Universal Declaration of Human Rights 

As reflected in our Diversity & Inclusion statement, COH embraces the principles of universality of human rights that resonate within the Universal Declaration of Human Rights also reflected in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The following was excerpted from an overview developed by Christian Tomuschat, Professor emeritus at Humboldt University, Berlin, for related materials accessible via the United Nations’ Audiovisual Library of International Law which affords useful general background and perspective for purposes of understanding the general application to COH’s overarching humanitarian mission. 

The ICCPR comprises all of the traditional human rights as they are known from historic documents such as the First Ten Amendments to the Constitution of the United States (1789/1791) and the French Déclaration des droits de l’homme et du citoyen (1789). However, in perfect harmony with its sister instrument, Part I starts out with the right of self-determination which is considered to be the foundational stone of all human rights (article 1). Part II (articles 2 to 5) contains a number of general principles that apply across the board, among them in particular the prohibition on discrimination. Part III enunciates an extended list of rights, the first of which being the right to life (article 6). Article 7 establishes a ban on torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and article 8 declares slavery and forced or compulsory labour unlawful. Well-balanced guarantees of habeas corpus are set forth in article 9, and article 10 establishes the complementary proviso that all persons deprived of their liberty shall be treated with humanity. 

Freedom of movement, including the freedom to leave any country, has found its regulation in article 12. Aliens, who do not enjoy a stable right of sojourn, must as a minimum be granted due process in case their expulsion is envisaged (article 13). Fair trial, the scope ratione materiae of which is confined to criminal prosecution and to civil suits at law, has its seat in articles 14 and 15. Privacy, the family, the home or the correspondence of a person are placed under the protection of article 17, and the social activities of human beings enjoy the safeguards of article 18 (freedom of thought, conscience and religion), article 19 (freedom of expression), article 21 (freedom of assembly), and article 22 (freedom of association). Going beyond the classic dimension of protection against interference by State authorities, articles 23 and 24 proclaim that the family and the child are entitled to protection by society and the State.

Article 25 establishes the right for everyone to take part in the running of the public affairs of his/her country. With this provision, the ICCPR makes clear that State authorities require some sort of democratic legitimacy. Finally, article 27 recognizes an individual right of members of ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities to engage in the cultural activities characteristic of such minorities. No political rights are provided for. Minorities as such have not been endowed with any rights of political autonomy.

Article 26 establishes a clause on equality and non-discrimination which seemingly stands in contrast to article 2, paragraph 3, the introductory non-discrimination clause, which is ancillary in nature, being applicable only in conjunction with one of the other substantive rights. The Human Rights Committee, the organ entrusted with monitoring compliance by States with their obligations under the ICCPR, has interpreted article 26 as setting forth a general ban on discrimination, without any regard for the field of life concerned. To date, this extension of the scope ratione materiae of article 26 remains contested.

The Human Rights Committee is the principal actor at the international level mandated to enforce the rights enunciated in the ICCPR. The instruments put at its disposal for that purpose are of limited scope, however. States are required to submit at regular intervals reports which are carefully scrutinized; at the end of that process, the Committee summarizes its assessment of the prevailing human rights situation by noting in particular its concerns in open and straightforward language without any diplomatic inhibitions. Such concluding observations are not legally binding. Similarly, the final views which the Committee delivers after having examined an individual communication under the [First] Optional Protocol to the ICCPR lack any binding legal force. Of course, States are expected to live up in good faith to the views addressed to them by the Committee. If they just shoved away such recommendations, the whole procedure would make no sense. In addition, by formulating “general comments”, the Committee has opened up a new window of activity. Through such “general comments”, it explains the scope and meaning of the provisions of the ICCPR and clarifies general issues as they arise in the process of implementation.

It is at the national level that the ICCPR has exerted its greatest impact. When today anywhere in the world a national constitution is framed, the ICCPR serves as the natural yardstick for the drafting of a section on fundamental rights. In most countries, the ICCPR has been made part and parcel of the national legal order although there is no general rule of international law that would enjoin States to embrace a specific method of implementation. Thus, the United States has made a declaration according to which the ICCPR is not self-executing within its domestic legal system. In some countries, administrative authorities and the courts are specifically enjoined to follow the applicable international guarantees when interpreting the national constitution (e.g., article 10, paragraph 2 of the Spanish Constitution). In other countries, the ICCPR has even been given the legal force of a provision of constitutional or quasi-constitutional rank (e.g., article 15, paragraph 4, of the Constitution of the Russian Federation). These legal techniques are not automatically successful, since, as a rule, national judges are not very familiar with the guarantees laid down in international human rights instruments and are more often than not reluctant to accord them precedence over the applicable national laws and regulations.