THE ELUSIVE RIGHT TO TRUTH IN TRANSITIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS JURISPRUDENCE

This article undertakes a comparative legal analysis of the scope of an emerging legal duty to find the truth about historical human rights abuses after periods of political transition. There is substantial inconsistency between human rights regimes on how they establish temporal jurisdiction in the...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The International and comparative law quarterly 2018-04, Vol.67 (2), p.353-387
Main Author: Sweeney, James A
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Charters
Courts
Enforcement
European Court of Human Rights
HUMAN RIGHTS
Human rights violations
HUMANITARIAN LAW
Inconsistency
Inter-American Court of Human Rights
International courts
INTERNATIONAL LAW
Jurisdiction
JURISPRUDENCE
Legal responsibility
Political change
Political transition
Principles
RECONCILIATION
Transitional justice
Treaties
Truth
United Nations. Human Rights Committee
Values
War crimes
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Summary:This article undertakes a comparative legal analysis of the scope of an emerging legal duty to find the truth about historical human rights abuses after periods of political transition. There is substantial inconsistency between human rights regimes on how they establish temporal jurisdiction in their transitional jurisprudence, which has not yet been systematically investigated. This contribution fills the gap in the literature by identifying and critiquing the way in which the right to truth in times of transition is both expressly and implicitly vindicated in the decisions of the Human Rights Committee, and the regional jurisprudence of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and European Court of Human Rights (the conclusion also addresses the less voluminous African regional jurisprudence). It is argued that the ‘underlying values’ of human rights treaties can provide a foundation for a powerful but finite right to truth.
ISSN:0020-5893
1471-6895
DOI:10.1017/S0020589317000586