جستجوی مقالات مرتبط با کلیدواژه « Remedial Secession » در نشریات گروه « فقه و حقوق »

RST, emerging in the framework of the external right to self-determination of groups characterized as people, is among the most controversial newly developed concepts in international law in general and international minority rights law, in particular. By examining the views of this theory’s proponents and opponents, the footprints of philosophical schools of international law, particularly the two schools of natural law and legal positivism, are seen behind the arguments made by the proponents and opponents. Proponents of this theory can be classified as the adherents of the natural law school and its fundamental principles. Its opponents are considered to be followers of the legal positivism school. Opening the door for entrance and influence of moral values and principles to international law, the adherents of natural law theory regard RST as a last resort for saving the oppressed against an oppressive state and deem it permissible and legitimate. The legal positivism school’s followers, emphasizing the will and interests of states, reject this theory in the framework of positive law and contemporary international law, which is generally and mainly based on the state's consent. Employing a descriptive-analytical method and relying on the related books and articles, this study aimed to assess the RST in the light of natural law and legal positivism schools.

The conflicts between minority groups and the central government are considered to be one of the current threats to international peace and security. Employing the descriptive-analytical method and studying three cases of Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Nagorno-Karabakh and Kosovo, this paper seeks to analyze the performance of UN in settling the identity-based territorial conflicts. The authors believe that the reason behind the failure of UN in settlement of Cyprus and Karabakh crises is that the Security Council has always supported the rights of Cyprus and Azerbaijan to maintain their territorial integrity without mentioning the possibility of the realization of right to remedial secession. In fact, the Council has always given an unconditional guarantee to central governments and thereby has lost its pressure tool on these states to grant appropriate privileges to secessionist groups in order to persuade them to abandon their secessionist demands. On the contrary, through implicit recognition of remedial secession as the last resort and after the deadlock of negotiations, this organization has had a relatively successful performance in Kosovo problem and impeded the continuation of an endless crisis. It appears that the report-card of this Organization in this regard is neither black nor white; it is grey and this leaves us in a world of fears and hopes.

The right to self-determination could be applied in situations aiming to prevent crimes against humanity that are subject to the responsibility to protect. Generally, governments that violate the right to self-determination of their people, including minority groups, are more prone to committing these heinous crimes. The doctrine of the responsibility to protect seeks to establish a responsible government toward its citizens; The protection aspect of the doctrine has been discussed in this research, which does not necessarily include intervention. Adhering to human rights standards and exercising the right to self-determination in the framework of the responsibility to protect is a foundation to prevent situations that can lead to atrocities and widespread violations of human rights. Thus, this can be considered as the link between the right to self-determination and the responsibility to protect. Literature Review The right to self-determination of people has been an important subject of much legal research as a fundamental principle of international law. On the other hand, the responsibility to protect is also among the attractive topics of international law as a new doctrine. The two notions have been separately discussed by researchers such as Antonio Cassese, Jörg Fisch, Yasmine Nahlawi, and Stacey Henderson. It can be claimed that the subject of this article which is an updated version of the corresponding author’s master’s thesis, is an innovative topic in the international law literature and has not been explored before.

Firstly, a descriptive research method has been used for this research i.e., the characteristics and aspects of the right to self-determination and the responsibility to protect have been discussed separately. Secondly, based on the legal research method, the governments’ experiences in different situations have been observed to reach the final research result regarding the commonalities of these two notions. 

From the international law’s point of view, the internal aspect of the right to self-determination is an erga omnes rule, and its external dimension has been accepted as a jus cogens rule.However, it should be noted that a separatist interpretation of the right to self-determination has no place in the current system of international law. International legal doctrines, governments’ stances, and international documents always emphasize on the importance and priority of the principle of territorial integrity. Further, international peace and security requires that separatist interpretations not be supported.

Today, respecting human rights and, most importantly, the right to self-determination is a global matter and the international community should contribute to its realization. The right to self-determination can be realized indirectly under the doctrine of responsibility to protect. In other words, the right to self-determination can be applied as a means of preventing the occurrence of crimes that are subject to the responsibility to protect doctrine, and in this regard, the international community can assist and take measures and put them on its agenda to ensure the exercise of this right.The responsibility to protect emphasizes the primary responsibility of governments and the international community to assist other countries in carrying out their sovereign duties and only refers to the element of intervention at the last stage. the international community should come to the understanding that non-interventionist measures and international aid to the governments have a fundamental role and importance in supporting people and strengthening them and are to the benefit of international peace and security. The application of the responsibility to protect in Libya and the remedial secession in Kosovo showed how ineffective and destructive under-developed legal theories can be in practice.On the other hand, the doctrine of responsibility to protect suffers from a lack of clear criteria for intervention which is a problem that the international community should take steps to resolve. In many cases, powerful countries, especially the permanent members of the Security Council, apply double standards towards human rights issues. So, in order to prevent similar tragedies and protect the citizens, the international community should set clear and thorough standards regarding human rights issues and make them binding. However, it should be noted that the concept of cultural diversity should be taken into account In the process of formulating standards because, in issues related to human rights, no fixed standard that could be applied to all.

This article analyzes the crisis of secession in the Catalan region of Spsin in terms of  the right to self-determination in international law. The focus of this paper is on the application of this rule to non-colonial situations. While applying the right to self-determination in colonial situation is well-established and the people of these lands can create their own government under this rule, serious doubts have been raised about the right of self-determination outside the colonial situations. There is no consensus about the right to remedial secession under international law. This article tries to examine the customary law and the most important international instruments dealing with the right to self-determination, in particular the right of Catalan ethnic minority in Spain to form a new state. It is concluded that the Catalan authorities’ reliance on this right for declaring independence faces serious legal difficulties.

This paper examines the legitimacy of the unilateral separation of the Crimea from Ukraine in accordance with public international law, with respect to the right to self-determination and the right to remadial secession. It is examined in detail that, beyond decolonization, the right to self-determination does not include a general right to external self-determination. In non-colonial situations, there are two theories of unilateral secession and remedial secession. By examining the Crimea case in the light of each the cases, we conclude that unilateral secession is generally permitted under international law, but the unilateral secession of Crimea from Ukraine is an exception and prohibited under international law. Because it is the result os Russian military intervention in the peninsula and a sort of widespread violation of international law. On the other hand, by examining the practices of gevernments and judicial and semi-judicial bodies, we find that remedial secession is not yet a part of customary international law and the doctrine is also cntroversial. Assuming Crimea cannot be cinsidered a viable secession due to the diversity of the peninsula population and lack of “people” and lack of evidence of human rights violations or organized discriminatory behavior by Ukrainian authorities.

Regarding legitimacy and requisite threshold which must be met to create the remedial secession, there is yet no consensus between the views of jurists and countries. Some countries are led to believe that the very existence of people should be threatened by the central government and genocide or crimes against humanity must be committed against them. But most of the countries and jurists including the authors  who are inspired by safeguarding clause included in the Declaration of Friendly Relations consider systematic denial in people`s participation in managing local affairs and extensive discrimination against them adequate for making the right to secession. By all means, unilateral secession should be considered as a last remedy and resort and there should be no alternative for maintaining territorial integrity. In this article, legitimacy and required threshold for achieving remedial secession will be discussed.

The right to self-determination is one of the fundamental and most crucial principals ofinternational law. Such cruciality is emerged from violating territorial integrity of countries. There will be no controversy over territorial integrity while colonies apply their right to self- determination; but recently after separation of Abkhazia and Ossetia from Georgia, Kosovo from Serbia, initiating the separation process by Kurds and Catalonians in Iraq and Spain, a controversy has arisen over territorial integrity denial in situations of serious human rights breach. Theory of remedial secession not only states such questions but also believe in supremacy of human rights over territorial integrity in humans rights breach situations. Studying on this theory constructions, indicates that there are some conflict between this theory and principal of interpretation of treaties under articles 31 and 32 of 1969 Vienna treaty. At the same time such theory goes beyond the existing rules and principals of responsibility of states and has criminal nature unlike the principals of responsibility of states which have remedial nature.

There is no on uniform and consistent practice in the international community on the secession of Crimea from Ukraine and it`s integration into Russia. Although the number of dissenting countries are greater and the state attitudes are contradictory in comparison to former positions. The western states and the U. S. A are of the opinion that – in their written statements in Accordance with the international law of the unilateral declaration of independence in respect of Kosovo case- the scope of the principle of territorial integrity is confined to the sphere of relations between the states. Therefore non-state groups have no obligation to respect this rule. Russia، on the other hand، is of the opinion that one of the essential elements of the principle of territorial integrity is to provide guarantee against dismemberment of the state`s territory. In the opinion of Russia، unilateral secession is allowed only on the Remedial Secession Theory. Russia is of the view that there must be certain condition، such as outright armed attack by the parent state، threatening the very existences of the people in question، and all efforts should be taken to consideration in order to settle the tension between the parent state and the ethnic community concerned whiting the framework of exciting states. This situation dose not exist in Crimea in the time of holding referendum. Different positions of states in this case including the debated in the General Assembly have shown that there is still contradictory state practice. Therefore، it seems that there is no well-established rule in this matter in the international law.

The overwhelming view concerning the unilateral secession under contemporary international law is that، in international law، there is no rule in regard to secession. some international lawyers concentrate upon the principle of respect to territorial integrity of independence and sovereign states and maintain that unilateral secession is unlawful. Meanwhile a moderate and relatively new approach has been proposed by some international lawyers so called “Remedial Secession Doctrine” that according to it، although international law supports territorial integrity of independence and sovereign states in international community، in special circumstances، a state cannot rely on its territorial integrity. The principle of Self-Determination of peoples prevails over Territorial Integrity and so، secession of a part of territory of a state by a people comprising a part of the population of the territory would be possible. Basis and foundation of such argument is relies on inverted reading of the “safeguard clause” embodied in the United Nations General Assembly resolution 2625 that repeated in 1993 Vienna declaration and program of action. this characterize the existence of the Right to Remedial Secession in National and Regional Judicial Decisions.

A relatively unprecedented approach has been proposed by some international lawyers in regard to the legitimacy of unilateral secession in International Law. According to that, in special circumstances a part of a population of an existing state has a remedial right to secession and in such circumstances; International Law does not protect the territorial integrity of a sovereign state. The basis and foundation of such argument relies on the inverted reading of the “Safeguard Clause” embodied in the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2625 and 1993 Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action. The status of remedial right to secession in Customary International Law could be observed as one of the important sources of International Law. According to considerable supports for the remedial right to secession in doctrine, this article is to determine whether under contemporary International law, remedial right to secession is being promoted as a Rule of Customary International Law or not.

Different statements by several states in Kosovo Case show that there are at least three approaches regarding the right of self-determination in the cases outside the colonialism. Some of the States (especially Asian and African) believe that outside the special context of colonial self-determination, there is no right of unilateral independence for ethnic groups, then in accordance with the principle of sovereignty and territorial integrity, any unilateral  independence is condemned. On the other side, some countries (specially the United States) believe that there exist not any serious condemnation for unilateral independence in contemporary international law unless at the time of independence by unlawful use of force. The last group of States, having faith on the illegitimacy of unilateral independence, does not reject the possibility of unilateral independence under the theory of remedial secession in a situation of the gross violation of rights and apparent use of force by central government. While the first group did not recognize the independence of Kosovo as a lawful act and the latter did, there was a sharp break among the idea of the members of the third group, which will be discussed in detail.