Dismantling the
Tools ofreport
Oppression
INTERPOL
2018
framework to the same degree as refugee
status determinations, both are sovereign
decisions that give effect to legal obligations
under international law. For example,
extradition refusals made on non-refoulement
grounds, or due to the use of torture
evidence apply well-established principles
of international law. There is no obvious
reason why INTERPOL should give more
weight to one type of sovereign decision
over another.
regarding the prohibition of torture.133
We believe that it would be helpful for
INTERPOL to develop and publish clear
principles on how it will address such
matters and the evidence which it will
take into account.
135. In the recently published decisions of the
CCF (discussed in more detail below), we
find indications of where the CCF, at least,
considers the limits of INTERPOL’s human
Repository of practice on article 2
of the constitution
a. rights obligations to lie. These can be
summarised as follows:
133. In the Rules on the Processing of Data,
an amendment brought into force following
the 83rd General Assembly in 2014 requires
INTERPOL to prepare a repository of practice
on Article 2 of the Constitution. Given the
distinct lack of clarity on how INTERPOL
approaches its constitutional commitment,
this was a welcome development.
We understand, however, that more than
4 years later the process of developing
the Repository is still underway.
In Decision Excerpt No. 2, we see that
the Commission will examine the risks
of human rights violations on a
case-by-case basis, and that it does not
perceive its role to be “to assess a
country’s law enforcement or judicial
system”. The implication is that, in order
to be successful, human rights arguments
in favour of deletion of an INTERPOL
alert will need to be specific to the case
in question and not generic statements
b. about the human rights record of the
country in question.
134. INTERPOL has, nonetheless, met twice with
the UN Committee against Torture with a view
to seeking its input on how it should interpret
its obligations in relation to the prohibition
of torture and to identifying ways in which
the UN Committee against Torture can
contribute to INTERPOL’s decision-making.132
We acknowledge that INTERPOL faces
challenges in finding the right balance
between its primary role of facilitating
international police cooperation and the
need to do so without undermining human
rights. We have been informed by INTERPOL
that internationally recognised human
rights standards regarding the prohibition of
torture are being applied, and CCF decisions
also confirm that INTERPOL recognises
international human rights standards
Decision Excerpt No. 12 provides some
insight into how extradition refusals are
taken into consideration by the CCF.
This decision also confirms that INTERPOL
recognises freedom from torture and
cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment,
as guaranteed under Article 3 of the
European Convention of Human Rights
and Article 5 UDHR as a fundamental
right under international law. In this
case, the CCF appears to have found
that a decision made by an independent
judiciary to refuse extradition on
non-refoulement grounds provided
evidence that the data in question
violated Article 2 of the Constitution.
INTERPOL General Assembly, Resolution AGN/543/RES/7 of 1984; CCF Decision Excerpt No 2 confirms that extradition refusals will, rather than
automatically leading to deletion as Fair Trials has proposed, be recorded as an addendum to the original notice. Available at: https://www.interpol.int
/content/download/34452/452069/version/2/file/Decision%20Excerpt%20N%C2%B02.pdf
131
CCF, Decision Excerpt 2
130
61
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