postliminium

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The principle of postliminium, as a part of public international law, is a specific version of the maxim ex injuria jus non oritur, providing for the invalidity of all illegitimate acts that an occupant may have performed on a given territory after its recapture by the legitimate sovereign. Therefore, if the occupant has appropriated and sold public or private property that may not legitimately be appropriated by a military occupant, the original owner may reclaim that property without payment of compensation.Lauterpacht, H., Oppenheim's International Law, Vol. II, pp. 616-620 It derives from the ius postliminii, of Roman law. The codification of large areas of international law have made postliminium to a great extent superfluous though. It may either be seen as a historical concept, or a term generally describing the consequences to legal acts of an occupant after the termination of occupation.Woltag, J.-C.,'Postliminium' in Wolfrum, R. (ed) Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law (Oxford University Press 2009) para. 1