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The Court That Built the Advisory Opinion It Refused to Complete: OC-30/25 on Arms Trafficking, Corporate Immunity, and the Reach of Advisory Jurisdiction

March 26, 2026

Mexico’s effort to hold the gun industry to account has now encountered an institutional setback in San José. Its request for an advisory opinion raised six questions before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR). This post examines, against a more expansive account of OC-30/25 offered here, whether laws granting public or private arms-industry companies procedural immunity against victims’ claims are compatible with Articles 8 and 25 of the American Convention on Human Rights. In its 2025 advisory opinion on illicit firearms trafficking, publicly notified on 5 March 2026, the Court addresses the broader human rights implications of such trafficking, but does not answer that question directly. That omission is central to the opinion. It leaves unresolved whether victims can access a court and obtain a remedy when domestic law bars claims against companies related to the arms industry from the outset. The opinion develops much of the normative framework needed to answer that question, yet stops short of doing so.

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The Inter‑American Court’s Warning Shot: Illicit U.S. Firearms and the Hemispheric Duty States Keep Ignoring

March 23, 2026

Criminal organizations finance, procure, broker, transport, and illegally distribute U.S.‑made weapons throughout Latin America and the Caribbean to fuel political violence in the region. Latin America is experiencing a surge of violence that is neither spontaneous nor locally contained. It is engineered—manufactured, trafficked, and laundered through a hemispheric supply chain that begins overwhelmingly in the United States and…

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Back to the Pre-Lisbon era? Why the Provisional Application of the EU-Mercosur Agreement is so Controversial

February 23, 2026

On 17 January 2026, the EU and Mercosur signed an ambitious trade and cooperation package composed of two instruments: a Partnership Agreement (EMPA) and an Interim Trade Agreement (iTA). After more than 20 years of negotiations, this deal has been praised as a major stepping stone for extending the EU’s economic and geopolitical influence worldwide, particularly in…

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In defense of a human right to democracy: Reflections on the pending Advisory Opinion before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights

July 11, 2025

On the 26th of March of this year the Secretariat of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (‘IACtHR’ or ‘the Court’) issued a press release communicating the request for an advisory opinion presented by the republic of Guatemala focused on democracy and its protection in the Inter-American human rights system. Throughout their filing, Guatemala explores the…

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Resurfacing Issues of the Arab League in Light of the Gaza War

December 6, 2023

In the complexities of the international fora and UN resolutions, regional organizations can fill in and complement the international organizations in preserving global peace and security. Article 52 of the UN Charter (1945) states that UN member states “shall make every effort to achieve pacific settlement of local disputes through such regional arrangements or by such regional agencies…

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