In the face of terrorism, human rights law’s requirement that states “respect and ensure” rights necessitates that states take active steps to safeguard their populations from violent attack, but in so doing do not violate rights. Security experts usually emphasize the aspect of ensuring rights while human rights advocates largely focus on respecting rights. The trick, which neither side in the debate has adequately referenced, is that states have to do both at the same time. Hence, both our contemporary human rights and security discourses on terrorism need to be broadened and renewed. This renewal should be informed by the understanding that international human rights law protects the individual both from terrorism and the excesses of counterterrorism, like torture.

To develop this thesis, my article Terror/Torture, Journal of International Law 1 (2008) [1], the article aims to spark the development of a new human rights approach to terrorism by suggesting new discourses around the paradigm of terror/torture.

The seventh anniversary of the atrocities of September 11, 2001 [see below], is perhaps an appropriate time to stress that, in addition to continuing their work to criticize state practices in the context of the “war on terror,” international human rights lawyers need to develop an analysis of and specific response to the phenomenon of Muslim fundamentalism and affiliated transnational jihadist movements. The response to Muslim fundamentalism needs to be developed in the context of assessing other fundamentalisms – Christian, Jewish, Hindu – as well. (For an example, see the website of Women Living Under Muslim Laws/Femmes sous les lois musulmanes [2].)

Moreover, any such analysis and response need to be free from discrimination against Muslims – but not by pretending that the particular and grave challenge to international law from these fundamentalist and jihadist movements does not exist. Their primary victims, as the U.S. National Strategy for Combating Terrorism acknowledges, are other Muslims and people of Muslim heritage or those who live in the Muslim world [3]. However, as that Strategy fails to acknowledge – but as Robert Dreyfuss explains in his 2005 book, Devil’s Game – Western policies in the region have historically contributed to the rise of these movements. The social project of these movements also poses a particular threat to women’s human rights, as is evident from even a cursory glance at the website entitled Secularism is a Women’s Issue [4].

Today’s somber anniversary is a good time to remember the importance of human rights support for those in the Muslim world and Diaspora Muslim populations who have exposed and opposed Muslim fundamentalist terrorism and whose human rights have been imperiled as a result. One example is Cherifa Kheddar [5], the president of Djazairouna [6], an association of Algerian victims of Islamist terrorism. Kheddar’s brother and sister were both murdered by Algeria’s fundamentalist armed groups during the terrible 1990s. Since then, she has worked tirelessly in one of the most dangerous parts of the country to support victims of terrorism – and to demand justice for them. In addition to enduring the ongoing threat posed by the resurgent terrorism of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which seeks to rekindle the horrors of the 1990s in Algeria, Kheddar has also been penalized by the Algerian government for her opposition to an amnesty that was given to both non-state and government perpetrators. As is detailed here and here, she was demoted in her government job, and may lose her government housing (a very difficult sanction in Algeria’s impossible housing situation).

Another imperiled and important opponent of jihadist terrorism is the Algerian journalist Mohamed Sifaoui [7], who is known for his infiltration of Al Qaeda in Europe, which produced a celebrated exposé. Sifaoui is also an outspoken advocate of women’s rights. He was reportedly attacked by two men with links to Algerian armed groups on the streets of Paris in June. A civil society campaign currently seeks to have his French police protection reinstated. [8]

The real struggle against terrorism – as opposed to the “war on terror” which has so challenged international law – is a human rights struggle carried out in part by people like these with their voices and pens and organizing efforts. The only way such efforts can succeed is with sustained and thoughtful support from human rights advocates. Counterterrorist policies that violate international law clearly undermine the endeavors of people like Sifaoui and Kheddar. But a human rights response that focuses solely on the impact of counterterrorism, and not of terrorism itself, hinders their work as well. Instead, international lawyers need to develop what Gita Sahgal has called a “human rights account” of terrorism. Perhaps that could be our best contribution to commemorating the terrible events of September 11, 2001.

Karima Bennoune

Terror/Torture

Karima Bennoune
Rutgers School of Law - Newark

Berkeley Journal of International Law (BJIL), Vol. 26, No. 1, pp. 1-61, 2008
Rutgers School of Law-Newark Research Papers No. 032

Abstract:
In the face of terrorism, human rights law’s requirement that states “respect and ensure” rights necessitates that states take active steps to safeguard their populations from violent attack, but in so doing do not violate rights. Security experts usually emphasize the aspect of ensuring rights while human rights advocates largely focus on respecting rights. The trick, which neither side in the debate has adequately referenced, is that states have to do both at the same time. In contrast to these largely one-sided approaches, adopting a radical universalist stance, this Article argues that both contemporary human rights and security discourses on terrorism must be broadened and renewed. This renewal must be informed by the understanding that international human rights law protects the individual both from terrorism and the excesses of counter-terrorism, like torture. To develop this thesis, the Article explores the philosophical overlap between both terrorism and torture and their normative prohibitions. By postulating new discourses around the paradigm of terror/torture, it begins the project of creating a new human rights approach to terrorism.

Accepted Paper Series
Date posted: June 21, 2008 - Last revised: March 18, 2009

* http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1148284

On September 11, ...

... 1857 (150 years ago today), more than 100 children, women, and men, emigrants in a wagon train headed from Arkansas to California, were killed when they made camp in Utah. As the Archeological Institute of America writes of this Mountain Meadows Massacre, “Who attacked the group is an ongoing debate, but historical accounts tell of a combined force of local Mormon militia and Paiute Indians. Executed in 1877, Mormon Bishop John D. Lee was the only person punished for the crime.” The story is told as well at this LDS site, and is the subject of a just-released film, “September Dawn.” The cairn above marks a mass grave.

... 1973, Chilean President Salvador Allende died in a coup d’état led by his military chief, Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Allende, as the BBC reported, was “the world’s first democratically-elected Marxist head of state” — a status that made him a target for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, said to have “backed” the military “uprising.”

... 2001, hijackers used U.S. civilian airliners as tools of terrorism. The World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington each were hit, killing thousands; a 3d jet crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. The September 11 attacks touched off a campaign that U.S. officials dubbed GWOT, the global war on terror. The attacks were attributed to the Al Qaeda network, whose leader, Osama bin Laden, remains at large to this day.

Posted by Diane Marie Amann

* http://intlawgrrls.blogspot.com/2007/09/on-september-11.html