Tag Archives: European Convention of Human Rights

Migrants as a Weapons System

While the international community generally considers mass migrant population flows across nation-states a primarily humanitarian crisis, Aaron Petty argues that it is often an intentional tool of aggression used by nation-states. The weaponization of migrants is the instrumentalization of population flows through both the threat and the actual migration of people into the territory of a target state. Use of migrants as a weapons system has a long history of being employed by nation-states as an act of aggression to obtain strategic foreign policy objectives.

In this article, Petty suggests that the weaponization of migrants is likely to increase against the United States and its allies, particularly where the current geopolitical environment of strategic competition between large powers is playing out below the level of armed conflict. Petty argues that weaponization of migrants could be deemed a violation of international law relating to armed conflict, and the United States should advocate that such tactics are not legally permissible and may justify legitimate retaliation to deter such weaponization.  

10 Standards for Oversight & Transparency of National Intelligence Services

Authors Sarah Eskens, Ott van Daalen, and Nico van Eijk present a set of 10 standards for oversight and transparency for surveillance by intelligence services. The authors approach these recommendations from the viewpoint of the European Convention on Human Rights and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, and illustrate their implementation using cases from the Court of Justice of the European Union and the European Court of Human Rights.

State Responsibility to Respect, Protect, & Fulfill Human Rights Obligations in Cyberspace

In this article, Gabor Rona and Lauren Aarons explore how international human rights law applies to cyberspace. They address the substantive obligations of the state responsibility to respect, ensure, and promote human rights in cyberspace, including protecting against third party abuse and providing remedies for violations. Finally, the authors outline the limitations of and permissible restrictions on human rights obligations in cyberspace.