International Human Rights Trump National Sovereignty

Lung-chu Chen

Recently, the well-known Institute of International and Strategic Studies in London released its annual report, emphasizing that in view of the evolution of international law and the new world order, international human rights are taking precedence over national sovereignty. Using NATO’s massive humanitarian intervention in Kosvos, U.N. intervention in the East Timor crisis, and the lawsuit involving Pinochet’s extradition as illustrations, the report spotlights international law’s trends toward humanization and human rights. A dictator who engages in crimes of torture, genocide, or “ethnic cleansing” cannot invoke “national sovereignty” to avoid criminal responsibility.

In the world community of ever increasing interdependence, transnational interaction never ceases. International law is more than a body of static rules, it is a continuing process of authoritative decision by which members of the world community clarify, identify, and secure their common interests. These common interests are twofold: 1. Maintain minimum world order, keep international peace and security; 2. Promote optimum world order, foster human rights, political, economic, social, and cultural developments, and the shaping and sharing of all values.

In the past, international law, treating the State as the only subject, was obsessed with national sovereignty. Today, international law is becoming more people-centered, and human rights become mainstream values. Human rights and peace are indivisible. As dramatized by the Holocaust, large scale human rights deprivations, if unchecked, would not only devastate individuals and groups, but also threaten international peace and security. Thus, the U.N. Charter has made protection of human rights a major goal, and has imposed obligations on member states to protect human rights. The Security Council established special International Criminal Tribunals to deal with genocide and crimes against humanity in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda. In the near future, a permanent International Criminal Court is expected to come into being, to deal with this type of international crimes. National leaders or high governmental officials who commit such crimes cannot escape criminal responsibility by invoking “national sovereignty” as a pretext. Governmental officials will be held accountable; this is a paramount command of contemporary international law.