EU Human Rights Research Articles

Do large language models have a legal duty to tell the truth?

Careless speech is a new type of harm created by large language models (LLM) that poses cumulative, long-term risks to science, education and shared social truth in democratic societies. LLMs produce responses that are plausible, helpful and confident, but that contain factual inaccuracies, misleading references and biased information. These subtle mistruths are poised to cumulatively degrade and homogenize knowledge over time. This article examines the existence and feasibility of a legal duty for LLM providers to create models that 'tell the truth'. We argue that LLM providers should be required to mitigate careless speech and better align their models with truth through open, democratic processes. We define careless speech against 'ground truth' in LLMs and related risks including hallucinations, misinformation and disinformation. We assess the existence of truth-related obligations in EU human rights law and the Artificial Intelligence Act, Digital Services Act, Product Liability Directive and Artificial Intelligence Liability Directive. Current frameworks contain limited, sector-specific truth duties. Drawing on duties in science and academia, education, archives and libraries, and a German case in which Google was held liable for defamation caused by autocomplete, we propose a pathway to create a legal truth duty for providers of narrow- and general-purpose LLMs.

Rule of Law and Human Rights: Analysis of International Standards and Case Law

The EU's human rights policies and actions have two main components: protecting the fundamental rights of EU citizens and promoting human rights around the world. One of the aspects that the UN focuses on is the relationship between democracy and human rights, as the organisation upholds the importance of equal political participation of citizens of its states and full respect for human rights, including the recognition, protection and promotion. As defined by the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF), human rights are norms that recognise and protect the dignity of all people, meaning they apply to everyone, without distinction of race, gender, education, political opinion, sexual orientation or any other type of moral judgement. The realisation of human rights also obliges states to be responsible for protecting these norms and prohibits certain acts that violate them. Human rights can be said to be one of the greatest achievements of mankind. One of the most important human rights documents is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed in 1948 at the UN General Assembly. Consisting of 30 articles, the Declaration formalises all the theoretical developments made earlier on civil, political, social, economic and cultural rights. Another innovation of the Declaration was the inclusion of human rights in the universal character, becoming the rights of all peoples. Thus, for the UN, human rights "are universal legal guarantees that protect individuals and groups from acts and omissions by governments that violate human dignity"3. Human rights are fundamental and therefore inalienable human rights, i.e. those rights whose violation would lead to an attack on the very essence of humanity. For this reason, it is important that everyone is aware of and knows about human rights, their content and the forms of protection provided for them, as everyone should be able to enjoy their fundamental rights for the sole purpose of living in peace, without distinction. Human rights, democracy and the rule of law create an environment in which countries can promote development, protect people from discrimination and ensure equal access to justice for all.

Hungary’s Policy and Practice on Illegally Staying Migrants

This study explores Hungary’s policies and practices regarding persons illegally present in the country. It introduces Hungary’s unique legal and practical framework resulting from legal amendments aimed at regaining control of the external borders of the EU and the various judicial fora where these provisions have been tested. The study indicates that the policy framework was incompatible with EU and international human rights law, simultaneously discussing the Hungarian Constitutional Court’s decision regarding the state’s obligation in the case of the incomplete effectiveness of the joint exercise of competences in the field of fighting illegal migration. Moreover, it describes the framework of escorting illegally staying migrants through the Serbian border instead of conducting regular return procedures. In addition to analysing the individual cases and regulatory elements, the study indicates that the results of Hungarian measures in practice and whether it is worthwhile to consider these experiences during the EU migration reform processes should not be overlooked.

The EU Dual-use Regulation, cyber-surveillance and human rights: the competing norms and organised hypocrisy of EU export controls

ABSTRACTThis article analyses the process and outcome of the review and recast of the EU Dual-use Regulation which concluded in 2020. The recast was dominated by conflicts both among EU member states and between the European Council, European Commission and European Parliament about the interlinked issues of expanding the range of human rights states should consider when implementing the Regulation and controlling exports of “cyber-surveillance items”. The processes through which states individually and collectively determine their content of their export controls are often portrayed as a zero-sum contest between “norms” and “interests”. This article argues that the recast can be better understood if it is viewed as a competition between different constitutive and regulative norms grounded in humanitarian, economic and national security concerns. The article also argues that the outcome of the recast can be better understood if we apply Brunsson’s concept of “organized hypocrisy” and view it as a set of compromises which sought to address several competing norms. The article concludes by reflecting on the potential wider application of the “competing norms” and “organized hypocrisy” frameworks for other studies of states’ export controls and export control regimes.

Reappraising the EU-Turkey Refugee Statement within the Human Rights and Neoliberalism Nexus

ABSTRACT Instead of acting consistently with international law and its own refugee law, the EU has adopted an ambivalent stance over refugee arrivals to Europe. Member states’ increasing anxiety led the EU to tighten border controls and outsource its humanitarian responsibilities by agreeing on a statement with Turkey to prevent refugees from entering the EU irregularly. This paper focuses on the human rights breaches and contradictions of the EU-Turkey Statement by specifically investigating the one-in-one-out mechanism and the argument that Turkey is safe country. It is argued that the Statement has turned the refugee issue into the subject of the European market because the political architecture of EU human rights norms has historically been part of the neoliberal hegemony. Hence, the refugee case reveals how inadequately produced norms inside Europe’s borders reproduce inequalities and cause mismatches between the EU’s claimed role as rights promoter and its practical inadequacies and market-based pragmatism.

Migration Crisis in The European Union and Hungary's Legal and Political Attitudes Towards Migration

This paper delves into Hungary's legal and political attitudes towards migration in the context of the EU's migration crisis. Specifically, it examines Hungary's response to the migration crisis, including its efforts to restrict migration and tighten border controls, and the underlying motivations driving these measures. Additionally, it undertakes a critical analysis of the legal implications of Hungary's approach to migration, including the potential violations of EU law and human rights. The present article directs scholarly attention towards the contentious nature of Hungary's immigration and immigrant integration policies, undertaking law analysis thereof. The study concludes that Hungary's stance on migration poses a broader challenge to the EU's commitment to humanitarian principles and raises important questions about the future of migration policy within the Union. As such, this study highlights the urgent need for a comprehensive and coordinated approach to address the migration crisis which the EU is dealing with.

The Interplay between EU Public Procurement and Human Rights in Global Supply Chains: Lessons from the Italian Legal Context

Linking EU public procurement and the recently consolidated Business & Human Rights field of international law is a core challenge and opportunity in the current globalized economy. Global supply chains play a crucial role in enhancing socio-economic development, however evidence from NGOs and case law shows that human rights and labour standards abuses persist in many market sectors. Thus, goods, works, services procured by public entities may entail human rights risks, potentially occurring throughout their global supply chains. The EU regulatory framework has not adequately regulated such intersection, fostering ambiguity and uncertainties in the application which require legal clarification at multiple levels. This article looks at public procurement from a human rights’ legal perspective, firstly analysing whether there are human rights obligations for contracting authorities (§ 1). Key potentials and uncertainties under the EU Public Sector Directive are highlighted (§ 2), followed by the analysis of the case of Italy, unpacking the use of minimum sustainability requirements to foster human rights respect along global supply chains.

The unwrapping of various understandings of statelessness in Latvian media discourse

There is a substantial literature in the tradition of constructivism and sociological new institutionalism that suggests the existence of shared EU norms. Yet, the issue of how EU norms are adopted and/or contested in EU member states remains underexamined. In the paper, we therefore study the public discourse on citizenship in Latvia and examine how the discourse relates to EU norms on citizenship, minority rights and in the broader sense human rights. The analysis takes its empirical starting point in the period after the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 and focuses on how the issue of statelessness was discussed in the Latvian online media. Looking at how the contested term (‘statelessness’) achieves different meanings in the Latvian discourse, and how the domestic actors try to reformulate the EU norms in question, we aim at a better understanding of the diffusion of norms within the context of a regional organization. The conclusion indicates that apart from the EU human rights norm, there are several different articulations of statelessness (i.e. othering, security and instrumental) that are present in the discourse. This has enabled Latvian governments to stress their commitment to human rights promotion, while simultaneously facing criticism regarding the country’s stateless inhabitants.

Transnational Parliamentary Activities in EU Foreign Policy: The Role of Parliamentarians in the Establishment of the EU's Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime

Although the literature is increasingly interested in the parliamentary dimension of EU foreign policy, to this point no research has covered the role of parliamentarians in EU sanctions policy. This article argues that parliamentarians were successful in keeping the issue of a human rights sanctions regime on the EU's agenda and used all the tools at their disposal to push the EU foreign policy‐making machinery in the direction of adopting a new sanctions regime. This article does not limit itself to the study of the European Parliament but argues that parliamentary assemblies of different levels (national, cross‐level and European) are interconnected and worked together intensively on the adoption of the EU's human rights sanctions regime.

What Does it Mean to Say that the Court of Justice is not a Human Rights Institution? A Critical Appraisal

Abstract What role does the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) and EU law play in elaborating the rights and principles embodied by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)? Over the last 20 years, human (or ‘fundamental’) rights have become a constant part of the way the CJEU interprets and applies EU law. In a period where fundamental rights and values are increasingly under threat both globally and in Europe, judicial institutions remain an important last bastion of protection. Commenting on Judge Rosas’ (2007) observation that the CJEU is not in fact a human rights Court, three critical questions are derived: The first question is the most related to this special issue. What does the development of the CJEU—an institution with human rights responsibilities—mean for general international human rights law? The second takes up Judge Rosas’ observation that the CJEU, unlike the Strasbourg Court, has extensive judicial responsibilities beyond human rights. What does the development of EU human rights law mean for EU law more broadly? Finally, if Judge Rosas is right that the CJEU is not a human rights Court, what does that mean for its relationship to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the other organs of the Council of Europe? In answer to this last question, the article cautiously advances the argument that the very fact that the CJEU is not a human rights Court implies a more robust role than Judge Rosas suggests for external review of EU law by international human rights bodies.

Freedom to Conduct Business During the Covid-19 Pandemic

Unprecedented restrictions on various human rights were applied during the COVID-19 pandemic, and considered crucial in most cases to halt the spread of infection. Yet, a number of critical issues were raised concerning the scope and proportionality of said restrictions. Among these, the freedom to conduct business was one of the most affected by measures implemented in the first lockdown which was applied in many Member States of the European Union. This article analyzes the protection of this freedom in situations of emergency, its conflict with the right to health, and explores whether jurisprudential and doctrinal bases applicable before the pandemic could be applied or if new principles need to be developed to address unprecedented situations like COVID-19. The criteria to determine the proportionality of these restrictions from the perspective of International and EU human rights law are also discussed. The authors argue that the freedom to conduct business, although not envisaged directly in the European Convention on Human Rights, is part of the right to property, and thus should be protected in the same manner. Based on that, the approach to the deprivation of the right to use property and denial of the essence of the freedom to conduct business should be applied similarly, though not identically, to the approach ofde factoexpropriation, where a question of full or partial compensation may be relevant in case of substantial business losses. For other restrictions the availability of compensatory measures should be one of the key aspects while considering the proportionality of COVID-19 measures in restricting the rights of individuals or businesses.

Is the EU human rights legal framework able to cope with discriminatory AI?

The challenges introduced by AI for the EU anti-discrimination legal framework have been a widely discussed topic among the doctrine. In the light of the 20th anniversary of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, the Commission released a regulatory proposal to tackle AI. This paper seeks to determine whether the proposal successfully addresses the existent pitfalls of the EU framework. First, this paper explores the functioning of AI systems that employ machine learning techniques and determines how discrimination takes place. Second, the article examines intellectual property rights as one of the main barriers for accountability and redressal of violations committed by an AI system. Third, the state of the discussion concerning the pitfalls of the existent EU approach towards non-discrimination is addressed. The available academic literature suggests that discriminatory outputs produced by an AI will amount to indirect discrimination in most scenarios. In this sense, cases of indirect proxy discrimination will likely pass the proportionality test, therefore justifying the discriminatory output. The last section of this article studies the Commission’s regulatory proposal. Although the document seems to effectively tackle discrimination caused by biased training data sets, this paper concludes that intellectual property rights and proxy discrimination still constitute significant barriers for the enforcement of anti-discrimination law.

Human rights defenders in Moldova

At the international level, the subject of human rights defenders has grown. The European Union's human rights guidelines provide practical guidance to EU representatives around the world, one of the main being - the protection of human rights defenders. Parliament's resolutions aim to raise public awareness of human rights violations, support human rights defenders and shape EU human rights policy through concrete policy proposals.

MAINSTREAMING HUMAN RIGHTS THROUGH THE ENLARGEMENT POLICY: THE CASE OF THE WESTERN BALKAN COUNTRIES

The EU enlargement has been considered as the EU’s most efficient foreign policy instrument in terms of its ability to transform communist countries into functional democracies and open market countries. Since the beginning of 1990s, the promotion of human rights has become prominent topic either for the consolidation of human rights within the EU or outside. The argument of this paper is that the EU enlargement policy has influenced Western Balkan countries to improve their domestic legislation in the area of human rights. The paper demonstrates, firstly, how has evolved the EU human rights actorness from the establishment of the EE Community and secondly, discuss strategies and instruments used by the EU to export its norms and values in the Western Balkan countries. The paper addresses the following research question: how, whether and to what extent, the EU has promoted human rights in the Western Balkan countries. Throughout this paper, a doctrinal legal research has been used to analyze EU primary and secondary sources. The value of this paper lies in its comprehensiveness in drawing a complete picture of EU role in promoting human rights in Western Balkan countries through enlargement policy and to discuss the impact of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in the candidate countries.

The New EU Human Rights Sanctions Regime: a SWOT Analysis

The New EU Human Rights Sanctions Regime: a SWOT Analysis

EU Human Rights Sanctions Regime: Striving for Utopia Backed by Sovereign Power?

On 7 December 2020, the EU Foreign Affairs Council adopted an ‘EU Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime’ (EU HRSR). The objective of the EU HRSR is to give the EU to a flexible tool to address serious human rights violations and abuses worldwide. This article starts from the position that setting up an EU HRSR serves a noble objective. The EU HRSR could be desirable tool to flexibly confront those with consequences that commit serious human rights violations. Yet, it would crucially need to comply with human rights itself. This is not a small feat to accomplish. Much hinges on the listing and delisting criteria, the required evidentiary standard, and the information on which the listing decisions are based. Based on a detailed analysis of the Court of Justice’s sanctions case law, the article sets out the requirements with which the EU HRSR would have to comply. Finally, the horizontal EU HRSR is an attempt to decouple the protection of human rights from specific (political) conflicts. This decoupling directly charges the protection of human rights, which is traditionally portrayed as ‘neutral’, with sovereign politics. Human rights, sanctions, restrictive measures, listing criteria, evidentiary standard, delisting

The European Union's policy on human rights and Chinese sovereignism: The case of Xinjiang

The article explores the European Union's approach to human rights issues in China through the processes of bilateral and multilateral dialogue on human rights between the EU and the People's Republic of China, on the one hand. On the other hand, the paper deals with the analysis of the EU's human rights policy in the specific case of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, which is examined through normative and political activities of the EU, its institutions and individual member states. Besides, the paper examines China's response to the European Union's human rights approaches, in general, but also when it comes to the specific case of UAR Xinjiang. ?his is done through a review of China's discourse and behaviour within the EU-China Human Rights Dialogue framework, but also at the UN level and within the framework of bilateral relations with individual member states. The paper aims to show whether and how the characteristics of the EU's general approach to human rights in China are reflected in the individual case of Xinjiang. Particular attention shall be given to the differentiation of member states in terms of their approach to human rights issues in China, which is conditioned by the discrepancy between their political values, normative interests and ideational factors, on the one hand, and material factors and economic interests, on the other. Also, the paper aims to show the important features of the different views of the European Union and the Chinese state on the very role of Human Rights Dialogue, as well as their different understandings of the concept of human rights itself. The study concluded that the characteristics of the Union's general approach to human rights in China, as well as the different perceptions of human rights issues between China and the EU, were manifested in the same way in the case of UAR Xinjiang.

Liberty of thought, conscience and religion in the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Some particular aspects

This article is devoted to the certain aspects of protection of liberty of thought, conscience and religion in the meaning of Art. 9 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. We have studied the complexity of the key concepts interpretation, the essence of which is guaranteed by the Convention, due to the lack of extensive practice of the European Commission on Human Rights and the Human Rights Court. It is noted that for a long time in a significant number of complaints the Convention body has come to the conclusion that the issues raised in the complaints, might be considered through the prism or Art. 10, as they concerned freedom of expression, or fell within the limits of Art. 11 of the Convention, which guarantees freedom of assembly and association. At the same time, the values protected by Art. 9 are related to those ones, which are provided in Art. 8 and demand the respect for privacy. It is also closely linked to the right of parents to provide such education and training as it is consistent with their religious and ideological beliefs, as guaranteed by Art. 2 of the First Protocol to the Convention.This article illustrates the fact that the conventional understanding of these complex, deep and multifaceted concepts at the present stage is formed with the development of the case law of the European Human Rights Court, which in its activities is guided by the principle of effective and dynamic interpretation of conventions and other related principles, which ensures the protective mechanism effectiveness. As the time is extended, the Court case-law has developed an approach that allows to assess the views that the petitioners plan to benefit from the protection of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Such views in the meaning of Art. 9 must, first of all, be to some extent "convincing, serious, holistic and meaningful" and, secondly, be "compatible with human dignity".Taking into consideration the compiled content of the right guaranteed by Art. 9, viz. that it contains two aspects such as forum internum (internal) and forum externum (external), the article notes that regulation can be involved only in the case of forum externum. As long as liberty of thought, conscience and religion remains within a human being, this right is considered to be absolute. The state has a negative obligation not to interfere in such a right.In the framework of this article, the author considers it appropriate to state the position of the European Union on the attitude and ways to effectively address these issues. As the subject of international law and one of the most influential international organizations based on the values of human dignity, freedom, equality and respect for human rights (Art. 2 of the Treaty on European Union), the EU advocates for their real protection, which requires the development of specific legal instruments.Therefore, both the EU internal and international activities are based on the principles that underlie its creation. It is the foreign policy aspect of the EU human rights activities that is the subject of our article that is reflected in the “European Union Guiding Principles on the Promotion and Protection of Religious Freedom or Belief”.The article draws a number of conclusions. First of all, the right of liberty of thought, conscience and religion is one of the key principle of a democratic society and the value in European cultural and historical heritage. The issue of violation of the right to freedom of religion or belief is interrelated with freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and association. The issues of combating various forms of discrimination are not set aside. Additionally, the right, guaranteed by Art. 9, is a fundamental right and one of the democratic society foundations and the value in the law of the European Union. Moreover, the EU identifies problematic issues in the field of protection of liberty of conscience and religion as those ones that require particular attention, and the EU makes efforts to address them not only within its borders, but as well as in the foreign policy relations and initiatives

The Inconsistent Human Rights Agenda of EU Mediterranean Policy

Vagueness and inconsistency in policy formulation represent an underlying factor for the longstanding weakness and ineffectiveness of EU human rights action towards the Mediterranean neighbourhood. This article aims to shed light on the causes of such flaws in policy-making and grasp their consequences on EU approaches on the matter, focusing on the competing preferences vis-a-vis the role and scope of human rights held by the key actors who have affected the direction of EU Mediterranean policy over time. The article argues that the roots of human rights inconsistency therein lie in the EU’s protracted incapability to coherently conciliate such competing views despite opportunities to do so emerging periodically throughout the last thirty years of Euro-Mediterranean relations. EU Mediterranean policy, EU foreign policy analysis, human rights, political conditionality, Barcelona Process, European Neighbourhood Policy, civil society organizations

Anthropological shift? : EU human rights' Anthropology in view of life and family

The article reveals and explains the change in the way of proclaiming the protection of human life and right to marry/found a family in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU compared to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. The Author verifies the thesis according to which that change is, at its roots, connected with an anthropological shift.