Hacker News Reader

Comment by q3k | Hacker News Reader

US courts have jurisdiction over nearly anyone they want, due to the US's soft power projected on the rest of the world.

View on HN

Well... yes. But obviously to some limit. I don't think the US could extradite someone over matters that don't involve the something in the country.

Where is copyright infringement located?

In every so-called "free trade" agreement.

I am from Brazil...

During cold war, any kind of suspected "socialism" seemly counted as "something to do with USA" because a bunch of people were thrown out of helicopters (literally) when they couldn't be extradited.

Same for all Operation Condor countries.

It is a trick to avoid prosecution. When no body is found, it is hard to prove the person is dead and therefore hard to prosecute the perpetrators of the murder.

>But obviously to some limit

The only actual limit is if you hide in Russia or China.

I've read that France will not extradite a French citizen. So that's one other place to hide, if you're a French citizen. You won't escape justice that way, I think - if necessary they'll try you in France for a murder you committed in the US - but you'll escape US justice.

I couldn't believe that so I read up on it.

And indeed, https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/french-law-prohibits-ext... claims that French law says that France will not extradite its own citizens. And they have written that into every treaty they sign. For example http://www.mcnabbassociates.com/France%20International%20Ext... is the treaty with the USA and it includes:

Article 3(1) declares that neither State has an obligation to extradite its own nationals, but the executive authority of the United States shall have the discretion to do so. The nationality of the person sought shall be the nationality of the person at the time the offense was committed.

Article 3(2) requires a State that refuses an extradition request solely on the basis of the nationality of the person sought to submit the case to its authorities for prosecution, if so requested by the Requesting State.

It appears that you are entirely correct!

However, France is also subject to the European Arrest Warrant, which means they are "precluded from refusing the surrender of their own nationals wanted for the purposes of prosecution, but they may condition the surrender of a requested person on his or her being returned to the issuing state to serve any sentence ultimately imposed". This is obviously only for other European countries, but I bet you could then extradite from such a country to extra-EU jurisdictions simply with political help.

So let's say person X is wanted in the US. They get Country A to emit a warrant for them, A gets X from France, then extradites X to the US.

An example would be Roman Polanski who fled to France while awaiting sentencing in the US.

Also I think Germany will only extradite to EU countries.

Italy will also refuse extradition depending on the charges. Capital punishment for minors has been a sticky subject for several countries.

If you make good movies, France is fine with you raping minors in USA.

They would let you in just to spite the US.

I'd doubt he would be extradited if he was in his country of citizenship

Correct me if I am wrong, but I think US claims jurisdiction over anything that involves a transaction in USD. And because of the way international payment systems are set up, there always is a USD transaction somewhere in the loop.

If a Danish customer takes his Danish Krones to the bank and sends them to a supplier in Germany in the form on Euros, the transaction goes like DKK → USD → EUR, so US claims jurisdiction over it and enforces its domestic laws on it:

https://www.icenews.is/2012/03/04/us-confiscates-policemans-...

And it doesn't even have to be an international transaction. Even domestic ones sometime run afoul of this limitation, as this Canadian small business owner found out:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/square-canada-1.53031...

Sounds and read more like an very rare case where it is not even clear if this holds up in court.

Not really. This is how US is able to unilaterally impose sanctions on Iran. Since international transactions go through USD, they have effectively cut Iran from being able to transact with the rest of the world on a meaningful scale. European countries tried to build an alternative to circumvent the need for a USD layer, but it has not been successful. USD's unique position in the international stage allows US to impose its domestic policy on a large part of the world. From Washington Post:

> The power of U.S. sanctions lies in the use of the U.S. dollar in most international transactions. A foreign company that sends its proceeds from trade with Iran through an international bank would likely face sanctions because part of it would be conducted in dollars. An international company with an American employee who has something to do with a transaction, no matter how inconsequential, could also run afoul of U.S. sanctions.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/iran-...

I have heard of this exact thing, but can't find the information about it. I think it was a Matt Levine article?.

I'm so hazy on the details, other than that French nationals were prosecuted for alleged crimes in France because those crimes were denominated in US currency.

Edit: My memory must be wrong - there's a comment below that France will not extradite citizens

Not soft power. Military/political/financial power ( pax americana ). NZ is part of the vassal/ally network we have all around the world.

The US has tons of soft power in china, russia, etc, but no real influence in either because we have no political/military dominion over them. At least not yet.

Canada is a prime example. Canada has "soft power" in china but still their "citizens/spies" are arrested and they have to beg the US/EU to help free their "citizens/spies" in china. And for all the mocking of Trump that canada loves to do, when trump cracks the whip and tells them to arrest a chinese executive, they do it. It wasn't Trump's "soft power" that made canada jump, that's for sure. It isn't trump's "soft power" that make sweden, britain, etc side with him over china either.

Neither pax americana, pax romana, pax mongolica, etc were built around soft power. Actually the dependence on "soft power" probably signaled the end of pax romana, pax mongolica, etc.

Can you make this specific? What exactly did the U.S. do/threaten to get Canada to arrest a Chinese executive? Obviously, it wasn't a threat of military invasion, but I'm open to some other possibility.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com