SIOI director

Civil rights have been suspended in Moscow. How to protect oneself from the violence of the State.

ABSTRACT: That the individual has been allowed to act against the [native, ed.] State that has violated his rights" "is a very recent phenomenon [...] . The concept is contained in the European Convention of the Rights of Man, and today the condition for membership in the Council of Europe is the ratification of this Convention. Many powerful interests oppose this new form of safeguard of the rights of the individual and of the human being: "political mediations and inter-governmental controversies are the pillars of that 'international realism'" for which governments prefer the "medley of international politics". But it is necessary to transform "fundamental constitutional rights" into "universal human rights".

(1994 - IL QUOTIDIANO RADICALE, 5 November 1993)

International law regulates relations among governments; individuals as such are the object of the state society, not of the international community. An individual can act only in the context of the State. Human rights, which also apply to individuals, their rights and fundamental freedoms, remain the object of a new diplomatic mechanism of ascertainment, and seldom of juridical controversies among governments. Considering the history of mankind, it is a very recent phenomenon that the individual has been admitted to act against the State that violates his rights and fundamental freedoms. The European Convention on the Rights of Man rules that the individual can act against his native state, subordinating the acceptance of the procedure of individual appeal to the consent of the state. Since the '70s the procedure of individual appeal has been accepted also by Italy and later by France. Today the condition to be member of the Council of Europe is ratifying the European Convention of the Rights of Man and acc

epting the procedure of individual appeal. The awareness that there are no individual rights without the possibility of using them juridically has grown enormously. This eliminates the individual's isolation in the closed context of the state and of its government, and opens spaces to appeal against behaviours on the part of governments that fall short of a minimum universal standard of respect of human rights. This makes is easier to understand why the recent Vienna Conference on Human Rights has opposed this drive towards an international juridical safeguard of human rights. Political mediations and intergovernmental controversies are the pillars of that "international realism" and of that flexibility which the governments, especially the ones that are less respectful of human rights, prefer to use in the medley of international politics! And yet the innovative aspect of the Declaration of the Rights of Man of '48 and of the subsequent conventions is that of having transformed fundamental constitutional ri

ghts into universal human rights; rights that are not, therefore, confined to the judiciary defense allowed by the juridical regulations of a State, but tending towards the sphere of international justice.