I. Aims and Scope of the 2016 Minnesota Protocol   I. Aims and Scope of the 2016 Minnesota Protocol 1. 2. The Minnesota Protocol aims to protect the right to life and advance justice, accountability and the right to a remedy, by promoting the effective investigation of potentially unlawful death or suspected enforced disappearance. The Protocol sets a common standard of performance in investigating potentially unlawful death or suspected enforced disappearance and a shared set of principles and guidelines for States, as well as for institutions and individuals who play a role in the investigation. The Minnesota Protocol applies to the investigation of all “potentially unlawful death” and, mutatis mutandis, suspected enforced disappearance. For the purpose of the Protocol, this primarily includes situations where: (a) The death may have been caused by acts or omissions of the State, its organs or agents, or may otherwise be attributable to the State, in violation of its duty to respect the right to life.1 This includes, for example, all deaths possibly caused by law enforcement personnel or other agents of the state; deaths caused by paramilitary groups, militias or “death squads” suspected of acting under the direction or with the permission or acquiescence of the State; and deaths caused by private military or security forces exercising State functions.2 (b) The death occurred when a person was detained by, or was in the custody of, the State, its organs, or agents. This includes, for example, all deaths of persons detained in prisons, in other places of detention (official and otherwise) and in other facilities where the State exercises heightened control over their life.3 (c) The death occurred where the State may have failed to meet its obligations to protect life. This includes, for example, any situation where a state fails to exercise due diligence to protect an individual or individuals from foreseeable external threats or violence by non-State actors.4 There is also a general duty on the state to investigate any suspicious death, even where it is not alleged or suspected that the state caused the death or unlawfully failed to prevent it. 1 See, e.g. Art. 6(1), 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR); Art. 6, 1980 Convention on the Rights of the Child; and Art. 1, 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide; Arts. 12 and 13, 1984 UN Convention against Torture; Art. 10, 2006 International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (ICPED); UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials, Principles 6, 22 and 23; UN Principles on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions, Principle 9; and the Body of Principles for the Protection of All Persons under Any Form of Detention or Imprisonment, Principle 34. In situations of international armed conflict, see Art. 121, 1949 Geneva Convention III (with respect to prisoners of war); and Art. 131, 1949 Geneva Convention IV (with respect to civilian internees). 2 Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions to the UN Commission on Human Rights, UN doc. E/CN.4/2005/7, 22 December 2004, paras. 70–71. 3 These include psychiatric hospitals, institutions for children and the elderly and centres for migrants, stateless people, or refugees. 4 See, e.g., Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 31 on The Nature of the General Legal Obligation Imposed on States Parties to the Covenant, UN doc. CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.13, 26 May 2004, para. 8. 1