Redefining Accountability: AI's Role in Prosecuting Transnational Crimes under International Law

The article is devoted to one of the aspects of the problem of correlation between international and domestic law, namely the relationship between international and national law. This relationship is developing dynamically. The development of the interconnectedness of international and domestic law occurs in connection with the constant increase in the number of international treaties and national legal acts aimed at regulating social and domestic relations, which is the object of international cooperation. At present, trends in the further development of international law and its interaction with national legal systems have begun to emerge clearly. The process of globalization has strengthened the interconnection of states, expanded the range of intrastate social relations that are a common object of regulation of two legal systems - the international legal system and the domestic legal system. Based on the analysis of the provisions of the general theory of law and the doctrine of international law and international normative acts, the theoretical and legal problems of the relationship between domestic and international law are considered. It explores the social and legal nature of the relationship between the two legal systems and explores the importance of harmonizing domestic state law with international law. It is noted that although international law and domestic law have a single social nature, they functionally act as two relatively independent and closely interacting and interdependent systems of law. The nature of their interrelations, methods and forms of interaction, as well as their functional connection, interdependence and the role of the state in this process are revealed. It is emphasized that the relationship and interaction are not limited only to the norms of the two legal systems, but cover the two legal systems as a whole. Consequently, there must be harmonization of the norms of national law with all sources of international law, including with the individual international obligations of states. The article notes that the state is a participant in the creation of legal norms of both domestic and international law. The process of coordinating the will or position of states when concluding international treaties is regulated by the norms of international law, and the process and procedure for expressing these declarations of will or positions are determined by the norms of national law. At the same time, international law does not belong to the legal system of specific states, although in fact it is part of all legal systems. If the object of regulation coincides, the norms of international law always take precedence over domestic ones. According to the author of the article, the concept of a legal conflict should not be identified with the invalidity of international treaties. It is argued that the case of conflict occurs only with a valid contract. It is also emphasized that many norms, enshrined in international law by treaty or customary means, acquire the character of jus cogens and therefore are binding on all states, regardless of ratification or accession to certain treaties or agreements. The article points out that international law imposes an obligation on the state as a whole, but it is domestic law that determines state bodies and officials who are responsible for fulfilling the international obligations of the state.
 The purpose of the article is to theoretically clarify the essence of the relationship and interaction between international and domestic law, to identify the importance of harmonizing domestic legislation with international law and the grounds for the priority of international norms over national law.

Domestic courts play an important role in the adjudication of international law, including international human rights law. The relationship between international and domestic law has often been characterized as a continuum between monism and dualism. In a monist system, international law is automatically a part of domestic law, and a conflict between the two is resolved in favor of international law. In a dualist system, domestic law is superior to international law within the domestic legal system, while international law is superior to domestic law within the international legal system. A conflict between domestic law and international law is thus not always resolved in the same way in both systems. In addition, one of the areas with the most active use of international law in a domestic legal system is under a theory of universal jurisdiction. Universal jurisdiction most often involves both the incorporation of international law into a domestic legal system and the assertion outward (extraterritorially) of domestic judicial system. Universal jurisdiction arose initially in the context of criminal prosecutions, but is also found to some extent in civil litigation, particularly in the United States. Under the principle of universal jurisdiction, a state may assert jurisdiction over an offender regardless of the nationality of the offender or victim, the place of commission of the wrongful act, or any other link to the state asserting jurisdiction.

The publication of a Policy Paper on Case Selection and Prioritization (the “Policy Paper”) by the Office of the Prosecutor (“OTP”) of the International Criminal Court (“ICC”) in September 2016 has reignited the longstanding discussion about the status of environmental crimes under international law. The Policy Paper expressed the intention of the OTP to consider, in the selection of crimes to be submitted to the jurisdiction of the ICC, those committed through, or resulting in, “the destruction of the environment, the illegal exploitation of natural resources or the illegal dispossession of land.” Such wording soon gained widespread attention, prompting many news outlets to declare that, from now on, the ICC would focus on prosecuting “environmental crimes.” The news sources’ enthusiasm, however, appears misplaced for several reasons. The first and foremost objection comes from a consideration of the ICC’s limited jurisdiction. In fact, this is strictly confined by the Rome Statute to the prosecution of “the most serious crimes of [international] concern,” currently identified as the genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and aggression. The only reference to the environment that appears in the Rome Statute is included in Article 8.2(b)(iv), which lists among the activities constituting a war crime the act of, “[i]ntentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause . . . widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment.” Given the limited attention to the environment, it would be difficult to maintain that the ICC has jurisdiction over “environmental crimes,” unless it could be shown that such jurisdiction either (i) may be derived implicitly from the current description under the Rome Statute of the crime of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, or (ii) has been extended by virtue of the creation of a new rule of international law, either customary or treaty-based. Most importantly, though, the possibility for the ICC to prosecute “environmental crimes” seems prevented by the failure to find a satisfactory definition for this notion. In the legal practice, this expression doesn’t have any authoritative meaning, as international treaties remain completely silent on the issue. And while several attempts at a definition have been made, as will be examined in more detail below, each of them raises several doubts and concerns. Many of the suggested definitions are, in fact, characterized by the lack of clarity with respect to the different sources from which the liability for “environmental crimes” arises and the specific consequences attached thereto. Indeed, such definitions indiscriminately consider: (i) the criminal liability of an individual arising from the breach of a rule of national environmental law; (ii) the criminal liability of an individual arising from the breach of a rule of international environmental law; and (iii) the liability of the State arising from the breach of a rule of international environmental law, whether customary or treaty-based. Of these three options, only the second would seem viable to serve as a foundation of the ICC’s jurisdiction over environmental crimes. The picture that emerges from the above-mentioned remarks shows that there is still widespread confusion on the consideration to be attributed to environmental crimes under international law, as well as the possibility of seeking prosecution for these crimes before an international tribunal. The purpose of this Note is to address such confusion and shed some light on the treatment that environmental crimes receive under international law. To do so, Part II provides a brief and general overview of the principles of international criminal law, with particular respect to: (i) its definition and the features distinguishing it from other overlapping branches of international law; (ii) the crimes that can be considered as belonging to its realm; and (iii) its sources and the possibility for it to evolve over time. Part III discusses what the term “environmental crime” means and which specific offenses, if any, may be punishable under international criminal law. In doing so, this Part will focus on the fundamental difference between “crimes under international law” and “transnational crimes” and the differences in the regimes applicable to each category. Lastly, Part IV discusses the current limits of the ICC’s jurisdiction and, in particular, the possibility of extending it to the prosecution of crimes, including environmental crimes not currently captured by the Rome Statute. Accordingly, this Part examines the potential impact of the Policy Paper in changing the scope of the ICC’s jurisdiction, as well as the relevance of other proposals advanced by academics and scholars to extend the ICC’s jurisdiction to environmental crimes. In this context, relevance will be given to the introduction of a crime of “ecocide” as a fifth crime against peace, and to the amendment of the description of the crimes provided under the Rome Statute through customary international law.

The article examines the contribution of the Nuremberg tribunal in the formation of modern international law on criminal organizations. The methodological basis of the study is a systematic analysis of international law on liability for international crimes, the use of comparative law, formal law and other methods, historical analysis of the origin and development of liability for international crimes, generalization of a wide range of normative and practical materials. The evolution of the responsibility of non-governmental organizations that committed international crimes in the period after the Nuremberg Trials is analyzed, in particular the trends and factors that influenced the development of the concept of international criminal responsibility. In characterizing evolution in international law, it is advisable to consider not all changes in international law, but only those that indicate qualitative improvement. The evolution of international law, like all development, is always objective. The enshrinement of the principle of international criminal responsibility in the Statute of the Nuremberg Tribunal constitutes a protective function, which is expressed in the direct application of the norms of international criminal law and international humanitarian law. The development of international law governing the jurisdiction of criminal organizations does not stop. It is noted that with the development of legal certainty of the status of non-governmental organizations, the principles set out in the decisions of the Nuremberg Tribunal on the responsibility of individuals and legal entities under public law for crimes against humanity are developing. The main trends in the development of international criminal law, including the liability of non-state legal entities under public and private law. It is determined that in the period after the Nuremberg Trials, the main direction in the legal definition of liability for war crimes was the development of norms and mechanisms of criminal liability. Criticism of Russian researchers’ views on the responsibility for international crimes of non-governmental organizations committed in other countries, who believe that non-governmental organizations in this case can not be recognized as criminal organizations. It is stated that international law does not contain a clear line between formally defined organizations - legal entities recognized as subjects of national law, and criminal groups, whose legal status can be recognized from the standpoint of the decisions of the Nuremberg tribunal. International legal norms on this issue should be devoted to identifying the criminal nature of the group and the establishment of criminal consequences for members of the criminal group. Dissemination of international legal responsibility for war crimes, crimes against humanity committed during armed conflicts of international and non-international nature, the modern concept of international humanitarian law.

The paper analyzes the constitutional reform in Russia with an emphasis on the constitutional amendment on the interaction of the norms of international law and national legislation within the domestic legal system. Constitutional provisions and doctrinal approaches enshrined there play an important role in ensuring stable and predictable international relations. The paper discusses the possibility of applying two classical doctrines on the relationship between international and national law (dualistic and monistic) to the definition of the characteristics of amendments to Article 79 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation. The authors substantiate the necessity of introducing constitutional amendments from the point of view of the development of international relations and the maturation of domestic political, economic and social conditions over the past decades. Some doctrines of interpretation of international treaties of interstate bodies and the possibility of determining the parameters of their execution in the legal system of Russia are considered. It is concluded that the new model of interaction between international and Russian law corresponds to the principle of sovereign equality of states enshrined in the UN Charter. The authors summarize that the supplement of the constitutional norm under consideration clarifies the constitutional model of the relationship between international and Russian law. It allows for the full implementation of the provisions of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, as well as the execution of international legal acts, including decisions of interstate bodies that comply with the Constitution of the Russian Federation, which eliminates possible threats to destabilize the rule of law of the state. Thus, we are not talking about adopting a radical model of the primacy of national law over international law, but rather about adapting the doctrine of dialectical interaction between Russian and international law to the needs of modern development of our state.

This chapter looks at international soft law against the background of broader issues about the normativity of law. It explores the ways in which “institutional normativity” operates across legal systems with special focus on the relationship between different constructs of validity. The chapter develops a narrowly defined “core” concept of validity that reflects the minimum conditions for providing effective normative guidance in institutional settings. This concept revolves around the idea that validity establishes a mediated relationship between the legitimacy of law and the internal processes of legal practices. The chapter argues that more specific constructs of validity are political constructs that reflect the concrete political and institutional dynamics of particular legal practices. This point about the coexistence of different constructs of legality and legal validity is demonstrated by an analysis of the relationship between international law and modern state law. The chapter characterise the proliferation of international soft law as one manifestation of the tensions that this coexistence brings about. The growing volume and significance of international soft law has a lot to do with a constraining model of legality in domestic legal systems which have a spillover effect on international law. Soft law often needs to fill normative spaces that have been made hard to access for hard international law. For a more concrete analysis, issues about international soft law in the field of human rights law are picked out. Using the General Comments of the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as an example, the chapter looks at the legitimacy problems that the proliferation of soft law generates.

To the extent that international trade and development policy employs legal methods, institutions and participants, there is a need to take into account the role of legal culture. There are many different legal cultures in the world, including the widely found common and civil law traditions, as well as the many non-western legal traditions and sub-traditions found within the hundreds of different legal systems spread across the globe. International law has, however, traditionally eschewed consideration of legal culture—arguing that international law is unique, is sui generis, and as such domestic legal traditions were not relevant. Yet, the humans involved in creating and nurturing international legal fields and institutions will themselves reflect the legal culture of their home states, and will often import aspects of those legal cultures into international law. The same must be true of international development law. In addition, international legal fields, such as international development law, must often work within domestic legal systems, and as such they will directly interact with the domestic legal traditions. It is thus important to understand the interaction between the legal cultures reflected in the relevant part of that international law and in that of the domestic legal system. Such an understanding can be useful in ensuring the effective interaction of the two systems. This paper explores these themes, continuing the author’s past and ongoing consideration of the role of legal culture in international law, including its role within institutions such as the World Trade Organization.

Russia initiated the creation of the Eurasian Economic Union and the shaping the all-encompassing Greater Eurasian Partnership. For these geopolitical projects to successfully move forward, Russia must place its bets on using the toolkit of international law, while encouraging the development of regional and transregional integrational law and the systemwide modernization of its own domestic legal system. Accordingly, it is in Russia’s interests to preserve a vitally important quality of its legal system—openness to international and supranational law—as well as to strengthen and defend international law and refute all accusations that international law is ineffective or has even already collapsed. All theoretical constructs and statements about how international law is at the brink of a profound crisis contradict objective truth and common sense. They were only needed in order to untie various actors’ hands in international affairs. In actuality, adherence to international law is as necessary as ever. Without it, decent international cooperation cannot be restored, peaceful coexistence and solutions to global problems cannot be provided, and development for all cannot be achieved. It is vital to understand that it is in fact international law and supranational law that are the genuine law, while national law, on the contrary, often merely legitimizes lawlessness and barbarity. Prominent Russian legal scholars were writing about this at length and with authority in the early 20th century. Furthermore, today international law is only one part of the global regulatory system.

Though Taiwan is not a member state of the United Nations, it is determined to incorporate some international human rights treaties in the same way a usual state does. In 2009, the Government made every effort to “ratify” the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women into the domestic legal system in accordance with the “treaty obligation.” Unsurprisingly, none of the instruments of ratification were successfully deposited with the Secretary-General of the United Nations. Two years later, the Government submitted its initial reports under the two Covenants to a group of ten international independent experts for review in Taiwan. In this connection, the Government and people of Taiwan have come to recognize that international human rights law constitutes an integral part of the legal system of Taiwan. With this recognition, the courts have occasionally applied or referred to the two Covenants in their decisions and judgments in spite of the doubts and criticism as to the validity of the international human rights treaties’ rules. Apparently, the determination to internalize international human rights law into the domestic legal system of Taiwan is beyond any doubt; however, several problems have emerged subsequent to the failure of completing the process of ratification under international law. The problems may be summarized as follows. First, the question concerning the capacity to conclude international treaties and the nature of the legal effect as regards the unilateral act by Taiwan in the context of international law. Second, the status and effect of international human rights treaties in the domestic legal order of Taiwan, Third, there are questions concerning the method of incorporating international human rights treaties by enacting the Implementing Act, which was specifically designed to create the binding force of the treaty law within the jurisdiction of Taiwan. Fourth, the practice applied by the courts or in constitutional interpretation as regards the rights and freedoms in the human rights treaties. Without proper theory and adequate practices concerning how to incorporate international human rights treaties in Taiwan, international human rights law is nothing but an unexpected and unwelcome international law that has caused an unpleasant disturbance in the domestic legal order. That said, this chapter intends to elucidate the legal implications of these questions and the problems therein and to deliberate a possible solution for the judiciary to take the rights and fundamental freedoms seriously.

INTRODUCTION. Interaction between different legal systems is a substantial challenge for the international law science. Such an interaction becomes even more specific in integration states’ associations which peculiarity is direct effect of the legal acts of such associations with regard to individuals. The article examines various approaches to the interaction between international financial law as a brunch of international law and the EU law. Author outlines different types of the interaction.MATERIALS AND METHODS. Author researched different types of the interaction on the basis of legal empirical materials in the sphere of finance including international agreements, court decisions, recommendations and working documents. Th methodological basis of the research contains general scientific and special methods including logical, historical, analytical comparative and prognostic methods.RESEARCH RESULTS. Interaction typology can be made on the basis of various criteria. International financial law and the EU law use a model of interaction between general and special regime of international law as well as a model of implementation of international law in a domestic legal system. The first model has been applied in two cases. When the European Economic Community was established and when mew Members entered in it (genesis interaction) as well as when Member state left the EU (terminal interaction). In the course of current functioning of the EU gives the priority to the second model. The latter contains two methods of interaction: incorporation and reference. Incorporation of soft law rules has specific features since it may be realized not only via legal instruments but also via recommendations of the EU institutes and bodies.DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS. Basing on the analysis of rule-making and application of law in the EU finance sphere author argues the distinction between monism and dualism is performed using the criterion of the self-execution of international agreements. Interaction of international financial law and the EU law is pursuing on the level of principles and global ideas and values of contemporary world. These principle and values may be declared in the framework of international fora and organizations. Interaction is pursuing on the level ‘general international law and the EU law as a whole’ as well as on the level ‘international financial law and the EU financial law’.

In international criminal law theory, a conceptual divide is made between international crimes stricto sensu (genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, aggression) and transnational organised crime. This differentiation sustains the direct, respectively indirect enforcement mechanism: the so called ‘core crimes’ belong to the subject matter jurisdiction of international criminal tribunals and the International Criminal Court, whereas national jurisdictions aim to counter transnational crimes, by concluding ‘suppression conventions’ and seeking international cooperation on the basis of the aut dedere, aut judicare principle. Nevertheless, the division is questioned for being too rigid and simplistic, as the boundaries between the categories are increasingly blurred. On the one hand, political rebel groups and organised crime often unite to challenge the power monopoly of the state, while corrupt governments and private business conspire to exploit the local population (by pillage, deportation from their lands or pollution of the environment). On the other hand, there is an ongoing debate, triggered by the ICC Kenya Decision of March 2010, whether the commission of crimes against humanity is the ‘privilege’ of states and state-like groups, or whether the category should be expanded to cover larger organisations that are capable of committing such atrocities. In other words, there is a proliferation of state and non-state actors that engage in both ‘classic’ international crimes (war crimes, crimes against humanity) and transnational crime. These developments have fuelled the plea for supranational law enforcement in respect of transnational (organised) crime, exceeding the realm of inter-state cooperation on a horizontal basis. This essay will pay a modest contribution to this discussion by arguing that the quest for more effective law enforcement is bedeviled by the perplexity of fitting new patterns of crime and new perpetrators of international crimes into the classic mould of international criminal law. These two aspects are obviously intimately related and should not be considered in isolation. Any initiative to invigorate international criminal law enforcement - by for instance establishing new (international or regional) courts or by expanding the subject matter jurisdiction of existing courts – should therefore pay attention to both the elements of crimes and the modes of criminal liability.

In a worldwide market economy with strong demand for cheap labour and a global society that exposes millions of individuals to poverty and deprives them of their economic human rights, exploitation amounting to slavery is profitable, and endemic. And although corporate involvement in modern slavery is notorious and slavery and slavery-related practices may qualify as crimes against humanity or war crimes, commentators have repeatedly noted the general reluctance of institutionalized criminal justice to engage in prosecution of corporate involvement in slavery. This article aims to shed some light on the legal issues at the intersection of slavery, corporate action and international criminal law. Beginning with drawing a basic distinction between crime under international law and transnational crime, the analysis delves into criminal responsibility under international law. It then proceeds in two steps. First, the author examines the definitions of crimes under international law as they are laid down in the Statute of the International Criminal Court, and enquires which of these are applicable to the prosecution of slavery and slavery-related practices, what are their requirements and what are the major problems of their charging. Second, the author turns to issues of attribution: how is criminal responsibility to be attributed and to whom, i.e. the corporation itself or the individual corporate officer? The article concludes with a plea to take advantage of the existing framework of international criminal law and to apply it more determinedly to corporate contexts.

International and domestic law offer a study in contrasts: States' legal obligations often depend on their consent to specific international legal norms, whereas domestic law applies to individuals with or without their consent; enforcement in international law is weak and, for many international treaties, non‐existent, whereas states spend considerable resources to create centralized coercive enforcement mechanisms; and international law is characterized by much less institutional differentiation and specialization of functions than domestic legal systems are. These differences have invited a number of skeptical challenges to international law, 3 of which we explore in this essay. The first points to 1 or more of the deviations of international law's institutional structure from that of a modern state's legal system as a basis for denying that international law is really “law.” Central to the debates over international law's status as law are concerns about whether and why the concepts of law inherited from domestic legal systems should serve as the blueprint for theorizing law in general and international law in particular. The second skeptical challenge targets international law's legitimacy. It claims that we lack reasons to treat international legal norms or the exercise of political power by international institutions, as anything other than an attempt by states to advance their national interests. If this challenge succeeds, states and other subjects of international law have merely prudential reasons to comply with it rather than a moral duty to obey it. Following a brief description of recent debates over how we ought to understand the concept of legitimacy when used to assess international political practices or global governance, we survey several possible bases for a moral duty to obey or respect international law. These include state consent, instrumental accounts of legitimate authority, and global democracy. The third set of challenges focuses on the relationship between state sovereignty and international law. International rules and institutions often make demands for reform affecting the domestic law of a state in order to elicit compliance with international law. Skeptics argue that the rule of international law is incompatible with states' political self‐determination. Regardless of whether their defense of this claim ultimately succeeds, thoughtful engagement with it may well require us to rethink some of the fundamental concepts and normative ideals in political philosophy, including state sovereignty, democracy, individual rights, political authority, and political obligation.

The subject. The interaction of modern national legal systems and the international legal system is still the most controversial legal phenomenon. An exclusively national approach to solving issues of the general theory of international law could not and cannot justify expectations and close the need for legal comprehension. The situation is aggravated by the fact that, at the level of universal international law, the solution of issues on the agenda with the help of positive methods of legal regulation, and, consequently, the implementation of the norms of existing international treaties today are criticized, tested and often completely violated. The implementation of the norms of existing international treaties is increasingly faced with attempts to refute their postulates using the "customs" under which those "rules" are veiled. In such conditions, national legal systems may experience an increased "feeling of jealousy" to their sovereignty and try to "close" as much as possible using the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of the state.Purpose of the study. In such conditions, it is most important to choose the right vector in improving international law, and not order, law based on normative principles. It is important to correctly "choose the key" to harmonizing the will of sovereign states of our time. The article is devoted to the search for a more correct way of developing international law through its interaction, and not counteraction with the national one.Methodology. The research was carried out using a formal legal interpretation of international legal acts, as well as a comparative analysis of Russian and foreign legal literature. Structural and systemic methods are also the backbone of the study. The conclusions of the work are based on dialectical unity and the struggle of opposites, as well as on interacting deduction and induction in relation to legal systems.The main results. The growing trend towards fragmentation of international law leads to a reduction in the base of sources in the universal sphere of international law. The intensification of regionalization and the creation of regional unions of sovereign states is becoming a source of polar processes: on the one hand, supranational control over the observance of international law by states within their legal system increases, on the other hand, natural situations of non-execution of decisions of international judicial bodies arise. Such situations, without a proper assessment of the reasons for the issuance of the international acts of law enforcement themselves, can lead to unfounded criticism. There is an impressive amount of work in the field of correlation between international and national law, as well as in the field of enforcement of decisions of international judicial bodies. Despite this, in the field of practical implementation of the norms of international law, there remains a lack of doctrinal developments. Such a situation will inevitably lead to attempts to create a semblance of a norm, an escalation of confrontation, and an inability to reach agreement on issues on the agenda. The situation at the level of the universal international legal system is aggravating, therefore, the verification of the limits of competence of regional education authorities, in particular of supranational judicial control bodies, becomes even more important.Сonclusions. The author comes to the conclusion that, on the one hand, in the sphere of universal international law, there is a reduction in the base of sources of international law. On the other hand, in the field of regional international integration, on the contrary, the number of sources of international legal regulation is increasing, and the process of their implementation is intensifying. Universal international law based on the principles of the UN Charter is the most qualitative regulator of the field of international public relations. However, at the present stage of development of the international community, regional integration may well come to its aid: through regional interaction, the consolidation of the wills of sovereign states can and should be achieved a legal constructive dialogue on key issues of already universal international law. Using the approaches of national legal regulation exclusively and unilaterally, it is impossible to productively approach issues of international law: neither in the field of creating international organizations of various types, nor in matters of fulfilling obligations under international law. According to the results of the study, it was concluded that only non-confrontational interaction of specialists in the field of international and national (primarily constitutional) law can provide the construction of the most effective model of interaction of these legal systems. This requires a transformation of the basic approaches to the issues of interaction between international and national law. The basic unity of the general theory of law and the specific features of legal systems should be the starting points for doctrinal research of existing legal structures and the practice of their implementation.

This chapter examines the ontological foundations of international law and their impact on Indigenous peoples, with a particular focus on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in Australia. It argues that international law’s concepts of sovereignty, civilization, nature, and rights are grounded in a distinctly Western, modernist ontology that has been used to justify colonialism and environmental exploitation. This ontological framework contrasts with many Indigenous ontologies, which tend to emphasize relationality, reciprocity, and obligations to Country. The chapter explores how this ontological clash has affected Indigenous peoples through the imposition of international law norms in domestic legal systems. It then considers how Indigenous peoples are actively challenging and reshaping international law’s ontological foundations through interventions in both international and domestic forums. Key examples include the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the successful human rights communication regarding climate change made by Indigenous claimants from the Torres Strait Islands, and recent Australian jurisprudence recognizing Indigenous ontologies. By unsettling international law’s foundational concepts, these Indigenous legal interventions open up possibilities for ontological and legal pluralism. The chapter argues that such pluralism is necessary to address the global environmental crisis and achieve social and ecological justice. It concludes that embracing Indigenous wisdom and ontologies in international and domestic law could transform our collective response to planetary challenges.