Does it violate international law? Does the use of torture-tainted information, or sharing information which leads to torture, violate international law? As State actors, intelligence, security and police staff should uphold applicable international law, both through the application of relevant treaties and customary international law. This necessarily places clear limits on the actions of all executive actors and requires positive action should breaches of human rights be threatened or occur. Jurisdictional questions have often been presented as a barrier to the extraterritoriality of human rights obligations, particularly in circumstances where State agents are not clearly in situations of control. Yet even with some questions remaining over the extraterritoriality of human rights obligations, this should not obscure the relevance for all State actors to comply with human rights obligations, wherever they may be. As observed by the Human Rights Committee, “it would be unconscionable to so interpret [obligations under the Covenant] as to permit a State party to perpetrate violations of the Covenant on the territory of another State, which violations it could not perpetrate on its own territory.”21 Similarly, the International Court of Justice considered that the rights enshrined in the Covenant extend “to acts done by a State in the exercise of its jurisdiction outside its own territory.”22 Several relevant obligations may be derived from the absolute prohibition against torture. Nevertheless, it should be noted that the boundaries of emerging areas of law remain uncertain, and conclusions drawn in such areas should not be understood as universally recognised or settled principles of international law. 21 22 CCPR, Sergio Euben Lopez Burgos v. Uruguay, Communication No. R.12/52, U.N. Doc. Supp. No. 40 (A/36/40) at 176 (1981). Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Advisory Opinion of 9 July 2004, I.C.J. Reports 2004, paras. 111 and 113. 21

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