Human Rights Law Commons^™

Dam(N) Displacement: Compensation, Resettlement, And Indigeneity, Stephen R. Munzer

Cornell International Law Journal

Hydroelectric dams produce electricity, provide flood control, and improve agricultural irrigation. But the building and operation of these dams frequently involve forced displacement of local communities. Displacement often has an outsized impact on indigenous persons, who are disproportionately poor, repressed, and politically marginalized. One can limit these adverse effects in various ways: (1) taking seriously the ethics of dam-induced development, (2) rooting out corruption, (3) paying compensation at or near the beginning of dam projects, (4) using land-for-land exchanges, (5) disbursing resettlement funds as needed until displaced persons are firmly established in their new locations, and (6) having entities that …

Interpersonal Human Rights, Hanoch Dagan, Avihay Dorfmann

Cornell International Law Journal

Our increasingly globalized environment, typified by the significant role of transnational interactions, raises urgent concerns about the commission of grave transnational wrongs. Two main legal strategies— belonging, respectively, to public and private international law— offer important directions for addressing these urgent concerns. One strategy extends state obligations under human rights law to some non-state actors; the other adapts traditional private international law doctrines, notably its public policy exception. Both strategies make important advances, yet both face significant difficulties, which are all fundamentally rooted in what we call “the missing link of privity”— namely, identifying the reason for imposing the burden …

Women’S Rights In The Dprk: Discrepancies Between International And Domestic Legal Instruments In Promoting Women’S Rights And The Reality Reflected By North Korean Defectors, Jina Yang

Cornell International Law Journal

It is commendable that the DPRK has ratified the CEDAW and has established legislative measures to protect women from violence and guarantee equal protection. However short of internationally accepted human rights standard the DPRK may fall, such actions show that the DPRK is nonetheless trying to be a responsible member of the international community. However, many findings show that women’s rights are far from reaching the international standards, because of patriarchal traditions that are entrenched to the North Korean society and the national institutions related to women’s rights, which are used to mobilize women to work for the state, rather …

North Korean Detention Of U.S. Citizens: International Law Violations And Means For Recourse, Patricia Goedde, Andrew Wolman

Cornell International Law Journal

North Korean detention of U.S. citizens has prompted considerable attention in the U.S. media over the years, especially with the most recent case of Otto Warmbier’s death. Releases have usually been negotiated through diplomatic channels on a humanitarian basis. While detainee treatment is influenced primarily by political considerations, this Article asks what international legal implications arise from these detentions in terms of international law violations and recourse. Specifically, this Article analyzes (1) violations of consular law and international human rights law as applied to the detainees, such as standards for arrest, investigation, trial, and detention, and (2) whether viable legal …

Labor And Human Rights Conditions Of North Korean Workers Dispatched Overseas: A Look At The Dprk’S Exploitative Practices In Russia, Poland, And Mongolia, Teodora Gyupchanova

Cornell International Law Journal

The Database Center for North Korean Human Rights (NKDB) has so far dedicated over three years to a focused research on the human rights conditions of North Korean laborers overseas. In this amount of time NKDB researchers have only managed to uncover a small fraction of the abuses endured by the North Korean citizens dispatched overseas to earn revenue for the North Korean regime. There is a lot of work that still needs to be done, which should involve investigation of the working and living conditions of North Korean laborers residing in different countries, seeking accountability from the entities, government …

Taking Ihi, R2p And Legitimate Defense Seriously: North Korea As The Primary Consideration, Morse Tan

Cornell International Law Journal

North Korea has the worst human rights crisis in terms of the breadth and extent of its violations, and also presents the most serious security crisis in the world. A trio of doctrines— International Humanitarian Intervention, the Responsibility to Protect, and legitimate defense— provide the foundation for a range of solutions and approaches to resolve this crisis. At the same time, North Korea poses real dangers, the situation is delicate, and the resolutions may prove difficult. Strong determination is necessary to stay the course until the Koreas reunite, ideally in a peaceful manner. The situation has moved rapidly over the …

Targeting And The Concept Of Intent, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

International law generally prohibits military forces from intentionally targeting civilians; this is the principle of distinction. In contrast, unintended collateral damage is permissible unless the anticipated civilian deaths outweigh the expected military advantage of the strike; this is the principle of proportionality. These cardinal targeting rules of international humanitarian law are generally assumed by military lawyers to be relatively well settled. However, recent international tribunals applying this law in a string of little-noticed decisions have completely upended this understanding. Armed with criminal law principles from their own domestic systems, often civil law jurisdictions, prosecutors, judges and even scholars have progressively …

The Duty To Capture, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The duty to capture stands at the fault line between competing legal regimes that might govern targeted killings. If human rights law and domestic law enforcement procedures govern these killings, the duty to attempt capture prior to lethal force represents a cardinal rule that is systematically violated by these operations. On the other hand, if the Law of War applies then the duty to capture is fundamentally inconsistent with the summary killing already sanctioned by jus in bello. The following Article examines the duty to capture and the divergent approaches that each legal regime takes to this normative requirement, and …

Is Jus In Bello In Crisis?, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

It is a truism that new technologies are remaking the tactical and legal landscape of armed conflict. While such statements are undoubtedly true, it is important to separate genuine trends from scholarly exaggeration. The following essay, an introduction to the Drone Wars symposium of the Journal, catalogues today’s most pressing disputes regarding international humanitarian law (IHL) and their consequences for criminal responsibility. These include: (i) the triggering and classification of armed conflicts with non-state actors; (ii) the relative scope of IHL and international human rights law in asymmetrical conflicts; (iii) the targeting of suspected terrorists under concept- or status-based classifications …

Evidence Obtained By Cruel, Inhuman Or Degrading Treatment: Why The Convention Against Torture’S Exclusionary Rule Should Be Inclusive, Akmal Niyazmatov

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

Convention against Torture (CAT) prohibits admissibility of evidence obtained by torture but fails to extend similar prohibition to evidence obtained by cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment (CIDT evidence). Manfred Nowak argues that CAT's failure to prohibit CIDT evidence can be resolved if in interpreting torture we take the purposive element, instead of severity, as the main element that distinguishes torture from CIDT. He argues that both torture and CIDT require infliction of severe pain and thus it must be the purpose for which severe pain was inflicted that distinguishes torture from CIDT. If the purposive element is key in distinguishing …

Convergences And Divergences In International Legal Norms On Migrant Labor, Chantal Thomas

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This essay will argue that even where disparate treaties converge doctrinally, they may diverge normatively and that normative divergence may be significant in its own right. Section I of this essay seeks to chart out an initial such analysis, conducting a concise comparison of particular rules affecting migrant workers from different realms of international law. Section I concludes with both a graphic representation of doctrinal convergences and divergences, and a further discussion the doctrinal relationships among treaties as elucidated through consideration of hypothetical legal disputes.

Section II considers the normative implications of divergent rule systems. In particular, Section II raises …

Do We Need National Human Rights Institutions?: The Experience Of Korea, Buhm-Suk Baek

Cornell Law School J.S.D. Student Research Papers

Korea has experienced a drastic transformation in the "rule of law." During the colonization era, it was nearly impossible for Koreans to foster appropriate human rights. The Korean War further seriously damaged the human rights consciousness in Korea. Military governments ruled the country for 30 years, and it was not until the end of the 1980s that democracy returned. In 1998, Dae-Jung Kim who has been persecuted under the former military regime, was elected President and now exemplifies the progression of Korea "from a victim of human rights violations to a human rights leader." Following President Dae-Jung Kim's election promises …

Enhancing Enforcement Of Economic, Social, And Cultural Rights Using Indicators: A Focus On The Right To Education In The Icescr, Sital Kalantry, Jocelyn E. Getgen, Steven A. Koh

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Nearly fifteen years ago, Audrey Chapman emphasized the importance of ascertaining violations of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) as a means to enhance its enforcement. Today, this violations approach is even more salient given the recent adoption of the Optional Protocol to the ICESCR. This article focuses on the right to education in the ICESCR to illustrate how indicators can be employed to ascertain treaty compliance and violations. Indicators are important to enforcing economic, social, and cultural rights because they assist in measuring progressive realization. The methodology that we propose calls for: 1) analyzing the …

Attempt, Conspiracy, And Incitement To Commit Genocide, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

In these brief commentaries to the U.N. Genocide Convention, I explore three criminal law modes of liability as they apply to the international crime of genocide. Part I analyzes attempt to commit genocide and uncovers a basic tension over whether attempt refers to the genocide itself (the chapeau) or the underlying offense (such as killing). Part I concludes that the tension stems from the fact that the crime of genocide itself is already inchoate in nature, since the legal requirements for the crime do not require an actual, completed genocide, in the common-sense understanding of the term, but only a …

Enhancing Enforcement Of Economic, Social And Cultural Rights Using Indicators: A Focus On The Right To Education In The Icescr, Sital Kalantry, Joycelyn E. Getgen, Steven Arrigg Koh

Cornell Law Faculty Working Papers

Nearly fifteen years ago, Audrey R. Chapman emphasized the importance of ascertaining violations of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) as a means to enhance its enforcement. Today, the violations approach is even more salient given the recent adoption of the ICESCR’s Optional Protocol, a powerful tool to hold States parties accountable for violations.

Indicators are essential tools for assessing violations of economic, social and cultural rights (ESCRs) because they are often the best way to measure progressive realization. Proposed guidelines on using indicators give guidance on the content of States parties reports to treaty monitoring …

The United Nations Declaration On The Rights Of Indigenous Peoples: A New Dawn For Indigenous Peoples Rights?, Ronald Kakungulu

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

Governments in many countries of the world struggle with how to accommodate properly the needs and claims [rights] of native/indigenous peoples within their jurisdictions whose presence long predates European conquest and occupation. In this paper, a comparison and contrast of the approaches of the African and other jurisdictions whose jurisprudence is informative to the protection of the rights of African indigenous peoples, like the Inter-American Court of Human Rights compared with the US, Canada, New Zealand and Australia ‘the big four’ who voted against the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous on September 13, 2007 at the UN General …

Measuring State Compliance With The Right To Education Using Indicators: A Case Study Of Colombia’S Obligations Under The Icescr, Sital Kalantry, Jocelyn Getgen, Steven A. Koh

Cornell Law Faculty Working Papers

The right to education is often referred to as a “multiplier right” because its enjoyment enhances other human rights. It is enumerated in several international instruments, but it is codified in greatest detail in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). Despite its importance, the right to education has received limited attention from scholars, practitioners, and international and regional human rights bodies as compared to other economic, social and cultural rights (ECSRs). In this Article, we propose a methodology that utilizes indicators to measure treaty compliance with the right to education. Indicators are essential to measuring compliance …

Economic Sanctions Against Human Rights Violations, Buhm Suk Baek

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

The idea of human rights protection, historically, has been considered as a domestic matter, to be realized by individual states within their domestic law and national institutions. The protection and promotion of human rights, however, have become one of the most important issues for the international community as a whole. Yet, with time, it has become increasingly difficult for the international community to address human rights problems collectively. Despite a significant development in the human rights norms, effective protection of fundamental human rights and their legal enforcement has a long way to go.

This paper will argue that economic sanctions …

Myanmarese Refugees In Thailand: The Need For Effective Protection, Buhm Suk Baek, Gauri Subramanium

Cornell Law School J.S.D. Student Research Papers

This paper deals with the Thai government's policy on refugees with a special focus on refugees from Myanmar. It is designed to give suggestions to international human rights NGOs working in the Thai-Myanmar border areas for the protection of the human rights of Myanmarese refugees. Most international human rights NGOs in this region are lobbying for the Thai government to ratify the Refugee Convention or at the very least, take active steps towards the protection of refugees under customary international law.

This paper is, however, concerned by these NGOs’ reliance on the ratification of the Convention as a solution to …

Reproductive Injustice: An Analysis Of Nicaragua's Complete Abortion Ban, Jocelyn E. Getgen

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Torture As A Problem In Ordinary Legal Interpretation, Alan Hyde

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

American legal discourse on torture takes for granted some, usually all, of the following propositions, that make discussion of torture more difficult than it should be. Torture is assumed to present unusually difficult problems of definition, full of vague concepts, fine lines, gray areas, murky moral dilemmas, "dirty hands." This vagueness is thought to be even more of a problem for the attendant concept of "cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment." The legal sources of either prohibition are assumed to be dubious under American law. Prohibiting torture is, perhaps for these reasons, thought to require moral justification not necessarily required of …

Saddam Hussein's Trial In Iraq: Fairness, Legitimacy & Alternatives, A Legal Analysis, Christian Eckart

Cornell Law School J.D. Student Research Papers

The paper focuses on Saddam Hussein’s trial in front of the Iraqi High Criminal Court in Baghdad. After providing an overview of the facts surrounding the court’s installation, the applicable international law is identified and the fairness and legitimacy of the current proceedings are analyzed. The paper finishes by considering whether the trial should be relocated and addresses alternative venues that could have been chosen to prosecute Iraq’s ex-dictator.

Introducing Discipline: Anthropology And Human Rights Administrations, Iris Jean-Klein, Annelise Riles

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Anthropologists engage human rights administrations with an implicit promise that our discipline has something unique to offer. The articles in this special issue turn questions about relevance and care so often heard in the context of debates about human rights outside in. They focus not on how anthropology can contribute to human rights activities, but on what anthropological encounters with human rights contribute to the development of our discipline. They ask, how exactly do we render the subject relevant to anthropology? Reflecting on some ways anthropologists in this field have dispensed care for their subjects, the authors highlight two modalities …

Applying The Death Penalty To Crimes Of Genocide, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Reclaiming Fundamental Principles Of Criminal Law In The Darfur Case, George P. Fletcher, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

According to the authors, the Report of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Darfur and the Security Council referral of the situation in Darfur to the International Criminal Court (ICC) bring to light two serious deficiencies of the ICC Statute and, more generally, international criminal law: (i) the systematic ambiguity between collective responsibility (i.e. the responsibility of the whole state) and criminal liability of individuals, on which current international criminal law is grounded, and (ii) the failure of the ICC Statute fully to comply with the principle of legality. The first deficiency is illustrated by highlighting the notions of genocide …

Exporting U.S. Anti-Terrorism Legislation And Policies To The International Law Arena, A Comparative Study: The Effect On Other Countries' Legal Systems, Olga Kallergi

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

The terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York on 9/11 set in motion a new era all over the world: an era of a world uniting against a common enemy, but also an era of insecurity and fear. Laws have been changed worldwide, nations have united against a common threat, legal theories and beliefs of centuries have been questioned, and civil liberties have been replaced by a need for national safety. Has this worldwide effort worked? Is our world a better place now that we are all fighting the same enemy? Did we learn from our past …

Human Rights Treaty Drafting Through The Lens Of Mental Disability: The Proposed International Convention On Protection And Promotion Of The Rights And Dignity Of Persons With Disabilities, Aaron A. Dhir

Cornell Law School Inter-University Graduate Student Conference Papers

In this piece I explore whether, if established, the proposed International Convention on Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities will be an effective way to limit abuses of the rights of persons diagnosed with mental disabilities. In Section I, I discuss the failure of international human rights law to effectively address these abuses to date. In Section II, I consider the debate surrounding the need for a disability-specific Convention. In Section III, I argue that in order for the proposed Convention to be effective, and not simply a hollow mechanism, it must reject the …