AVOIDING LEGAL OBLIGATIONS CREATED BY HUMAN RIGHTS TREATIES

2008 ◽  
Vol 57 (4) ◽  
pp. 751-788 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ed Bates
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Legal Obligation ◽  
Sole Purpose ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
The Subject

AbstractThis article examines the legality of the options that may be open to a State that is unwilling to accept a legal obligation created by a human rights treaty it has already ratified. It briefly addresses the subject of ‘derogation’ from human rights treaties before looking in detail at denunciation of the same. It proceeds to examine the legality of strategies such as entering a late reservation to a human rights treaty and of denouncing the treaty with the sole purpose of entering a new reservation to it.

Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the CRC: Is There a Legal Obligation to Cooperate Internationally for Development?

2009 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wouter Vandenhole
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Development Assistance ◽  
Development Cooperation ◽  
Legal Obligation ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Rights Of The Child ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
Human Rights Treaties

AbstractSeveral provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child contain references to international cooperation, sometimes in combination with a reference to the needs of developing countries. This article explores whether these references, in light of the interpretation given by the Committee on the Rights of the Child and of other human rights treaties which contain similar wording (in particular the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the Disability Convention), amount to a legal obligation to cooperate internationally for development in the field of economic, social and cultural rights. While it is not possible to establish the existence of a legal obligation to provide development assistance in general – which would amount to an extraterritorial obligation to fulfil – legal obligations to respect and protect economic, social and cultural rights of children in third countries do apply. Moreover, the CRC Committee has clarified some specific obligations of fulfilment for donor countries, such as, amongst others, the allocation of 0,7 per cent of GDP to development assistance, and the adoption of a rights-based approach to development cooperation, in which children's rights are mainstreamed.

Human Rights Obligations of Armed Groups

2019 ◽  
pp. 444-462
Author(s):  
Andreas Th Müller
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Potential Application ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Armed Groups ◽  
The Past ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
State Actors

One of the asymmetries faced by military missions in areas of limited statehood are diverging legal obligations of state and non-state actors, in particular in relation to human rights duties. From a perspective of states bound by human rights treaties, there is a certain danger that armed groups opposing them might abuse the obligations incumbent upon state actors. Against this perception, the potential application of human rights law to armed groups is not only relevant as a tool for protecting civilians but also from a reciprocity perspective in view of the fluidity of armed conflicts and with a view to convergence of standards. The chapter assesses how international law and international legal practice in relation to armed groups have evolved over the past decade. It takes stock of recent developments and analyses the degree to which human rights obligations apply to armed groups.

scholarly journals Recalibrating Human Rights-Based Approaches to Development: Are they Progressive and Transformational?

2021 ◽  
pp. 49-64
Author(s):  
George Jotham Kondowe
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Person ◽  
Development Interventions ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Development Processes ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Progressive Potential ◽  
Local Levels ◽  
Development Practice

This paper argues that notwithstanding criticisms levelled against Human Rights-Based Approaches (HRBAs) to development, such approaches are progressive and transformational because they provide a framework of standards on which development should be grounded. Further, HRBAs provide an analytic and institutional resource for articulating a wide range of justice concerns in order to challenge power relations and structural impediments in development processes. The paper is not blind to other contributions which have focused on the progressive potential of HRBAs and the attention that has been given to the challenges and pitfalls of implementing such approaches. Therefore, the paper builds on existing literature to advance its main thesis that HRBAs, which flow from human rights that are the subject of binding international legal obligations, are progressive and transformational because they provide a human rights language that can be vernacularised at national and local levels when development interventions are properly contextualised. The paper concludes with the position that despite concerns raised against HRBAs, such approaches offer a principled approach to development that puts a human person at the centre. Thus, concerns against HRBAs do not necessarily erode or invalidate the legitimacy of the transformative and progressive nature of such approaches in development practice.

Identifying the norms of the customary international law of human rights

2021 ◽  
pp. 40-101
Author(s):  
William A. Schabas
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
Periodic Review ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
State Practice ◽  
Jus Cogens ◽  
Peremptory Norms ◽  
Regional Custom

References to customary law by national and international courts tend to be perfunctory, with only summary attempts to analyse the evidence. It is the same for jus cogens or peremptory norms. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is increasingly viewed as a source of legal obligation. The near-universal ratification of human rights treaties facilitates the identification of custom, bearing in mind the phenomenon of reservations. Materials generated by the Universal Periodic Review mechanism of the Human Rights Council provide rich evidence not only of State practice but also of the views taken by States about the content of international legal obligations. Regional custom, jus cogens, and the persistent objector are examined.

scholarly journals E.T. Phoned Home…They Know

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (1-4) ◽  
pp. 92-112
Author(s):  
Holly Huxtable
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Big Brother ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
European Court ◽  
Human Rights Regime ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Extraterritorial Jurisdiction

The rationale behind the applicability of human rights treaties to foreign surveillance is the subject of debate. Presented with the opportunity to weigh in on this issue in the case of Big Brother Watch and Others v The United Kingdom, the European Court of Human Rights simply assumed (and rightly so) that the European Convention on Human Rights applies, providing no further reasoning. This article explores the challenges that arise with establishing jurisdiction over foreign surveillance under human rights treaties, and argues for an alternative base for extraterritorial jurisdiction grounded in the moral and theoretical principles underlying the human rights regime.

Reservations to Treaties and Human Rights Committee General Comment No. 24(52)

1997 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 390-412 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine J. Redgwell
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Effective Implementation ◽  
Rights Of The Child ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Civil And Political Rights ◽  
Made In

On 2 November 1994 the Human Rights Committee adopted General Comment No.24(52) relating to reservations made on ratification or accession to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. It is addressed to States party to the Covenant and indicates the manner in which reservations to Covenant guarantees will be treated. The fact that the Committee has issued a general comment on the topic of reservations is clear expression of the Committee's concerns regarding the number and scope of reservations which have been made. In its view these threaten to undermine the effective implementation of the Covenant as well as impair the performance of the Committee in respect of the subject matter to which the reservations apply. Though not as seriously afflicted by reservations as some other human rights treaties, most notably the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Covenant has nonetheless been the object of some sweeping reservations to which few objections have been made. There is the concern that the integrity of the Covenant may have been sacrificed in order to ensure widespread participation. “Indeed”, suggests Higgins, “one might almost say that there is a collusion to allow penetrating and disturbing reservations to go unchallenged.”

scholarly journals Investigating the extraterritorial application of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights as well as the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

De Jure ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Mateus
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Military Occupation ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Civil And Political Rights

The territorial scope of the application of human rights treaties has been a core discussion when dealing with the enforcement of human rights obligations imposed by human rights treaties on State Parties. In particular, this is because the conduct of a State may affect the human rights of people situated outside the State's territorial borders. Accordingly, to afford protection to the affected States, most international human rights instruments contain the so-called jurisdictional clause which aims to identify the range of people to whom States owe their human rights obligations under a treaty. However, the term "jurisdiction" has not achieved an undoubted definition as yet and remains a continued area of contention. The subject matter of this article is the extraterritorial application of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). It concerns therefore, the applicability of these human rights treaties to the conduct of a State which affects the rights of people outside its territorial borders and results in the lack of the full enjoyment of the human rights recognised in the Covenants, and which would be qualified as a violation of human rights treaty had it been undertaken on the State Party's own territory. Although most of the literature on this topic relates specifically to armed conflict and military occupation, the author applies the tests established for the determination of the exterritoriality of the treaties in circumstances inclusive of and beyond armed conflict and military occupation.

INTERIM MEASURES IN THE UN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMITTEE

2004 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 445-454 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Binding Force ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
The Subject ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Interim Measures

International human rights bodies with responsibility for monitoring the implementation and enforcement of rights protected by human rights treaties are usually empowered to indicate interim, or provisional, measures of protection in cases of urgency in order to safeguard the rights and persons of victims of alleged violations of human rights.1Whether State parties are obliged to comply with a request for interim measures of protection has been the subject of some debate. The purpose of this note is to examine the issue of the binding force of interim measures of protection in the United Nations human rights system in light of the views of the Human Rights Committee (hereafter the Committee) inPiandiong, Morailos and Bulan v The Philippines.2Before doing so, however, we need to recall briefly the Committee's role in securing the rights of the individual.

“The heart above the ruins”: Miriam Waddington’s Poetry, the Spanish Civil War, and Jewish Canadian Literature

1969 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily Robins Sharpe
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Spanish Civil War ◽  
World War ◽  
Canadian Literature ◽  
The Earth ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Subject ◽  
War Consequences

The Jewish Canadian writer Miriam Waddington returned repeatedly to the subject of the Spanish Civil War, searching for hope amid the ruins of Spanish democracy. The conflict, a prelude to World War II, inspired an outpouring of literature and volunteerism. My paper argues for Waddington’s unique poetic perspective, in which she represents the Holocaust as the Spanish Civil War’s outgrowth while highlighting the deeply personal repercussions of the war – consequences for women, for the earth, and for community. Waddington’s poetry connects women’s rights to human rights, Canadian peace to European war, and Jewish persecution to Spanish carnage.

Need of Human Rights as a Better Way of Life

Think India ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 72-83
Author(s):  
Tushar Kadian
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Basic Needs ◽  
Research Paper ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Labour Unions ◽  
The People ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Made In

Actually, basic needs postulates securing of the elementary conditions of existence to every human being. Despite of the practical and theoretical importance of the subject the greatest irony is non- availability of any universal preliminary definition of the concept of basic needs. Moreover, this becomes the reason for unpredictability of various political programmes aiming at providing basic needs to the people. The shift is necessary for development of this or any other conception. No labour reforms could be made in history till labours were treated as objects. Its only after they were started being treating as subjects, labour unions were allowed to represent themselves in strategy formulations that labour reforms could become a reality. The present research paper highlights the basic needs of Human Rights in life.

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