II. Ex parte Pinochet: Lacuna or Leap?

1999 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 949-958 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Warbrick ◽  
Dominic McGoldrick ◽  
Eileen Denza
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
The State ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Private Law ◽  
Criminal Proceedings ◽  
Sovereign Immunity ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
House Of Lords ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Heads Of State

The Lords were not lost in admiration of section 20 of the State Immunity Act 1978. Lord Browne-Wilkinson described it as “strange” and “baffling”. It is certainly true that (as Lord Browne-Wilkinson continued) “Parliament cannot have intended to give heads of state and former heads of state greater rights than they already enjoyed under international law”.1 Nor was it intended that their rights should be inadvertently curtailed. The State Immunity Bill originally introduced into the House of Lords in 1977 would, by reflecting in UK statute law the European Convention on State Immunity2 make huge inroads into absolute sovereign immunity—tottering but not yet demolished through the repeated onslaughts of Lord Denning. The European Convention was however “essentially concerned with ‘private law’ disputes between individuals and States”.3 It was not intended to have any application to criminal proceedings—in so far as lawyers in 1977 even contemplated criminal proceedings in domestic courts against foreign States in their public capacity. It did not deal with the personal privileges or immunities of heads of state. There were no ready-made treaty rules on heads of state and no clear customary rules either.4

9. Immunities from National Jurisdiction

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Dixon ◽  
Robert McCorquodale ◽  
Sarah Williams
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
International Organisations ◽  
Sovereign Immunity ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Head Of State ◽  
National Jurisdiction ◽  
Per Se ◽  
Heads Of State ◽  
The Relationship

States and international organisations and their representatives in the courts of other States enjoy immunity from legal process. This immunity can be split conveniently into State (or sovereign) immunity, and diplomatic and consular immunities. The first concerns foreign States per se (including the Head of State), while the second concerns the personal immunities enjoyed by representatives of those States. This chapter discusses the general principles of state immunity in international law; state immunity in the United Kingdom; Heads of State and other holders of high-ranking office; the relationship between immunity and acts contrary to international law; the immunities of international organisations and their staff; and diplomatic and consular immunities.

The Resolution of the Institute of International Law on the Immunities of Heads of State and Government

2002 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-125 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hazel Fox
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Criminal Proceedings ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Prosecutorial Discretion ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
Civil Aircraft ◽  
Heads Of State ◽  
Witch Hunts ◽  
State Of Israel

A pressing issue of the day requiring authoritative resolution is whether public officials when in office carrying out their official functions may be prosecuted by the courts of other countries for alleged international crimes. Objection has been made, though not by the Danish Government, to a new ambassador appointed by the State of Israel, taking up his appointment as head of the Israeli diplomatic mission in Copenhagen, on the ground of his implication in war crimes. Recently, criminal proceedings were brought in the French courts against Colonel Ghadaffi as the serving Head of the State of Libya for complicity in acts of terrorism resulting in the destruction of a French civil aircraft and death of all its passengers. Writing critically of the Lords' decision in the Pinochet case, Henry Kissinger talks of the tyranny of judges replacing that of government, of prosecutorial discretion without accountability and warns that ‘historically the dictatorship of the virtuous has often led to inquisitions and witch hunts’.

Part II The Sources of the Law of State Immunity, 7 English Law: The UK State Immunity Act 1978

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fox Hazel ◽  
Webb Philippa
Keyword(s):  
General Structure ◽  
The State ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Brussels Convention ◽  
Private Capacity ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
The Status ◽  
English Law ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Heads Of State

This chapter reviews the status and general structure of the State Immunity Act 1978 (SIA), and gives an outline of its provisions. The SIA was enacted to codify the restrictive rule of State immunity and bring UK law in line with current international practice, and to enable the UK to ratify the European Convention on State Immunity 1972 (ECSI) and the earlier 1926 Brussels Convention and 1934 Protocol relating to the Immunity of State-owned ships. In addition, it provided for the recognition in the UK of foreign judgments given against the Crown in the courts of States Parties to the ECSI, and it also made provision for the extension to heads of State acting in their private capacity and their families of the privileges and immunities enjoyed by the head of a diplomatic mission and his family.

The European Convention on State Immunity and International Crimes

1999 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 507-520
Author(s):  
Roger O’Keefe
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Individual State ◽  
Criminal Jurisdiction ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Vexed Question

The European Convention on State Immunity provides for the immunity of states and their organs from the domestic courts of the respective Contracting States. In doing so, it makes no apparent distinction between those courts’ civil and criminal jurisdictions. Yet the vexed question of the immunity of state officials from the latter, especially in respect of crimes established under international law, has been spectacularly brought to the fore by the Pinochet case. It is on this question—the immunity of individual state officials from the criminal jurisdiction of foreign states specifically in respect of international crimes—that this article focuses.

The European Convention on State Immunity and International Crimes

1999 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 507-520 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger O’Keefe
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Individual State ◽  
Criminal Jurisdiction ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Vexed Question

The European Convention on State Immunity provides for the immunity of states and their organs from the domestic courts of the respective Contracting States. In doing so, it makes no apparent distinction between those courts’ civil and criminal jurisdictions. Yet the vexed question of the immunity of state officials from the latter, especially in respect of crimes established under international law, has been spectacularly brought to the fore by the Pinochet case. It is on this question—the immunity of individual state officials from the criminal jurisdiction of foreign states specifically in respect of international crimes—that this article focuses.

scholarly journals The Law of State Immunity before the Brazilian Supreme Court: what is at stake with the “Changri-La” case?

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Aziz Tuffi Saliba ◽  
Lucas Carlos Lima
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Law ◽  
Potential Outcomes ◽  
Sovereign Immunity ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
Constitutional Review ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
Fishing Boat ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Legal Arguments

It was 1943 when the Changri-La fishing boat and its ten fishermen crew disappeared near Cabo Frio, Rio de Janeiro. But only in 2001 the Tribunal Marítimo da Marinha do Brasil recognized that the vessel had been sunk by a German submarine. The relatives of the victims sought compensation at the Brazilian courts for its material damages and non-pecuniary losses. However, they stumbled upon a customary norm of Public International Law: the rule prescribing that a State is entitled to immunity in respect of acta jure imperii before the domestic courts of another State. After a long journey within the Brazilian courts, the case reached the Supremo Tribunal Federal (STF) – the Brazilian Supreme Court, which blends functions of constitutional review and court of last appeal – and in March 2021, the trial finally started. In the Extraordinary Appeal with Interlocutory Appeal (ARE) 954858 – currently suspended after Justice Alexandre de Moraes’ request to see the records –, it is discussed whether human rights violations are an exception to the rule of States’ sovereign immunity. While the case has not yet reached a conclusion, some Justices have already expressed their legal views – their votes, as they are called in the Brazilian Supreme Court – offering potential outcomes for the discussion. In this essay, we analyze two issues present in some of the votes: absence of proper engagement with international legal arguments, revealing a detachment from international law, and the possible consequences of the thesis proposed by the reporting Justice, Edson Fachin. Our endeavor is both to comment and to explain what is at stake with the Changri-la case.

Identifying Conflicts of Norms: The ICJ Approach in the Case of the Jurisdictional Immunities of the State (Germany v. Italy: Greece Intervening)

2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 1003-1012 ◽  
Author(s):  
FRANÇOIS BOUDREAULT
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Sovereign Immunity ◽  
International Court Of Justice ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
International Court ◽  
The Icj ◽  
Jus Cogens ◽  
German Reich

AbstractThe potential for conflicts of norms is particularly great in modern international law. Yet until now, the International Court of Justice has said very little as to what it considers a conflict of norms. The opportunity to do so arose in the case of the Jurisdictional Immunities of the State (Germany v. Italy: Greece Intervening). There, it was argued that granting Germany sovereign immunity in proceedings before Italian courts involving civil claims for violations of international humanitarian law (IHL) committed by the German Reich between 1943 and 1945 would come in conflict with prevailing peremptory (jus cogens) norms of international law. In its 3 February 2012 Judgment, the ICJ rejected this argument. In the present article, the author argues that the conceptions of conflict of norms underlying the Court's judgment and the dissent of Judge Cançado Trindade both have weaknesses. The author suggests an alternative framework to ascertain conflicts of norms. He then applies this framework to the rules of state immunity and the IHL rules breached by Germany, agreeing in the end with the conclusion reached by the majority of the ICJ that these rules did not conflict.

Ships, sovereign immunity and the subtleties of the Brussels I regulation: Case C-641/18 LG and others v. Rina SpA, Ente Registro Italiano Navale: Ships, sovereign immunity and the subtleties of Brussels I: Rina

2021 ◽  
pp. 1023263X2110059
Author(s):  
Vincent Power
Keyword(s):  
Member State ◽  
International Law ◽  
Red Sea ◽  
State Court ◽  
Private Law ◽  
Eu Law ◽  
Commercial Activity ◽  
Sovereign Immunity ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
Flag State

More than 1000 passengers on a Panamanian-registered ferry drowned in the Red Sea. Some survivors and relatives of some of the victims sued the classification and certification ship society which had surveyed the ferry. Relying on the Brussels I Regulation, the plaintiffs sued the defendants in the latter’s seat (in Italy). The defendants claimed sovereign immunity as they were acting on behalf of Panama (that is, the flag state). The CJEU ruled that, generally, Article 1(1) of the Regulation means that an action for damages, brought against private-law corporations engaged in the classification and certification of ships on behalf of, and upon delegation from, a non-EU Member State, falls within the concept of ‘civil and commercial matters’ in the Regulation. The defendants were therefore not immune. The CJEU qualified its ruling by saying that this is conditional on the activity being not exercised under ‘public powers’ (within the meaning of EU law) because then it would then be a sovereign and not a commercial activity. The CJEU thereby ruled that the customary public international law principle that foreign states have immunity from jurisdiction does not preclude an EU Member State court seised of a dispute from exercising jurisdiction under the Regulation in these circumstances.

Ius Humanitatis and the Right to Reparation for International Crimes in Foreign Domestic Courts

2014 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 358-376
Author(s):  
Marcel Brus
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Domestic Court ◽  
Core Element ◽  
International Crimes ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Humanitarian Ethics ◽  
The Right

This article focuses on the possibilities for victims of international crimes to obtain reparation in a foreign domestic court. The chances of success for such claims are small under traditional international law. The article questions whether the development of human rights and humanitarian ethics as a core element of international law (referred to as ius humanitatis) is having an impact on traditional obstacles to making such claims. Two elements are considered: the relevance of changing societal attitudes to the ‘rights’ of victims of such crimes and their possible effect on the interpretation and application of existing law, and whether in present-day international law humanitarian concerns have led to limiting obstacles that are still based on sovereignty, notably regarding the universality principle, prescription, and state immunity. The general conclusion is that on all these points much remains to be done.

scholarly journals Criminal Proceedings Against Albers

2013 ◽  
Vol 107 (3) ◽  
pp. 632-638
Author(s):  
Filippo Fontanelli
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
International Law ◽  
World War ◽  
Criminal Proceedings ◽  
Sovereign Immunity ◽  
International Court Of Justice ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
International Court ◽  
Court Of Appeal

In August 2012, the First Criminal Division of the Court of Cassation (Supreme Court or Court), the highest Italian domestic court, issued a judgment upholding Germany’s sovereign immunity from civil claims brought by Italian war crime victims against Paul Albers and eight others in the Italian courts (Albers). In so doing, the Court overruled its own earlier decisions and also reversed the judgment of April 20, 2011, by the Italian Military Court of Appeal (Military Court), which had upheld such claims relating to war crimes committed by German forces in Italy during World War II. With this ruling, the Court of Cassation put an end to its decade long effort to find an exception to the well-known rule of customary international law providing for sovereign immunity from foreign civil jurisdiction for actsjure imperii. Thisrevirementresulted from the Court’s decision to give effect to the judgment of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) inGermany v. Italy.

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