was committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against a civilian population.

Need I mention the sustained attack by the referees in the earlier games in the first round... ie: Croatia v Australia - "Handball? What handball?"

5. The perpetrator knew that the conduct was part of or intended the conduct to be part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against a civilian population.

[See above response to element 4]
[Breaking news update] This probative article details how the penalty kick that was awarded to Italy was a part of an anti-Australian conspiracy.

I think that the criminal culpability of Luis Medina Cantalejo is self-evident. I call on the Prosecutor to bring criminal proceedings against him immediately.

P.S. Yes, I know that I have a thesis proposal to write, but this was far more important.
P.P.S. For those of you keeping score, you'll note that element 2 is missing from the above section. That's because it's irrelevant.

You bloody legends!

You may actually have to have lived in Japan or speak Japanese to appreciate the humour in this...

Kickin' arse since 2006

It was a thing of beauty. So much so, that I could've cried... and in fact, in the first half, I almost did. But that was for an entirely different reason.

Australia beat Japan in the first match of Group F - 3 to 1. I've been asked a dozen or so times now what it was like to be an Australian in Japan during the event. Make no mistake - if, as some would say, the World Cup is modern-day warfare, and soccer matches resemble military campaigns, then following this analogy to its logical conclusion, I was a soldier behind enemy lines and my backup battalion was nowhere to be seen.

I went to a restaurant in the heart of the enemy territory, only to be surrounded by several dozen Japanese people chanting and screaming and jumping and hollering at the television screens for much of the game. I was with 4 other Australians, and bunch of Australia-friendly Japanese (who were still cheering on Japan, though).

I blame myself for the first goal that Japan scored. I do. Amongst the cheering and screaming from the Japanese around me, I had a half-hearted attempt at trying to cheer on the Australian team with our not altogether original chant of "Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi oi oi!", and I think I chanted out of key or something and so the cosmic forces conspired - yet again - to punish me for being tone deaf because it was exactly when I started to chant that Japan scored... so it's my fault. I do apologise.

And then it happened - our first goal... ever! And then a second, and a third. It's possible that the four of us in managed to better the sound generated by the several dozen Japanese when they got their first (and only) goal... I don't really know -the whole 10 minutes of pure elation made me numb.

As if that wasn't enough, I'm a glutton for punishment - I've been invited by the Brazilians in my dormitory to go and watch the Brazil v Australia match at a Brazilian bar...

----The traditional Aussie congratulatory gesture of rubbing----
----ones head against the other persons mid-section----

Information overload

Five hours of my life has been wasted. In fact, probably more that - I'm sure I could work out exactly how much time I devoted to the now fruitless activity of conducting research online for a number of projects I'm doing if I bothered to think about it, but I think my frustration would just intensify, and end up manifesting itself into some kind of extreme anti-social behaviour - like growling at little old ladies who walk too slowly, or drop-kicking little toy dogs who yap at me as I walk past.

It was five hours I could've spent by going to the movies, and relaxing, then going off to a coffee shop and reading my book. It was five hours I could have devoted to changing the layout of my blog - which I've been meaning to do for the past six months now. But no, I decided to spend it trawling through an electronic database of law journals, and downloading PDF files, only to then have them all come up with data error messages when I tried to load them all up again. Pure damn fury ensued.

I'm sick of my laptop - the sheer length of time it takes to do all the research I need to do is staggering. In between downloading PDF files and then saving them to my desktop, I can perform several quick tasks - like organising the books on my bookshelf according to category and size... and I have dozens of files to find and download. Thus the five hours.

I've been neglecting my blog because I've got too much to do - I'm juggling like 4 or 5 balls at any given time, and I just don't have time to devote to writing much. That, and nothing interesting has happened recently. I've been trying to rewrite my thesis proposal for university, and I sent off a quick draft of an idea for a topic the other day to several professors and Aunty M, and received a number of different responses and reactions. All very useful, all very critical. At least it's helped me to clarify my ideas, but it has only intensified my workload exponentially. Also, I've started to develop recurring flashbacks of my interview last year in which I had to defend my thesis proposal (not thesis defence... no no... thesis proposal defence...), and in an attempt to avoid a similar not-altogether-enjoyable experience, I've started reconsidering my thesis proposal to disturbingly abstract depths...

That, combined with the research I have to do for my current job, the other extra-curricular activities I'm doing, and my natural need to read newspapers from around the world every day, I think I'm beginning to suffer from information overload. On the plus side, I'm a now an undisputed master of multi-tasking. I can write emails, rewrite my thesis proposal, listen to podcasts to learn about the history of the Rwandan holocaust and scan local newspapers for articles of possible academic relevance to cut out and put in a dedicated folder all at the same time.

And then my damn computer refuses to load the PDF files I spent five hours finding and downloading... Pure damn fury.