The liability of companies for extra-territorial human rights violations does not solely arise from human rights statutes and traditional tort law approaches, but also from the corporate and securities law domains. Securities law requires that public companies disclose any high risk activity that the company is involved in, to the extent that it may affect the viability of the corporation, and this includes possible human rights violations. Management decisions in the field of Corporate Social Responsibility must concern the long-term viability of a company, and therefore accommodating, to the extent possible, the demands of stakeholders – be they traditional shareholders, responsible shareholders, or affected communities. This thesis will analyze the legal obligations triggering such corporate decisions, as well as the industry trends which inform them. The focus will be on Canadian public mining companies.

The liability of companies for extra-territorial human rights violations does not solely arise from human rights statutes and traditional tort law approaches, but also from the corporate and securities law domains. Securities law requires that public companies disclose any high risk activity that the company is involved in, to the extent that it may affect the viability of the corporation, and this includes possible human rights violations. Management decisions in the field of Corporate Social Responsibility must concern the long-term viability of a company, and therefore accommodating, to the extent possible, the demands of stakeholders – be they traditional shareholders, responsible shareholders, or affected communities. This thesis will analyze the legal obligations triggering such corporate decisions, as well as the industry trends which inform them. The focus will be on Canadian public mining companies.

In this dissertation, I examine the within-country and between-country effects of state-based human rights violations on annual counts of total, fatal and attributed attacks. I use the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) for my outcome variables and Political Terror Scale (PTS) to measure state-based human rights violations. Scholars argue that repressive governments that silence dissidents and close all avenues of political expression increase the likelihood of terrorism and other acts of violence against the state (Gurr, 1970; Crenshaw, 1981; DeNardo, 1985; Piazza, 2017). In such circumstances, terrorism and acts of violence against the state may serve as a defense mechanism against repressive governments (Gurr, 1970). Others argue that state-based violations of human rights can damage public approval and perceptions of legitimacy towards the government (Piazza, 2017). This, in turn, fosters anti-state and anti-status quo grievances. Such polarized environments become vulnerable to extremist movements in regard to the gathering of support, recruitment of new members, and distribution of effective propaganda, all of which may result in increased terrorist attacks at the country-level (Walsh and Piazza, 2010). I use the fixed effects negative binomial regression model to test the effects of within-country changes in state-based human rights violations on annual changes in terrorism. I use generalized hierarchical linear modeling to test the effects of between-country changes in state-based human rights violations on annual changes in terrorism. Using country-level data from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD), Political Terror Scale (PTS), Polity IV, Freedom House and the World Bank, I examine the relationship between state-based human rights violations and terrorism for 175 countries between 1980 and 2014. The results indicate that state-based human rights violations is significantly and positively correlated with annual terrorism. The results regarding human rights violations are consistent for both within-country and between-country differences. Increases in human rights violations within a country results in increase in the number of terrorist attacks. Similarly, countries which have higher human rights violations also have high frequency of annual terrorist attacks.

Doctor Legum - LLD / Uganda and her citizens have endured a troubled, violent, conflict-prone history since independence from the British on 9th October 1962. Conflict in Uganda, just like in many an African country, has its primary root causes in the colonial legacy which sowed a fertile ground for several other secondary causes of present day subsisting conflicts. During Uganda's various military conflicts millions have had their human rights and civil liberties violated with impunity. At the end of each conflict and / or crisis, Uganda has had to grapple with the challenge of finding a lasting solution amidst the significant losses made by the country, many ethnic groups and her citizens. No long term viable and efficient solution or mechanism has been introduced or instituted to forestall future conflicts. What appears to have been introduced or instituted are stopgap measures. Since President Yoweri Museveni took over power on 26 January 1986, a military conflict has been raging in northern Uganda and the surrounding areas spanning eastern Uganda, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo (hereafter: 'DRC'), the Sudan and the Central African Republic (hereafter: 'CAR'). In this decades-old conflict, the war has primarily pitted the Lord's Resistance Army (hereafter: 'LRA') against the Uganda Peoples Defence Forces (hereafter: 'UPDF'). Like many conflicts, the more than twenty-year-old contestation has resulted in the gross violations of human rights of millions of people situated across five African states. The human rights violations, which have resulted in the commission of international crimes have been perpetrated and perpetuated with impunity by both warring parties (LRA and UPDF). Although initially an internal conflict, the conflict in northern Uganda has catapulted itself into an international conflict based on the parties involved, the interest generated, the crimes committed and the areas and people affected by it.

Magister Legum - LLM

"Whereas victims of ordinary crimes such as theft, robbery, assault or murder find it easier to obtain redress, victims of the most serious violatons such as war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity receive less attention insofar as their redress is concerned. Apart from some exceptional cases where victims of serious human rights abuses had their right to redress vindicated, there has not been an effective and comprehensive way of redressing victims of gross human rights violations. In Africa for instance, victims' redress in post-Apartheid South Africa and post-genocide Rwanda have been problematic. Thus, it is meaningful investigating how effectively the victims' right to reparation can be implemented in case of gross and systematic human rights violations. Preliminary to the above interrogation are questions such as: what are gross and systematic human rights violations? What are international standards regarding redress for the victims of such abuses? The case studies of Sierra Leone and the DRC will be closely analysed as an empirical foundation for these questions. ... This study consists of five chapters. Chapter one draws the context in which the study emerges. It provides the foundation and the structure of the dissertation. Chapter two outlines the legal framework that is relevant for answering the questions raised by this study. It explores international human rights standards regarding reparation of vicitms of gross and systematic violations. Chapter three analyses the implementation of victims' reparation in the context of Sierra Leone. It confronts Sierra Leonean responses to war victims with international standards on victims' reparation. Chapter four analyses victims' situation in the post-conflict Democratic Republic of Congo and draws lessons from the Sierra Leonean experience. Chapter five sums up findings of the study." -- Introduction. / Prepared under the supervision of Professor Alejandro Lorite Escorihuela at the Department of Law, American University in Cairo, Egypt / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2006. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

This essay analyzes in a comparative manner, the cases of Argentina and Uruguay regarding the amnesty laws that both issued to members of the armed forces after the transition to democracy from the authoritarian regime, for violations of human rights committed during the military dictatorship. The research seeks to understand the causes that have made the amnesty law in Argentina from 1986 and 1987, together with the presidential pardoning of 1989 to be declared unconstitutional in 2005 and 2007 by the Argentinian Supreme Court, while the Uruguayan amnesty law issued in 1986 is at the time when this research was made still in force. The focus of this study relies on four main actors that have made an impact on this issue: the Executive; the Supreme Court; the Inter-American system of Human Rights; and the human rights movement. Our research intakes a qualitative nature that is the most appropriate method for this kind of study. A comparative methodology is developed studying the cases of Argentina and Uruguay in order to outline similarities and differences between them both, which let us see the different variables that both cases have in an effort to better understand the causes that led to different outcomes regarding the present legal status of the amnesty laws. This essay utilizes as its theoretical framework, theories of Transitional Justice and Human Rights from below, which are applied to the material presented in both cases. In Argentina, the Supreme Court, the Executive, the human rights movement and the Inter-American system of Human Rights, have worked together in the last decade to abolish the amnesty laws and the pardoning in the country. The Supreme Court in Uruguay acting against the Executive power in the last time is seen as a keen factor to why the amnesty law is still in force today. Here, the referendums in 1989 and 2009 supporting the further upholding of the law influenced the decision of the Supreme Court, and also made a negative impact in the human rights movement.

A presente tese tem por escopo verificar o surgimento de uma nova exceção à imunidade de jurisdição dos Estados no caso de violação dos direitos humanos.Para chegar a essa conclusão, faz-se a análise e revisão críticas dos principais casos da jurisprudência estrangeira e nacional, de teorias, da Convenção da Basiléia sobre Imunidade de Jurisdição, da Convenção da ONU sobre Imunidade de Jurisdição, das leis internas sobre imunidade de jurisdição dos Estados Unidos, Reino Unido, Austrália e da Argentina.O tema é dividido em quatro partes: na primeira parte, trata-se de noções sobre jurisdição e imunidade de jurisdição. Na segunda, sobre a evolução da imunidade de jurisdição dos Estados. Na terceira, sobre as exceções clássicas à imunidade de jurisdição e, na última, sobre a nova exceção à imunidade de jurisdição no caso de violação dos direitos humanos. / The scope of this thesis is to analyze the emergence of a new exception to the rule of state immunity in the case of human rights violations. To reach this conclusion a survey of the main cases law and theories is done. In addition, the European Convention on State Immunity, the UN Convention on State Immunity, the sovereign immunity acts of the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and Argentina are comparatively examined. This thesis is divided into four parts: in the first part, it deals with notions of jurisdiction and jurisdictional immunity. In the second part, with the evolution of states immunity. In the third part, with the classical exceptions to jurisdictional immunity and in the last with the new exception to the state immunity in the case of human rights violations.

Concerns the situation of indigenous people in Argentina. / UN Job no.: G0511710 E. Material type: NGO written statements. Issued under agenda item 15, agenda document E/CN.4/2005/1.

Testimony flows from a story that originates long before the opportunity to be a witness about human atrocities occurs. And, ironically, testimony – the voice that is suppressed during times of state sanctioned terror – continues to flow long after the perpetrators fade from power. It is this ethereal and enduring paradox that raises the questions of what testimonial forms are, how they communicate, and whether they positively impact social justice as evidenced by enhanced communicative freedoms. The testimonial forms of this study are narratives about human rights atrocities which emerged from the 17-year military junta in Chile led by Augusto Pinochet. This project examines the development and uses of official and unofficial testimony surrounding times of transitional justice using a multi-modal analysis incorporating narrative and historical analysis, communication ethics, and critical theory which yields a meta-analysis of testimony and the context in which it functions. This research concludes that a life cycle of testimony exists that is organic and evolving. Furthermore, due to the unique circumstances of transitional justice periods, a theory of testimony ethics is called for to increase individual communicative freedoms that lead to enhanced social justice as well as to increase the success of truth commission communication processes.