Human Rights Challenges and Adequacy of State Responses to Natural Disaster

2009 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Stallworthy
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Natural Disaster ◽  
State Responses

23. Current issues

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rhona K. M. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Environmental Rights ◽  
The Future ◽  
International Human ◽  
State Actors ◽  
The Law ◽  
Fundamental Rights And Freedoms ◽  
State Responses

This chapter outlines the future agenda for international human rights and provides an overview of some issues that are likely to characterize the evolution of international human rights in the future. These include non-State actors, including businesses. Environmental rights are also considered. The chapter also suggests that State responses to the threat of terrorism must be proportionate to said threat and must be in accordance with the law, respecting fundamental rights and freedoms.

scholarly journals Treaty Bodies

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 344-368
Author(s):  
Kasey McCall-Smith
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
State Practice ◽  
Peremptory Norm ◽  
Treaty Body ◽  
State Responses ◽  
Reporting Procedures ◽  
The Way

Abstract This article contributes to existing understandings about the influence of human rights treaty bodies on the development of customary international law. It offers a method of assessing State responses to treaty body jurisprudence for the purposes of determining to what extent the responses push toward the reaffirmation or crystallisation of a customary rule of international law, namely the prohibition against torture. It speaks to the way in which, despite its status as a peremptory norm, the content of the norm is often challenged, but also incrementally expanding due in large part to the way in which treaty bodies engage and guide States both inside and outside of the primary reporting procedures. Ultimately, this article demonstrates that State practice and opinio juris are increasingly influenced by treaty bodies.

Addressing the Foreign Terrorist Fighter Phenomenon from a Human Rights Perspective

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (5) ◽  
pp. 483-493 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zubeda Limbada ◽  
Lynn Davies
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Deterrent Effect ◽  
Security Strategy ◽  
Violent Extremism ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Impact ◽  
State Responses ◽  
Rights Issues

Foreign terrorist fighters raise security concerns with regard to their actions abroad but also their possible return to their home countries. This paper asks whether tough state responses and new powers such as detention and withdrawal of citizenship raise significant human rights issues. It looks firstly at the different types of rights in play before examining counter-terror legislation from countries such as uk, Australia and Canada. Discourses of the profiles of extremists can be reductionist, ignoring the complexity of the journeys in and out of violent extremism. Does imprisonment does have a deterrent effect? What is the impact on communities of rendering individuals stateless? How does legislation impact on freedom of speech? The paper looks at good practices in deradicalisation from different countries, before outlining three key propositions. First is a much wider public education forum which explains different types of rights and encourages dialogue about what rights take precedence in a security strategy. Second is the forging of long term partnerships with communities, to build trust rather than stigmatise; and third is a greater democratisation of security policy, using two-way information and learning, from sources such as former extremists as well as from the voices of youth.

Famine Crimes in International Law

2003 ◽  
Vol 97 (2) ◽  
pp. 245-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Marcus
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Natural Disaster ◽  
Major Element ◽  
Foreign Minister ◽  
Soviet Government ◽  
Weather Patterns ◽  
Ethiopian Government ◽  
The Government

Some of the worst human rights catastrophes of the twentieth century were famines created or manipulated by governments. In 1932 at least five million Ukrainians starved to death, while hunger was largely unknown across the border in Russia.The Soviet government imposed disastrous grain quotas on the Ukraine, then let its own citizens literally collapse in the streets while it exported grain to further its “revolutionary” objectives.The Ethiopian famine of 1983-1985, preserved in popular memory as a natural disaster of biblical proportions, most fiercely struck those parts of the country that harbored irredentist movements. In a stunning, but telling, rejoinder to international pity for the purportedly hapless Ethiopian government, the Ethiopian foreign minister told a U.S. chargé d’affaires that “food is a major element in our strategy against the secessionists.” Since 1994, more than two million out of a population of twenty-two million in North Korea have starved to death, while South Koreans, affected by similar weather patterns, have remained completely untouched by famine. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), trying to distribute aid earmarked for famine victims, have watched helplessly as the government callously interfered and have arrived at the conclusion that “the authorities are deliberately depriving hundreds of thousands of truly needy Koreans of assistance.”

scholarly journals Między stanem epidemii a stanem klęski żywiołowej – COVID-19 a niektóre prawa człowieka

Radca Prawny ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 11-42
Author(s):  
Sławomir Czarnow
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Natural Disaster ◽  
The Republic

In between a state of epidemic and a state of natural disaster – COVID-19 and certain human rights The article examines the means of restricting selected human rights and freedoms during a state of epidemic against the requirements of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. The analysis particularly concerns the practice of restricting these rights and freedoms through ordinances as well as the imposition of fines and penalties for violations of epidemic orders and bans.

scholarly journals Emergencies: on the misuse of government powers

Public Choice ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Bjørnskov ◽  
Stefan Voigt
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Natural Disasters ◽  
Natural Disaster ◽  
The State ◽  
Unexpected Result ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
State Of Emergency ◽  
Presidential Democracies

AbstractNine out of 10 constitutions contain explicit emergency provisions, intended to help governments cope with extraordinary events that endanger many people or the existence of the state. We ask two questions: (1) does the constitutionalization of emergency provisions help governments to cope with disasters and other extraordinary events? (2) What particular parts of emergency constitutions fare best? We find that the more advantages emergency constitutions confer to the executive, the higher the number of people killed as a consequence of a natural disaster, controlling for its severity. As this is an unexpected result, we discuss a number of potential explanations, the most plausible being that governments use natural disasters as a pretext to enhance their power. Furthermore, the easier it is to call a state of emergency, the larger the negative effects on basic human rights. Interestingly, presidential democracies are better able to cope with natural disasters than parliamentary ones in terms of lives saved, whereas autocracies do significantly worse in the sense that empowerment rights seriously suffer in the aftermath of a disaster.

scholarly journals Electoral Governance and Human Rights Amid Pandemics in Africa: Key lessons from the Early COVID-19 Experience

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Mansha Mohee
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Disease Outbreaks ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Initial State ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Infectious Disease Outbreaks ◽  
The Face ◽  
State Responses

Abstract Over 25 African countries had planned elections for 2020. In the face of the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March, states resorted to one of two courses of action: adherence to planned electoral timelines in the shadow of the outbreak, which largely led to record low voter turnouts and hastened the spread of the virus; or adjourning elections with ill-defined election programming, constitutional tensions and unrest over delayed polls. The global health crisis not only frustrated the organization of the electoral process but set severe challenges to democracy, the rule of law and human rights in the region at a time of landmark elections, notably in Ethiopia, Burundi and Malawi. This article analyses initial state responses in electoral administration in light of international electoral norms, and interrogates the role of national and regional mechanisms in securing safe, inclusive, timely, free and fair elections amid new infectious disease outbreaks.

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