Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions

A/RES/77/218View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 68b Human rights questions, including alternative approaches for improving the effective enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms, published in 2022.

What other versions does this mandate have?

15 versions · 1997–2024

This is an older version — the most recent is A/RES/79/176

Year	Symbol	Title	Word length	Text similarity
2024	A/RES/79/176	Extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions	3,431	84%Compare
2023	A/RES/77/218	Extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions	3,316	74%Compare
2020	A/RES/75/189	Extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions	2,727	96%Compare
2019	A/RES/73/172	Extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions	2,647	89%Compare
2017	A/RES/71/198	Extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions	2,441	89%Compare

What subjects does this mandate have?

4 subjects

Extralegal Executions Human Rights Violations Right to Life Summary Executions

What’s in this document?

37 operative paragraphs

Reiterates its strong condemnation of all the extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions that continue to occur throughout the world;

Demands that all States ensure that the practice of extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions is brought to an end and that they take effective action to prevent, combat and eliminate the phenomenon in all its forms and manifestations;

Reiterates that all States:

Must conduct prompt, effective, exhaustive, thorough, independent, impartial and transparent investigations, exercising due diligence, in line with international standards and forensic best practices, and in this regard takes note of the Revised United Nations Manual on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extralegal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions,¹⁰ with reference to as much forensic expertise as necessary, into all suspected cases of extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, identify and bring to justice those responsible, while ensuring the right of every person to a fair hearing by a competent, independent and impartial tribunal established by law, grant adequate compensation within a reasonable time to the victims or their families and adopt all measures, including legal and judicial measures, necessary to put an end to impunity;

¹⁰The Minnesota Protocol on the Investigation of Potentially Unlawful Death (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.17.XIV.3).

Conduct such investigations, bearing in mind the need for gender equality in access to justice, particularly with regard to the gender-related killing of women and girls, also known as femicide, and the report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions submitted to the Human Rights Council at its thirty-fifth session¹¹ regarding a gender-sensitive approach to extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary killings, which points to the links between the arbitrary deprivation of life and systemic discrimination, such as gender-based and racial discrimination, and the greater rates of homicide among Indigenous women and girls and women and girls with disabilities, and extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions of refugees and migrants and humanitarian workers, and prevent the further occurrence of such executions, as recommended in the Principles on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extralegal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions,¹² fully consistent with their obligations under international law;

¹¹A/HRC/35/23.

¹²Economic and Social Council resolution 1989/65, annex.

Calls upon Governments, and invites intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, to actively support and pay greater attention to the work of national-level commissions of inquiry into extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, with a view to ensuring the effective contribution of these commissions to accountability and to combating impunity;

Calls upon all States, in order to prevent extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, to comply with their obligations under the relevant provisions of international human rights instruments, and also calls upon States which retain the death penalty to pay particular regard to the provisions contained in articles 6, 14 and 15 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, articles 37 and 40 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child¹³ and articles 12, 13 and 14 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities,¹⁴ bearing in mind the safeguards and guarantees set out in Economic and Social Council resolutions 1984/50 of 25 May 1984 and 1989/64 of 24 May 1989 and taking into account the recommendations of the Special Rapporteur in reports to the Council and the General Assembly, including the report submitted to the Assembly at its sixty-seventh session,¹⁵ regarding the need to respect all safeguards and restrictions, including limitation to the most serious crimes, stringent respect of due process and fair trial safeguards and the right to seek pardon or commutation of sentence;

¹³United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 1577, No. 27531.

¹⁴Ibid., vol. 2515, No. 44910.

¹⁵A/67/275.

Emphasizes that to prevent extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions States should take necessary steps to adopt such laws or other measures as may be necessary to give effect to the right to life in accordance with international law and that everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law;

Urges all States:

To take all measures required by international human rights law and international humanitarian law to prevent loss of life, in particular that of children, during detention, arrest, public demonstrations, internal and communal violence, civil unrest, public emergencies or armed conflicts and to ensure that the police, law enforcement agents, armed forces and other agents acting on behalf of or with the consent or acquiescence of the State, including private security providers, act with restraint and in conformity with international human rights law and international humanitarian law, including the principles of proportionality and necessity, and in this regard to ensure that police and law enforcement officials are guided by the Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials¹⁶ and the Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials;¹⁷

¹⁶Resolution 34/169, annex.

¹⁷See Eighth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, Havana, 27 August–7 September 1990: report prepared by the Secretariat (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.91.IV.2), chap. I, sect. B.

To ensure the effective protection of the right to life of all persons, to conduct, when required by obligations under international law, prompt, exhaustive and impartial investigations into all killings, including those targeted at specific groups of persons, such as racially motivated violence leading to the death of the victim, killings of persons belonging to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities or because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, killings of persons affected by terrorism or hostage-taking or living under foreign occupation, killings of refugees, internally displaced persons, migrants, street children or members of Indigenous communities, killings of persons for reasons related to their activities as human rights defenders, lawyers, journalists or demonstrators, killings committed in the name of passion or in the name of honour and killings committed for discriminatory reasons on any basis, to bring those responsible to justice before a competent, independent and impartial judiciary at the national or, where appropriate, international level and to ensure that such killings, including those committed by security forces, police and law enforcement agents, paramilitary groups or private forces, are neither condoned nor sanctioned by State officials or personnel;

Affirms the obligation of States, in order to prevent extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, to protect the lives of all persons deprived of their liberty in all circumstances and to investigate, respond to and ensure combat against impunity for deaths in custody, including in institutions;

Encourages States, taking into account the relevant recommendations of the United Nations and of regional human rights systems, to review, where necessary, their domestic laws and practices with regard to the use of force in law enforcement in order to ensure that these laws and practices are in conformity with their international obligations and commitments;

Emphasizes that, to prevent extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, States should take effective measures to ensure that the use of force by law enforcement officials is in conformity with international obligations and the principles of legality, precaution, necessity, proportionality and accountability, as well as their national legislation;

Reaffirms that the same human rights that people have offline must also be protected online, in order to help to prevent extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions;

Encourages States, in order to support the protection of the right to life, to make appropriate protective equipment and less-lethal weapons available to their officials exercising law enforcement duties, while pursuing efforts to regulate and establish protocols for the training and use of less-lethal weapons and in this regard strengthening international cooperation, bearing in mind that even less-lethal weapons can result in risk to life or serious injury;

Also encourages States to accelerate the work on fulfilling the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, bearing in mind the importance of the full enjoyment of human rights and access to justice for all and effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels, as well as the systematic mainstreaming and integration of a gender perspective;

Urges all States to ensure that all persons deprived of their liberty are treated humanely and with full respect for international law and that their treatment, including judicial guarantees and conditions, conforms to, as appropriate, the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules), as well as the United Nations Rules for the Treatment of Women Prisoners and Non-custodial Measures for Women Offenders (the Bangkok Rules) and, where applicable, the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the Additional Protocols thereto of 8 June 1977,¹⁸ as well as other pertinent international instruments;

¹⁸United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 1125, Nos. 17512 and 17513.

Welcomes:

The International Criminal Court as an important contribution to ending impunity concerning extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, and, noting the growing awareness of the Court worldwide, as highlighted during the twentieth anniversary of the adoption of the Rome Statute of the Court, calls upon those States that are under an obligation to cooperate with the Court to provide such cooperation and assistance in the future, in particular with regard to arrest and surrender, the provision of evidence, the protection and relocation of victims and witnesses and the enforcement of sentences;

The fact that 123 States have ratified or acceded to and 137 States have signed the Rome Statute, and calls upon all those States that have not ratified or acceded to the Rome Statute and the Agreement on the Privileges and Immunities of the International Criminal Court¹⁹ to give serious consideration to doing so;

¹⁹Ibid., vol. 2271, No. 40446.

Acknowledges the importance of ensuring the protection of witnesses for the prosecution of those suspected of extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, urges States to intensify efforts to establish and implement effective witness protection programmes or other measures, and in this regard encourages the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to develop practical tools, including gender-responsive tools, designed to encourage and facilitate greater attention to the protection of witnesses;

Encourages Governments and intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations to organize training programmes and capacity-building and to support projects with a view to training or educating military forces, law enforcement officers, government officials and forensic specialists, as well as private personnel acting on behalf of the State, in international humanitarian and human rights law connected with their work, to include a gender, disability and child rights perspective, as well as information on the role of journalists and media workers, in such training and to require, where appropriate, that all private security providers have vetting and training procedures in place, including mandatory appropriate weapons training, that include human rights norms and principles, and appeals to the international community and requests the Office of the High Commissioner to support endeavours to that end;

Urges States to promote and apply an approach that respects human rights obligations and is gender-responsive in the design, development and use of new technologies on the basis of a multi-stakeholder approach and to regulate new and existing technologies in a manner that ensures that the development and use of such technologies promote, protect and respect human rights, including the right to life, and makes sure that new technologies are not discriminatory and are not used to violate human rights;

Recognizes the need for international and multi-stakeholder cooperation in building capacity and ensuring technical assistance to address technological change and to bridge digital divides in order for all States, especially developing countries and the least developed countries, to benefit from opportunities and to address extrajudicial, arbitrary or summary executions properly;

Strongly urges all States to take the necessary measures to ensure the safety and security of national and international humanitarian personnel;

Requests the Secretary-General to continue, in close collaboration with the High Commissioner and in conformity with the mandate of the High Commissioner, established by the General Assembly in its resolution 48/141 of 20 December 1993, to ensure that personnel specialized in international humanitarian and human rights law, including in provisions related to gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls, form part of United Nations missions, where appropriate, in order to deal with serious violations of human rights, such as extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions;

Takes note with appreciation of the reports of the Special Rapporteur to the General Assembly²⁰ and the Human Rights Council, and invites States to take due consideration of the recommendations contained therein;

²⁰See A/76/264 and A/77/270.

Commends the important role that the Special Rapporteur plays in the elimination and prevention of extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, and encourages the Special Rapporteur to continue, within the mandate, to collect information, including data disaggregated by sex, age and disability, from all concerned, to respond effectively to reliable information that comes before the Special Rapporteur, to follow up on communications and country visits and to seek the views and comments of Governments and to reflect them, as appropriate, for example, in reports, as well as to identify relevant issues, provide advice and recommendations and share experiences and best practices to prevent extrajudicial, summary and arbitrary executions;

Acknowledges the important role of the Special Rapporteur in identifying cases where extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions could amount to genocide and crimes against humanity or war crimes, and urges the Special Rapporteur to collaborate with the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and, as appropriate, the Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide in addressing situations of extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions that are of particularly serious concern or in which early action might prevent further deterioration;

Welcomes the cooperation established between the Special Rapporteur and other United Nations mechanisms and procedures in the field of human rights, and encourages the Special Rapporteur to continue efforts in that regard;

Urges all States, in particular those that have not done so, to cooperate with the Special Rapporteur so that the mandate can be carried out effectively, including by favourably and rapidly responding to requests for visits, mindful that country visits are one of the essential tools for the fulfilment of the mandate, and by responding in a timely manner to communications and other requests transmitted to them by the Special Rapporteur;

Expresses its appreciation to those States that have received the Special Rapporteur, asks them to examine the Special Rapporteur’s recommendations carefully, invites them to inform the Special Rapporteur of the actions taken on those recommendations, and urges other States to cooperate in a similar way;

Once again requests the Secretary-General to continue to use his best endeavours in cases where the minimum standards of legal safeguards provided for in articles 6, 9, 14, 15 and 16 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights appear not to have been respected;

Requests the Secretary-General to provide the Special Rapporteur with adequate human, financial and material resources to enable the mandate to be carried out effectively, including through country visits;

Requests the Special Rapporteur to submit to the General Assembly, at its seventy-eighth and seventy-ninth sessions, a report on the situation worldwide with regard to extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions and recommendations for more effective action to combat this phenomenon;

Decides to continue its consideration of the question at its seventy-ninth session.

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

What other versions does this mandate have?

What subjects does this mandate have?

What’s in this document?

Table of contents