Resolution 1267 Committee in the War on Terror: a Ticking Time Bomb on Human Rights

Abstract

ABSTRACT The United Nations Security Council's efforts to suppress and to halt the acts of international terrorism resulted in the adoption of resolution 1267 in 1999 pursuant to chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations. This resolution was originally worded against the Taliban administration in Afghanistan for its alleged support and involvement in the bombing of the embassies of the United States of America in Kenya and Tanzania by Osama Bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda Network. The resolution places a ‘no assets’ and a ‘no-fly’ ban on the Taliban government or any of its representatives. The third category of the sanction places arm embargo on the Taliban and the designated individuals and entities.

As a result of the rising incidence of transnational terrorism, the resolution was made applicable to private individuals who are suspected to be affiliated with Osama Bin Laden or his Al-Qaeda organization. Worthy of note also is the establishment of the Resolution 1267 Committee which was saddled with the duty, inter alia, of putting the names of the suspected individuals on a list known as ‘the Consolidated List’ and requiring states to freeze these individuals’ assets and refraining them from flying in and out of their territories.

Using the experience of Mr. Abousfian Abdelrazik as documented in the recent Canadian case of Abousfian Abdelrazik v. Minister of Foreign Affairs & Attorney General of Canada as a case study and with the aid of a discussion of some established principles of international criminal law, this thesis will place the activities of the Resolution 1267 Committee on the scale of compatibility with the well established principles of natural justice and due process under international criminal law. The thesis will determine whether the working guidelines of the resolution 1267 committee conform with the centuries of jurisprudence on natural justice, equity and good conscience. It will examine whether the United Nations or any of its organs is bound to comply with due process or natural justice principles even in the face of threat to international peace and security.