The scope and content of the principle of non-refoulement: Opinion

Refugee Protection in International Law: UNHCR's Global Consultations on International Protection

Volumn , Issue , 2003, Pages 87-177

  Lauterpacht, Elihu ^a   Bethlehem, Daniel ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 84929282126     PISSN: None     EISSN: None     Source Type: Book    
DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511493973.008     Document Type: Chapter

References (73)

1. Eighth Session of the Asian-African Legal Consultative Committee, 8-17 Aug. 1966, p. 335 (hereinafter ‘Asian-African Refugee Principles’). Art. III(1) of the as yet unadopted Draft Consolidated Text of these principles revised at a meeting held in New Delhi on 26-27 Feb. 2001
2. American Convention on Human Rights or ‘Pact of San Jose, Costa Rica’, 1969, Organization of American States (OAS) Treaty Series No. 35,9ILM 673.
3. Cartagena Declaration on Refugees, embodying the Conclusions of the Colloquium on the International Protection of Refugees in Central America, Mexico, and Panama held in Cartagena, 19-22 Nov. 1984.
4. UNHCR, CollectionofInternationalInstrumentsandOtherLegalTextsConcerning Refugees and Displaced Persons
5. European Treaty Series No. 5 (hereinafter ‘European Convention on Human Rights’).
6. Soering v. UnitedKingdom (1989), series A, no. 161,98ILR 270, at para. 88; Cruz Varas v. Sweden (1991), series A, no. 201; 108 ILR 283, at para. 69;
7. Vilvarajah v. UnitedKingdom (1991), series A, no. 215; 108 ILR 321, at paras. 73-4 and 79-81;
8. Chahal v. UnitedKingdom (1996), Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1996-V; 108ILR 385, at para. 75;
9. Ahmed v. Austria (1997), Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1996-VI; 24 EHRR 278, at paras. 39-40;
10. T.I. v. United Kingdom, Application No. 43844/98, Decision as to Admissibility, 7 March 2000, [2000] INLR 211.
11. International Protection, A/AC.96/799,25 Aug. 1992, at paras. 14-16. This assessment was endorsed by the Executive Committee in Conclusion No. 68 (XLIII) 1992 on International Protection and implicitly by the UNGA in interalia Resolution 47/105 of 16 Dec. 1992 concerning assistance to refugees, returnees, and displaced persons in Africa.
12. Memorandum by the Secretary-General, E/AC.32/2, 3 Jan. 1950.
13. United Nations Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Status of Refugees and Stateless Persons, UN doc. A/CONF.2/108/Rev.1,26 Nov. 1952.
14. Universal Declaration of Human Rights, UNGA Resolution 217 A (III), 10 Dec. 1948 (hereinafter ‘Universal Declaration’) at preambular paras. 1 and 2.
15. Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties,1969, 1155 UNTS 331 hereinafter ‘Vienna Convention’.
16. Reservations to the Convention on the Prevention of and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Advisory Opinion, ICJ Reports 1951, 15, 23.
17. Legal Consequences for States of the Continued Presence of South Africa in Namibia (South West Africa) Notwithstanding Security Council Resolution 276(1970), Advisory Opinion, ICJ Reports 1971, p. 16
18. South West Africa, Second Phase, Judgment, ICJ Reports 1966, 6, 293-4.
19. Gabcikovo-Nagymaros Project (Hungary/Slovakia), Judgment, ICJ Reports 1997, 7, 114-15., 114.
20. Tyrer v. UnitedKingdom, Judgment of the European Court of Human Rights, 25 April 1978, Series A, No. 26, at para. 31.
21. R. Jennings and A. Watts (eds.), Oppenheim's International Law (9th edn, Longman, Harlow, 1992), 1274-5;
22. The Kronprins Gustaf Adolf (1932) Annual Digest (1931-32), No. 205, p. 372, at p. 374;
23. Reparations for Injuries Sufferedin the Service of the United Nations, Advisory Opinion, ICJ Reports 1949, p. 174, at p. 182;
24. Fubini Claim (1959), 29 ILR 34, at p. 46.
25. E. Lauterpacht, ‘The Development of the Law of International Organizations by the Decisions of International Tribunals’ Recueil des Cours, vol. 1976-VI, 396-402.
26. I. M. Sinclair, The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (2nd edn, Manchester University Press, 1984), p. 142.
27. International Law Commission, Articles on the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts, A/CN.4/L.602, 31 May 2001.
28. de Casariego v. Uruguay, Views of the Human Rights Committee of 29 July 1981, at paras. 10.1-10.3. Loizidou v. Turkey (Preliminary Objections), European Court of Human Rights, Judgment of 23 Feb. 1995, SeriesA, No. 310,103 ILR 622, atparas. 62-3. References in the text have been omitted.
29. The Refugee Convention, 1951: The Travaux Preparatoires Analysed with a Commentary by Dr Paul Weis (Cambridge University Press, 1995), 341-2.
30. UNHCR, Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status (Geneva, 1979, re-edited 1992), at para. 28 (hereinafter ‘UNHCR Handbook’).
31. Commission of the European Communities, ‘Proposal for a Council Directive on Minimum Standards for Giving Temporary Protection in the Event of a Mass Influx of Displaced Persons and on Measures Promoting a Balance of Efforts Between Member States in Receiving Such Persons and Bearing the Consequences Thereof’, provisional version, May 2000. On the basis of this proposal, a Directive was adopted by the Council at its meeting on 28-29 May 2001. The final text of the Directive has not yet been published. Explanatory Memorandum, at Art. 6(2).
32. UNHCR, ‘Protection of Refugees in Mass Influx Situations: Overall Protection Framework’, EC/GC/01/4,19 Feb. 2001, at para. 6.
33. T.I. v. United Kingdom, Application No. 43844/98, Decision as to Admissibility, 7 March 2000, [2000] INLR 211 at 228.
34. Weis, The Refugee Convention, 1951, 303 and 341.
35. A. Grahl-Madsen, Commentaryon theRefugeeConvention 1951: Articles 2-11,13-37 (UNHCR Division of International Protection, Geneva, 1997), 231-2.
36. UNHCR Handbook, at para. 42. 92 This matter is addressed further below.Conclusion No. 15 (XXX) 1979, para. (b). 94
37. UNHCR, Guidelines for National Refugee Legislation, 9 Dec. 1980, at section 6(2).
38. UNHCR's ‘Note on the Principle of Non-Refoulement, Nov. 1997, prepared in the context of a Nov. 1997 European Union seminar on the implementation of the 1995 EU
39. G. S. Goodwin-Gill, The Refugee in International Law (2nd edn, Clarendon, Oxford, 1998), p. 139.
40. UNHCR in its ‘Note on the Principle of Non-Refoulement ofNov. 1997, referred to above, that, ‘in view of the serious consequences to a refugee of being returned to a country where he or she is in danger of persecution, the exception provided for in Article 33(2)
41. Chahal v. UnitedKingdom (1997) 108 ILR 385, at paras. 74-81.Grahl-Madsen, Commentary on the Refugee Convention 1951, 235-6.
42. The Cartagena Declaration on Refugees of 1984 concluded inter alia that the principle of nonrefoulement ‘is imperative in regard to refugees and in the present state of international law should be acknowledged and observed as a rule of jus cogens’ (at section III, para. 5). On the views of the Swiss Government, see FFE/BBI, 1994III, 1486-7.
43. Military and Paramilitary Activities In and Against Nicaragua (Nicaragua v. United States of America), Jurisdiction and Admissibility, Judgment, ICJ Reports 1984, p. 392, at para. 73, Merits, Judgment, ICJ Reports 1986, p. 14, at paras. 174-9.
44. North Sea Continental Shelf, Judgment, ICJ Reports 1969, p. 3.
45. ICJ Reports 1986, p. 14, at para. 186.
46. Soering v. UnitedKingdom, 98ILR 270, at para. 88.
47. CruzVaras v. Sweden, 108 ILR 283, at para. 69; Vilvarajah v. UnitedKingdom, 108 ILR 321, at paras. 102-3; and Chahal v. UnitedKingdom, 108 ILR 385, at paras. 73-4 and 79-81.
48. T.I. v. United Kingdom, Application No. 43844/98, Decision as to Admissibility, 7 March 2000, [2000] INLR 211 at 228.
49. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 20 (1992), HRI/HEN/1/Rev. 1,28 July 1994
50. E. A. Ankumah, The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights: Practice and Procedures (Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, 1996). available at http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/africa/comcases/97-93c.html.
51. ECHR, the ICCPR, and the Torture Convention, and the Holy See, which is a party to the 1951 Convention and 1967 Protocol 148 Non-refoulement (Article 33)
52. Encyclopaedia of Public International Law (Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law, under the direction of Rudolf Bernhardt, North-Holland Publishing Co., Amsterdam, New York, 1985), vol. 8, p. 456.
53. Filartiga v. PenaIrala (1980) 21 ILM 585, 595-601 Under the heading ‘Freedom from torture is among the fundamental human rights protected by international law’, the United States noted inter alia:
54. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 24 (52) (1994), CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.6, 2 Nov. 1994, at para. 10.
55. L. Hannikainen, Peremptory Norms (Jus Cogens) in International Law: Historical Development, Criteria, Present Status (Finnish Lawyers’ Publishing Co., Helsinki, 1988)
56. G; Y. Dinstein, ‘The Right to Life, Physical Integrity, and Liberty’, in International Bill of Rights: The Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ed. L. Henkin, Columbia University Press, New York, 1981), atp. 122.
57. A. Boulesbaa, The UN Convention on Torture and the Prospects for Enforcement (Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, 1999), 4-8. The distinction for purposes of the Convention machinery notwithstanding, Art. 16(1) of the Convention affirms that ‘[e]ach State Party shall undertake to prevent in any territory under its jurisdiction other acts of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment which do not amount to torture’.
58. UNGA Resolution 3452 (XXX), Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Being Subjected to Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, 9 Dec. 1975, atArts. 1 and 2.
59. European Court of Human Rights in Ireland v. United Kingdom (1978), Series A, No. 25, at para. 167.
60. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 20 (1992), HRI/GEN/1/Rev.1,28 July 1994, at para. 4 (emphasis added).
61. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 24 (52) (1994), CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.6, 2 Nov. 1994
62. UNGA Resolution 39/118, ‘Human Rights in the Administration of Justice’, 14 Dec. 1984, at para. 1 (emphasis added).
63. US Restatement, 169-70.
64. Chahal v. UnitedKingdom, 108 ILR 385, at para. 75. See also Ahmed v. Austria,(1997) 24 EHRR 278, atparas. 39-40.
65. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 20 (1992), HRI/HEN/1/Rev. 1,28 July 1994, xtract quoted
66. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 20 (1992), HRI/HEN/1/Rev. 1,28 July 1994, at para. 2 (emphasis added).
67. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 20 (1992), HRI/HEN/1/Rev. 1,28 July 1994, at para. 9.
68. Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 20 (1992), HRI/HEN/1/Rev.1,28 July 1994, at para. 9 (emphasis added).
69. ChitatNg v. Canada, at para. 14.1, as quoted in para. 234 above.
70. Torture Convention provides: ‘No State Party shall expel, return (“refouler”) or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that hewould be in danger ofbeingsubjected to torture’ (emphasis added).
71. T.I.v. UnitedKingdom, Application No. 43844/98, Decision as to Admissibility, 7 March 2000, [2000] INLR 211, extract at para. 206 above; ChitatNg v. Canada, para. 234 above, at para. 16.1.
72. ICCPR, General Comment No. 20 (1992) and General Comment No. 24 (52)(1994);
73. European Convention on Human Rights and Chahal v. United Kingdom, at para. 79; Art. 27 of the American Convention on Human Rights; and Art. 2(2) of the Torture Convention. The Banjul Charter makes no provision for derogations.