The Weight of the Continuous Past: Transitional (In)Justice and Impunity States in Central America

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 126-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel E. Bowen
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
El Salvador ◽  
Central America ◽  
Violent Crime ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Significant Progress ◽  
Human Rights Abuses ◽  
Institutional Strengthening ◽  
Transitions To Democracy

AbstractCentral America’s Northern Triangle is infamous for high levels of violent crime and human rights abuses, producing “impunity states” in which violence typically goes unpunished. That violence reflects the broader impunity or “transitional injustice” that has persisted since the peace accords and transitions to democracy of the 1980s and 1990s. Several “posttransitional” trials for past human rights violations in recent years in Guatemala were made possible by institutional strengthening efforts in the prosecutorial agency, led by a unique United Nations commission. Significant progress away from broad impunity may also be seen in the 2015 “Guatemalan Spring,” in which a sitting president was forced to resign and submit to prosecution in connection with a corruption scandal. Comparisons of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras suggest that institutional strengthening is necessary before “posttransitional justice,” or an end to impunity more generally, can be possible.

The Security Council on women in war: between peacebuilding and humanitarian protection

2010 ◽  
Vol 92 (877) ◽  
pp. 197-219 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alain-Guy Tachou-Sipowo
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Active Participation ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Women In War

AbstractHaving established that massive human rights violations in armed conflict constitute a threat to peace and that women are the most severely affected by the scourge of war, the Security Council has since 1999 adopted a number of resolutions intended specifically for this group. These instruments contribute to the development of humanitarian law applicable to women and acknowledge the value of active participation by women in peace efforts. The following article first analyses the foundations on which the Council has been able to assume responsibility for protecting women in situations of armed conflict, and then considers the actual protection it provides. It concludes that the Council has had varying success in this role, pointing out that the thematic and declaratory resolutions on which it is largely based are not binding and therefore, they are relatively effective only as regards their provisions committing United Nations bodies. The author proposes that the Council's role could be better accomplished through situational resolutions than through resolutions declaratory of international law.

3. Human Rights in International Relations

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Dunne ◽  
Marianne Hanson
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Two Dimensions ◽  
State Sovereignty ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Human Rights Abuses ◽  
International Responsibility ◽  
Duty To Protect ◽  
Theoretical Issues

This chapter examines the role of human rights in international relations. It first considers the theoretical issues and context that are relevant to the link between human rights and the discipline of international relations, focusing on such concepts as realism, liberalism, and constructivism. It then explores key controversies over human rights as understood in international relations as a field of study: one is the question of state sovereignty; another is the mismatch between the importance attached to human rights at the declaratory level and the prevalence of human rights abuses in reality. The chapter also discusses two dimensions of international responsibility: the duty to protect their citizens that is incumbent on all states in light of their obligations under the various human rights covenants; and the duty of states to act as humanitarian rescuers in instances where a state is collapsing or a regime is committing gross human rights violations.

Collective Reparations as a Partial Remedy for State-Perpetrated Blanket Violations of the Rights of Targeted Child Asylum Seeker Groups

2019 ◽  
pp. 339-368
Author(s):  
Sonja C. Grover
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Central America ◽  
Asylum Seeker ◽  
Zero Tolerance ◽  
Migration Policy ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
The Us ◽  
Principles Of Justice

This article argues for the entitlement of discrete refugee groups to collective reparations for targeted state-perpetrated blanket grievous human rights violations against their group whether by the home, transit or prospective asylum state. A review of selected international law and international principles of justice are discussed as a grounding for the applicability of collective reparations in such a refugee context. The example is discussed of children from Central America who accompanied their parent or parents to the US-Mexican border in search of refugee asylum most of whom, but not all, crossed the US border irregularly and then were separated from their parents as a result of President Trump’s so-called ‘zero-tolerance’ migration policy and held in US custody. Over 500 of these children are still, at the time of writing, separated from their parents and for a significant number of those, their parents have been deported without them.

scholarly journals State Capture through Corruption: Can Human Rights Help?

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 113 ◽  
pp. 331-335
Author(s):  
Jimena Reyes
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Human Rights Protection ◽  
Rights Protection ◽  
Regional Systems ◽  
State Capture ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Negative Impacts

Until recently, the United Nations and regional systems of human rights protection had shown considerable reluctance to address human rights violations resulting from corruption. Instead, these actors would underline the negative impacts of corruption on human rights without identifying corruption itself as a violation of human rights. Since 2017, however, this has begun to shift. The UN, regional human rights institutions, and civil society have begun to devise concrete ways for human rights institutions and instruments to better contribute to the fight against corruption. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (“the Court”), in particular, has taken preliminary steps to establish a legal link between corruption and human rights violations.

From Shame to New Name: How Naming and Shaming Creates Pro-Government Militias

2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 906-918
Author(s):  
Lora DiBlasi
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
International Community ◽  
Human Rights Abuses ◽  
Amnesty International ◽  
New Name ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Naming And Shaming

Abstract Researchers have identified naming and shaming as a strategy used by the international community to reprimand state leaders for their repressive actions. Previous research indicates that there is variation in the success of this tactic. One reason for the heterogeneity in success is that leaders with an interest in repressing opposition but avoiding international condemnation have adapted their behavior, at least partially, to avoid naming and shaming. For instance, some states choose to create and utilize alternative security apparatuses, such as pro-government militias (PGMs), to carry out these repressive acts. Creating or aligning with PGMs allows leaders to distance themselves from the execution of violence while reaping the rewards of repression. This analysis explores this dynamic. In particular, I examine how naming and shaming by Amnesty International and the United Nations Commission on Human Rights influences the creation of PGMs to skirt future international condemnation by the offending state for all states from 1986 to 2000. I find that countries are more likely to create PGMs, especially informal PGMs, after their human rights abuses have been put in the spotlight by the international community.

The Politics of Human Rights Diplomacy

2020 ◽  
pp. 097359842094343
Author(s):  
Anupama Ghosal ◽  
Sreeja Pal
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
United Nations ◽  
National Security ◽  
International Organizations ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Precise Formulation ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
The Relationship

The issue of Human Rights features as a prominent agenda of the United Nations and its related international organizations. However, when it comes to precise formulation of a country’s foreign policy in bilateral or multilateral forums, the issues of trade and national security find priority over pressing human rights violations occurring within the countries engaged in the diplomatic dialogue. An often-employed reason behind such an approach is the need to respect sovereignty and non-interference of a country in diplomacy. This article aims at analysing the potential which diplomacy holds to pressurize recalcitrant regimes to respect human rights. In doing so, the article tries to explore the ambit of Human Rights Diplomacy and the relationship between agenda of politics and human rights.

Strategy, Ideology, and Human Rights: Jimmy Carter Confronts the Left in Central America, 1979–1981

2006 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 57-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
John A. Soares
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Latin America ◽  
El Salvador ◽  
Central America ◽  
The United States ◽  
Jimmy Carter

This article discusses the Carter administration's policies toward Nicaragua and El Salvador after the Sandinistas took power in Nicaragua in July 1979. These policies were influenced by the widespread perception at the time that Marxist revolutionary forces were in the ascendance and the United States was in retreat. Jimmy Carter was trying to move away from traditional American “interventionism” in Latin America, but he was also motivated by strategic concerns about the perception of growing Soviet and Cuban strength, ideological concerns about the spread of Marxism-Leninism, and political-humanitarian concerns about Marxist-Leninist regimes' systematic violations of human rights.

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