Abstract
The creation of States through secession, that is, regarding a separation not consented to by the parent State, has a very varied practice, especially depending on whether or not they are finally successful, but it allows the establishment of differentiating characteristics. The instruments adopted in the UN on the right of self-determination of peoples are aimed at a class of peoples: the colonies. Other peoples, such as national minorities, have a legal regime in current International Law that protects their rights to differentiation and non-discrimination, but does not recognize their external self-determination. However, as a consequence of the “safeguard clause” contained in UNGA Resolution 2615 of 1970, a doctrine of remedial-secession is being developed, which promotes the right of secession in the event of a serious violation of human rights. So far without recognition in international norms, neither in the conventional nor customary sense.
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Notes
- 1.
Castellino (2008), p. 513.
- 2.
- 3.
When it has this purpose, Heraclides (1991), p. 1, calls it secession stricto sensu.
- 4.
On this example of secession and integration see Bermejo García (2015).
- 5.
Crawford (2006), p. 375.
- 6.
In the case Chigarov and others v. Armenia (Application No. 13216/05), with a judgment of June 16, 2015, after stating the facts (para. 58 et seq.) and after analysing Armenia’s military, economic and political support to the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh (para. 69 et seq.), the Court concludes that
186. All of the above reveals that Armenia, from the early days of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, has had a significant and decisive influence over the “NKR”, that the two entities are highly integrated in virtually all important matters and that this situation persists to this day.
- 7.
Among others, Martínez Jiménez (2015), p. 251.
- 8.
- 9.
Some of these territories have the status of colonial enclaves, which since they have their historical origin in the subtraction of a part of the territory of a State, have certain specialities derived from the need to preserve the territorial integrity of the State from which they were separated, as prescribed in General Assembly resolution 2353 (XXII) of 1967 concerning Gibraltar.
- 10.
Similarly, the 1977 Report of the Special Rapporteur of the United Nations Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, Francesco Capotorti (Study on the rights of ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities, E/CN.4/Sub.2/384, Rev.1, para. 568). A full report on the definitions provided in United Nations texts is available at: https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Minorities/SR/A74160_Definitions_Descriptions.docx. On the issue of the definition of minority, see Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Question of Minorities of July 15, 2019, UN Doc. 59 of this report proposes the following definition for study: “An ethnic, religious or linguistic minority is any group of persons constituting less than half of the population of the whole territory of a State and whose members share common features of culture, religion or language, or a combination thereof. A person may freely belong to an ethnic, religious or linguistic minority without any requirement of citizenship, residence, official recognition or any other circumstance. It differs mainly from the one used at European level in that it intentionally removes the temporary link of residence or nationality.
- 11.
For example, Hungary’s Act No. LXXVII on the Rights of National and Ethnic Minorities of 7 July 1993 requires “at least one century of life in the Republic of Hungary”. In the Polish Act on National and Ethnic Minorities and National Languages of January 6, 2005, it is required that they identify themselves “with a community having its own State” (Article 2.1.f).
- 12.
IPCJ, Upper Silesian Minority Rights Case, Judgment of April 26, 1928, Series A, No. 15, pp. 46–47.
- 13.
Capotorti Report 1979, page 35, and UN Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/1986/7, Add. 4, page 30.
- 14.
In the preparatory works one can read: “The principle conformed to the purposes of the Charter only insofar as it implied the right of self-government of peoples and not the right to secession”, UNCIO, 1945, vol. 6, page 296. For some authors, such as Russell, only the internal dimension of self-determination was actually proclaimed in article 1.2, with the regulation of Chapters XI to XIII being only a regime either voluntary for colonial empires or imposed on defeated countries, but not a universal right. See Russell (1958), p. 811.
- 15.
Anderson (2016), p. 1207.
- 16.
In the terms used in different international texts of the time, for example in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 which ends its preamble with the expression “both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.”
- 17.
Article 2, paragraph 2: “Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.”
- 18.
Intervention of the Representative of the United Kingdom of July 2, 1955, of Australia of July 20. 1955 and of the Netherlands of August 29, 1955, UN Doc., A/2910/Add.1, Annexes, 5, 11 and 14. On the preparatory work and art. 1 of the ICCPR, see Palmisano (1997), pp. 107–145.
- 19.
Cassese (1995), p. 49.
- 20.
UN Doc. A/C.3/SR.676 (1955).
- 21.
In the same vein Bossuyt (1987), pp. 32–37.
- 22.
- 23.
- 24.
See, on the relationship with ancestral land, Final report of the Special Rapporteur, Ms. Erica-Irene Daes, E/CN.4/Sub.2/2001/21, and on natural resources, Final report of the Special Rapporteur, Ms. Daes, E/CN.4/Sub.2/2004/3.
- 25.
Cassese (1995), pp. 51–61.
- 26.
Hannum (1993), p. 25.
- 27.
CCPR/C/69/D/760/1996, Communication No 760/1997 of July 25, 2000.
- 28.
CCPR/C/21/rev.1/Add.5, para. 5.3. Previously, General Comment no. 12, from 1984, which dealt with “the right of self-determination (article 1)”, offers few express references, although it refers generally to the right of internal self-determination, the economic rights of peoples and the obligations with the autonomous territories and in escrow.
- 29.
UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, ‘General Recommendation XXI on self-determination’ (1996), UN Doc A/51/18, Annex VIII, para. 6.
- 30.
In five points it refers to national minorities: adjustment of Italian borders (point 9), peoples of Austria-Hungary (10), Balkan States (11), non-Turkish nationalities of the Ottoman Empire (12) and Poland as an independent State (13).
- 31.
Mentioned by Musgrave (2000), p. 24.
- 32.
On the principle of nationalities, see among the authors who studied it in the inter-war period, Redslob (1931), pp. 1–82.
- 33.
Lara Martínez (2005), p. 18 ff.
- 34.
Musgrave (2000), p. 30.
- 35.
Report of the International Commission of Jurists (1920), LNOJ Spec. Supp. 3, p. 5 y The Aaland Islands Question: Report Submitted to the Council of the League of Nations by the Commission of Rapporteurs (1921), League Doc. B7.21/68/106.
- 36.
Report of the International Committee of Jurists, Advisory Opinion upon de Legal Aspects of the Aaland Islands Que Upper Silesian Minority Rights Case, 1928, PCIJ Reports, Series A, No. 15, p. 4. Question, League of Nations, O.J. Spec. Supp. 3, 5, 1920.
- 37.
PCIJ, Upper Silesian Minority Rights Case, 1928, Reports, Series A, No. 15, p. 4.
- 38.
See on this debate López Martín and Perea Unceta, JA (2018), pp. 148–151, and in general on the international regime for indigenous peoples, among others, Torrecuadrada (2001).
- 39.
Along the same lines, the Lund Recommendations of September 1, 1999.
- 40.
AG/RES. 2888, XLVI-O/16.
- 41.
On the failure to consider the right of self-determination with respect to indigenous claims, see, inter alia, Report No. 89/13, Admissibility of Petition 879-07, Loni Edmonds and Sons v. Canada, November 4, 2013, para. 34.
- 42.
- 43.
- 44.
- 45.
Theodorakis (1999).
- 46.
- 47.
Martínez Jiménez (2015), p. 191.
- 48.
Renvoi relatif à la sécession du Québec, Jugements de la Cour Suprême de Canada, vol. 2, 1998, pages 217–297.
- 49.
Constitutional Court, Sentence 114/2017, of October 17, 2017, in the appeal of unconstitutionality 4334–2017, against the Law of the Parliament of Catalonia 19/2017, of September 6, called “of the self-determination referendum”.
- 50.
- 51.
Cited above.
- 52.
- 53.
A/CONF.157/23, June 25, 1993, paragraph 2.
- 54.
Of the same consideration is Judge Pinto de Albuquerque (para. 41 and 50), who in his dissenting opinion in this case adds as an argument the independence of Timor Leste (para. 39), which in our consideration is a characteristic example of decolonization.
- 55.
Arangio-Ruiz (1972), pp. 561–572.
- 56.
Positions of the United States and the United Kingdom, in UN Doc. A/AC.125/ Mr.92, pp. 21 and 141–143.
- 57.
Palmisano (1997), pp. 212–213.
- 58.
Kenya’s intervention. UN Doc./A/AC.125/Mr.69, p. 21.
- 59.
Koskenniemi (1994), p. 249.
- 60.
Cassese (1995), pp. 117–118.
- 61.
López Martín and Perea Unceta (2018), pp. 165–166.
- 62.
Castellino (2014), pp. 27–44.
- 63.
Hannum (1993), p. 2, maintains that the clause contained in Resolution 2625 was made as a measure of pressure against apartheid.
- 64.
White (1981), p. 160 ff.
- 65.
- 66.
Among others, Rosenstock (1971), p. 715; Kamenu (1974), p. 361; Nayar (1975), p. 343; Suzuki (1976), p. 807; Carey (1977), p. 56; Buchheit (1978), p. 72, 94 and 222; Nanda (1981), pp. 275–278; Franck (1993), pp. 13–14; Tomuschat (2006), p. 7; Theodorakis (1999); Crawford (2006), p. 19; Dugard and Raic (2006); Ryngaert and Griffioen (2009); Soroeta Liceras (2013), p. 21; Martínez Jiménez (2015); Anderson (2016), pp. 1253–1254; Umozurike (1972), p. 199; Tancredi (2001), p. 689; Sornarajah (1981), p. 49; Roch (2002), pp. 33–100; Pomerance (1982), p. 39; Pons Rafols (2015), p. 149, 215 and 308; Pavkovic and Radan (2007), pp. 232–239; Özden and Golay (2010); Murswiek (1993), p. 26–27; Mariño Menéndez (1996), pp. 89–90; McCorquodale (1994), p. 857 ff.; Díaz Barrado (1999), pp. 139–140; Gjidara (1991), p. 365 ff.; Islam (1991), pp. 456–460; Kohen (2002), p. 494; Kooijmans (1996), p. 212 ff.; Buchanan (1991); and Christakis (1999), p. 192.
- 67.
Rousseau (1976), pp. 56–57; Guilhaudis (1976), p. 180; Seara Vázquez (1991), p. 90; Ruiz Fabri (1992), pp. 153–178; Eastwood (1992), p. 299 ff.; Andrés Sáenz de Santamaría (1997), p. 160 ff.; Eudes (2006), pp. 631–646; Carrillo Salcedo (2012), pp. 20–22; Xanthaki (2007); Vidmar (2015), p. 370; López Martín (2018), pp. 75–122; and Fernández de Casadevante Romani (2018). Also Critescu A (1981), El derecho a la libre determinación. desarrollo histórico y actual sobre la base de los instrumentos de las Naciones Unidas. UN Doc. E/CN.4/sub.2/404/rev.1, p. 36.
- 68.
Critescu (1981), p. 39.
- 69.
Shaw (1997), pp. 478–507.
- 70.
Gutiérrez Espada and Bermejo García (2014), pp. 93–94.
- 71.
See Perea Unceta (2011), pp. 101–118.
- 72.
Written statement of Poland of April 14, 2009, para. 6.5.
- 73.
Vashakmadze and Lippold (2010), pp. 646–647.
- 74.
Falk (2011), pp. 57–58.
- 75.
- 76.
Roben (2010), p. 1071.
- 77.
- 78.
Van Den Driest (2013), p. 314.
- 79.
Oeter (2012), p. 63.
- 80.
Van Den Driest (2013), pp. 310–311.
- 81.
Roben (2010), p. 1075 and 1078.
- 82.
Written submission from the Republic of Cyprus, dated April 3, 2009, para. 143.
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Acknowledgement
Study carried out as a part of the Research Project DER2016-76312: Legal consequences of the secession of territorial entities from a State, with particular reference to the human rights implications. Lessons for Spain, financed by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, as part of the National Plan for Scientific and Technical Research and Innovation 2013–2016.
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Perea Unceta, J.A. (2022). The Absence of Any Basis for Secession in the Right of Self-Determination of Peoples and in the Serious Violations of Human Rights. In: Fernández de Casadevante Romani, C. (eds) Legal Implications of Territorial Secession in Spain . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04609-4_1
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