16 Report of the Eminent Jurists Panel on terrorism, counter-terrorism and human rights Chapter One: Human Rights versus Security? 1. Introduction Human rights law places the dignity of the human person at the centre of its concerns. Inflicting harm on civilians is clearly a breach of the core values that human rights are designed to uphold. Yet, if one were to judge from the public debates, and the stance taken by many governments, there is a tension between upholding human rights or ensuring people’s security in the face of the terrorist threat. It is a basic tenet of this report that any implied dichotomy between securing people’s rights and people’s security is wrong. Upholding human rights is not a matter of being “soft” on terrorism. On the contrary, countering terrorism is itself a human rights objective, since States have a positive obligation to protect people under their jurisdiction against terrorist acts. This positive duty on States requires them to prevent, punish, investigate, and redress the harm caused by such acts. At the same time, States must accept that this positive duty to protect applies both to those who may be at risk from terrorism and to those who may be suspected of terrorism. The State has no authority in law to determine that some people do not qualify to have their rights respected. The simplest way of explaining the inter-relationship between human rights and security is to reflect on the genesis of the modern-day human rights framework. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (hereinafter: UDHR) was adopted and proclaimed in 1948, in the wake of the genocidal horrors of the Second World War. The nations of the world recognised that “disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind.” 11 This recognition of the depths to which depraved human beings can sink, led the world community to conclude that the only way to avoid or at least temper such horrors in the future was to commit to respecting the principle that “all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.” 12 The international consensus, reflected in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Charter of the United Nations, was that no one in the future would ever again fall outside the protection of the law. In other words, the modern framework of international law, which was set in motion by the Charter of the United Nations, was established because of, and not despite, the need for security. The Panel believes that States tamper with this framework at their peril. Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, there was an international consensus about the inter-relationship of human rights and security. In the 1960’s, 11 Preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 10 December 1948. 12 Article 1, UDHR.