The ICC and Human Rights: The Crime Against Destruction of Cultural Heritage as Part of a Trend Towards Greater Human Rights Influence

The UN Security Council and the UN Human Rights Council have increasingly addressed the destruction of cultural heritage in recent years, reflecting an expanded focus on cultural heritage protection across the UN system. This chapter examines the approaches of these two bodies to cultural heritage destruction and explores how their approaches have mutually reinforced each other but also reflected their different mandates: international peace and security and international human rights, respectively. This chapter starts with an analysis of some of the key Human Rights Council resolutions on the matter, as well as the work of its special procedures, in particular the Special Rapporteur in the Field of Cultural Rights. It then looks at the resolutions of the Security Council both to assess the manner in which the Security Council has introduced cultural heritage destruction to the peace and security agenda and also to identify whether the Security Council has additionally addressed such destruction as a human rights violation. The chapter concludes with discussion of whether a human rights approach to cultural heritage destruction should be adopted more widely.

Download Full-text

Part II Substantive Aspects, Ch.19 Cultural Heritage and Women

The Oxford Handbook of International Cultural Heritage Law ◽

10.1093/law/9780198859871.003.0019 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Powderly Joseph ◽

Silva Rafael Braga da

Keyword(s):

Human Rights ◽

Cultural Heritage ◽

Lived Experiences ◽

Gender Issues ◽

Women's Agency ◽

Policy Initiatives ◽

Cultural Rights ◽

Human Rights Norms ◽

Experiences Of Women ◽

Made In

The women’s rights movement has secured important reforms aimed at realizing the promise of genuine equality and the universality of fundamental human rights norms. Giving substantive voice to the cultural rights of women has been an important feature of the discourse and has led to significant advances in recognizing the intersectionality of the forms of oppression experienced by women, the centrality of women’s agency in exercising their cultural rights, and the dangers of essentialized conceptions of the lived experiences of women. The chapter explores the extent to which gender issues are reflected in international cultural heritage instruments as well as in the practices and policy initiatives of UNESCO. It suggests that the advances made in the realization of women’s cultural rights have not yet been fully translated in the context of international cultural heritage law and practice.

Download Full-text

Part II Substantive Aspects, Ch.4 Intentional Destruction of Cultural Heritage

The Oxford Handbook of International Cultural Heritage Law ◽

10.1093/law/9780198859871.003.0004 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Lenzerini Federico

Keyword(s):

Human Rights ◽

Cultural Heritage ◽

International Law ◽

International Community ◽

Cultural Groups ◽

Special Significance ◽

Customary International Law ◽

Human Rights Protection ◽

Rights Protection ◽

Protection Of Cultural Heritage

This chapter focuses on the practice of deliberate destruction of cultural heritage, which has represented a plague accompanying humanity throughout all phases of its history and has involved many different human communities either as perpetrators or victims. In most instances of deliberate destruction of cultural heritage, the target of perpetrators is not the heritage in itself but, rather, the communities and persons for whom the heritage is of special significance. This reveals a clear discriminatory and persecutory intent against the targeted cultural groups, or even against the international community as a whole. As such, intentional destruction of cultural heritage, in addition of being qualified as a war crime, is actually to be considered as a crime against humanity. Furthermore, it also produces notable implications in terms of human rights protection. Protection of cultural heritage against destruction is today a moral and legal imperative representing one of the priorities of the international community. In this respect, two rules of customary international law exist prohibiting intentional destruction of cultural heritage in time of war and in peacetime.

Download Full-text