Our case today takes us to the Indian Ocean, to a remote and breathtaking group of islands at the centre of a high-stakes legal battle.

The Chagos Archipelago is the focus of a decades-long dispute between Mauritius and the United Kingdom — one that involves international courts, the shadow of the Cold War, and a powerful U.S. military base.

This legal battle continues to the present day, and at its heart is a devastating human story of a paradise lost.

Show Notes

Guest: Professor Douglas Guilfoyle, University of New South Wales

Check out Douglas's podcast Called to the Bar: International Law Over Drinks.

Litigation as legal statecraft: Small states and the law of the sea, by Douglas Guilfoyle (Centre for International Law Blog, National University of Singapore, 7 July 2023)

The Chagos Archipelago Before International Tribunals: Strategic Litigation and the Production Of Historical Knowledge, by Douglas Guilfoyle (Melbourne Journal of International Law)

Chagos islanders make historic trip home without British escort (BBC News, 16 February 2022)

The Last Colony: A Tale of Exile, Justice and Britain's Colonial Legacy by Philippe Sands & Martin Rowson

UK Foreign Secretary's statement on the Chagos Islands (7 October 2024)

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Would you take a friend to court to settle a dispute? Awkward?

This is what Australia did with Japan, a key friend and ally, in 2014 over Japan's refusal to stop killing whales in the Southern Ocean.

Special guest Mark Dreyfus is Attorney-General of Australia.

Mark represented Australia in the culmination of a 40-year diplomatic stoush between Australia and Japan which went all the way to the International Court of Justice in The Hague.

Case: Whaling in the Antarctic (Australia v. Japan) (2014)

Guest: Mark Dreyfus KC MP

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When the US Supreme Court ruled in favour of a company called Hobby Lobby in 2014, it was hailed by conservatives as a win for the religious freedom of business owners.

Critics of the decision said it dealt a major blow to the rights of employees to access reproductive healthcare.

But there's more to this case than meets the eye.

Has the Hobby Lobby case rewritten the rules about what a corporation actually is?

Guest: Associate Professor Steve Kourabas, Deputy Director, Centre for Commercial Law and Regulatory Studies, Monash University

Case: Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., 573 U.S. 682 (2014)

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