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The Un As Good Samaritan: Immunity And Responsibility, Kristen Boon

Chicago Journal of International Law

Since the United Nation’s founding, its need for immunity from the jurisdiction of member states courts has been understood as necessary to achieve its purposes. Immunities, however, conflict with an individual’s right to a remedy and the law’s ordinary principles of responsibility for causing harm. This inherent conflict at the center of the immunity doctrine has evolved into a very public rift in the Haiti Cholera, Kosovo Lead Poisoning, and Mothers of Srebrenica cases against the United Nations.

In these three cases alleging mass torts by the UN, the independence of the organization is perceived by some to have trumped …