Humanitarian Exemption Research Articles

Humanitarian exemptions: illusive progress in safeguarding humanitarian assistance in the international counterterrorism architecture

Abstract Global counterterrorism efforts have had a number of detrimental effects on the work of humanitarian actors in conflict zones. To mitigate these adverse effects and the underlying normative conflict between counterterrorism frameworks and international humanitarian law (IHL), scholars and humanitarian practitioners have been advocating for the introduction of humanitarian exemptions. These are clauses that exempt humanitarian assistance and related conduct from counterterrorism frameworks in order to ensure an unimpeded provision of humanitarian assistance in areas in which entities designated as ‘terrorists’ are active. This article argues that the progress promised by the emergence of these exemptions remains at least partially illusive. The exemptions remain shaped by a security-oriented perspective on humanitarian assistance and are preoccupied with actors. As a result, they are beneficial primarily to the largest and most prominent humanitarian actors established in the Global North while neglecting small and local humanitarian actors in conflict areas. As such, they defy IHL’s deliberate openness regarding the actors providing humanitarian assistance. Moreover, they violate the obligations of non-belligerent states under IHL to allow and facilitate the free passage of relief consignments which equally protects transnational financial support to local humanitarian actors and applies irrespective of the source of that support. We conclude that humanitarian exemptions are detrimental to efforts to ‘localize’ and decolonize the humanitarian sector. Therefore, instead of focusing on humanitarian exemptions as a ‘micro-solution’, advocacy should pursue a more comprehensive critical approach towards the global counterterrorism architecture.

Is the UNSC Resolution No. 2664 (2022) on humanitarian exemption a paradigm shift for sanction regimes?

Is the UNSC Resolution No. 2664 (2022) on humanitarian exemption a paradigm shift for sanction regimes?

Влияние санкционного давления на продовольственную безопасность: традиционные и новые измерения

The article explores an increasingly relevant topic of the impact of the sanction pressure on food security, summarizes and refines the assessments that have gained ground in political and academic discourse by early 2020s. The study first examines the restrictions on food and agricultural products, points at the legal gap that had emerged in this domain during the Cold War, and examines attempts to partially mitigate this gap by means of humanitarian exemptions from the sanction regimes. The range of options for making such exemptions has significantly expanded after the Cold War, but some factors, especially zero risk tolerance and overcompliance by financial institutions, reduce the effectiveness of these exemptions. Key mechanisms of direct and indirect impact of trade and financial sanctions on food security are addressed at the macro-level. The article also focuses on the novel dimensions of the nexus between sanctions and food security that emerged as a result of an escalation of the conflict in Ukraine and the following wave of unprecedented Western sanctions against Russia. In the future, the Western powers can also step up primary and secondary sanctions against those large non-Western powers who act as both suppliers of food products and donors of development programs. This, however, would inevitably have destructive reverse impact on the economies of both third states and sanctioning countries themselves. As a result, the sanctions–food security nexus may become even stronger, which, in turn, may hinder the achievement of food security-related goals and tasks envisaged in Global Sustainable Development Agenda. The only way out of this impasse is to boost parallel efforts to mitigate disruptive consequences of economic sanctions and to create conditions for resolving the conflicts which led to imposing these sanctions.

Challenges to implementation of humanitarian access norms in the Sahel

AbstractWhile the rules of international humanitarian law (IHL) on humanitarian access are clear, implementing them at the national level can become challenging. To ensure full respect for those rules, States must strike a balance between preserving the security of the civilian population and humanitarian organizations and ensuring that people have access to goods and services that enable the full enjoyment of their rights. This article seeks to show how the IHL rules governing humanitarian access apply in the context of the Sahel region of Africa. First, it describes the multiplicity of armed actors that are present in the Sahel and the humanitarian situation in this region. Next, it addresses the legal framework applicable to humanitarian access under IHL applicable in non-international armed conflicts. The article then examines the measures that have been taken by the States of the Sahel to protect the civilian population and humanitarian organizations, such as the resort to declaration of states of emergency and to armed escorts. It is shown that these measures can hinder the delivery of impartial humanitarian assistance. Finally, the article describes some creative solutions that have been put forward by Sahelian States to facilitate humanitarian access. Examples of these include the creation of coordination mechanisms to foster dialogue on humanitarian access where all concerned actors are invited to participate; the adoption of domestic legal frameworks related to humanitarian access through which this access is proclaimed and its violation sanctioned; and the recognition of humanitarian exemptions in counterterrorism laws.

Ecology, security and international action: beyond sanctions on North Korea

This article explores the international measures that can resolve ecological problems in a highly securitised zone, taking North Korea (DPRK) as an example. The main question posed is how effective the available international policy measures for ecological risk mitigation are in a highly securitised country. Irreversible ecological conditions and aggravating humanitarian crises co-influence each other and threaten society as a whole. The main purpose of the article is to suggest ways of mainstreaming the environmental aspect of security in international actions that engage with problematised countries like North Korea. A cross-cutting analysis is provided on the possible approaches – including environmental aid, extended or integral humanitarian exemption, and proactive ecological intervention – for the international community to be engaged in the field of environmental security under three different circumstances: peace, security alert and conflict. The current international measures employed in North Korea demonstrate that available tools are either overused or underused, thereby failing to address the interconnectivity of the triple perils for the economy, human welfare and ecosystem, and further aggravating political tensions.

COVID-19 als Herausforderung für die internationale Solidarität: Rechtliches Regime und Anwendung unilateraler Sanktionen im Rahmen der Pandemie

The COVID-19 pandemic, as an emergency situation, challenges the existing system of international relations and institutes additional threats to every individual around the world. This article provides an overview of threats from the pandemic within the United Nations’ concept of international solidarity, demonstrates developments of sanctions regimes imposed by individual states and regional organisations without or beyond authorisation of the United Nations Security Council, and assesses their impact on the enjoyment of different categories of human rights as well as the efficacy of humanitarian exemptions and availability of humanitarian aid.

The Implications of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Trade

On 17 March 2020, the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, and the President of the European Commission (hereinafter, Commission), Ursula von der Leyen, announced further European Union (EU) actions in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. Since the pandemic reached Europe, the EU has adopted a number of trade-related measures, including the issuance of guidelines for national border management, as well as export authorisation requirements. On 14 March 2020, the Commission adopted “Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/402 of 14 March 2020 making the exportation of certain products subject to the production of an export authorisation”, temporarily restricting exports of “personal protective equipment” to destinations outside of the EU. On 14 April 2020, the Commission announced that it would narrow down export authorisation requirements to protective masks only and extend the geographical and humanitarian exemptions. Governments around the world have been implementing trade-related measures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, some trade restrictive, but a number of countries have also called for the elimination of export controls and restrictions on essential goods. As the greater implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on trade are still difficult to assess, the emergency measures taken by affected countries already require legal scrutiny. At the same time, it must be noted that, as noted above for the EU measures, measures around the world are subject to change dynamically in view of the evolution of the pandemic.

Deep Brain Stimulation for Facial Pain.

Electro-modulation of subcortical deep brain structures by surgically implanted electrodes is now standard evidence-based treatment for movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease and essential tremor and is approved for dystonia and obsessive-compulsive disorder under a humanitarian exemption. Historically, deep brain stimulation (DBS) for multiple indications has demonstrated acceptable complication rates, rare mortality, and reducing morbidity as the technology and the techniques of its application have advanced. DBS for the amelioration of pain has been performed since the early 1950s, and became widely used in the 1970s, when targeting the somatosensory thalamus was shown to be efficacious for intractable pain syndromes including facial pain. The technique fell out of favour in the late 1990s after 2 multicentre trials failed to meet end-point criteria. Since these trials, DBS for pain has remained for investigational or "off-label" use. Criticisms from previous literature have involved unsuitability of patient selection, as well as inconsistencies in neurosurgical technique. Clinical success with DBS for facial pain has been for the treatment of a variety of chronic neuropathic and nociceptive pain syndromes; including trigeminal neuropathy, post-herpetic neuralgia, deafferentation facial pain, "atypical" facial pain, cluster headaches and other trigeminal autonomic cephalalgias, as well as head and neck pathologies, most often which have been resistant to all other 1st- and 2nd-line medical and surgical treatments, when DBS has become a "last treatment option." An enhanced understanding of the mechanisms of action of DBS for pain will enhance outcome, and appropriately prescribe evolving novel nuclear brain targets.

COVID-19 and the policy of sanctions: An event analysis

The article aims to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the use of sanctions as a foreign policy tool. The following research questions are posed: in what way did COVID-19 affect the policy of sanctions around the world? To what extant did the initiators of sanctions change their restrictions? Where did COVID-19 rank on the global sanctions agenda? What was the position of the UN as a key institution of global governance and what was the reaction of the key countries that initiated the sanctions? The main hypothesis is that COVID-19 has not significantly altered the existing sanctions regime. No single initiator-state has changed its sanctions regime in principle, but states have made a number of humanitarian exemptions. However, these exemptions are limited and sanctions have continued to be imposed as usual. In some areas, COVID-19 has even exacerbated international tensions and raised the risks of sanctions, especially in U. S.—China relations. The hypothesis was tested using the event analysis method of sanctions episodes during the pandemic (March-June 2020). The research provides an analysis of quantity and quality of events and their distribution among initiators. Emphasis is placed on the study of events connected to COVID-19. The results reveal a limited impact of COVID-19 on sanctions policy and highlight the weakness of the UN to affect the behavior of key sanctions initiators even in conditions of a global threat such as COVID-19.

Assessment of the Effects of Economic Sanctions on Iranians' Right to Health by Using Human Rights Impact Assessment Tool: A Systematic Review.

Background: Over the years, economic sanctions have contributed to violation of right to health in target countries. Iran has been under comprehensive unilateral economic sanctions by groups of countries (not United Nations [UN]) in recent years. They have been intensified from 2012 because of international community’s uncertainty about peaceful purpose of Iran’s nuclear program and inadequacy of trust-building actions of this country. This review aimed to identify the humanitarian effects of the sanctions on the right of Iranians to health and the obligations of Iran and international community about it. Methods: To assess economic sanction policies and identify violated rights and the obligations of states according to international human rights laws, in this study, Human Rights Impact Assessments (HRIA) tool is used. Applying this tool requires collection of evidences regarding the situation of rights. To provide such evidence, a systematic review of literature which involved 55 papers retrieved from the web-based databases and official webpages of Iran’s government and UN’ health and human rights committees and organizations was done. All articles about the consequences of economic sanctions related to nuclear activities of Iran on welfare and health of Iranians published from January 2012 till February 2017 in English and Persian languages were included. Search terms were economic sanctions, embargoes, Iran, welfare, health and medicine. Additional studies were identified by cross checking the reference lists of accessed articles. All selected papers were abstracted and entered into a matrix describing study design and findings, and categorized into a framework of themes reflecting the areas covered (health and its determinants). According to HRIA framework, related obligations of Iran and other states about adverse effects of the sanctions on Iranians’ right to health were extracted. Results: The sanctions on Iran caused a fall of country’s revenues, devaluation of national currency, and increase of inflation and unemployment. These all resulted in deterioration of people’s overall welfare and lowering their ability to access the necessities of a standard life such as nutritious food, healthcare and medicine. Also, the sanctions on banking, financial system and shipment led to scarcity of quality lifesaving medicines. The impacts of sanctions were more immense on the lives of the poor, patients, women and children. Humanitarian exemptions did not protect Iranians from the adverse effects of sanctions. Conclusion: Countries which imposed economic sanctions against Iran have violated Iranians’ right to health. International community should have predicted any probable humanitarian effects of sanctions and used any necessary means to prevent it. Furthermore, Iran should have used any essential means to protect people from the adverse effects of sanctions. Now, they should work on alleviation of the negative effects of sanctions. Even though, some of the effects such as disability and death cannot be compensated. In future, before imposition of sanctions, decisions makers should advice an international order to prevent such impacts on targeted countries’ populations.

Testing times ahead

The research and testing of drugs and devices within the rigid three-tier clinical trial framework is designed to ensure both the safety and efficacy of a drug or device as a prerequisite for marketing authorisation from the regulatory body. Under this criterion, experimental drugs can be given only to people participating in a clinical trial; under the jurisdiction of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), however, there are several very different mechanisms to grant access to experimental treatments when the standard of care may be inadequate or even non-existent.1http://www.fda.gov/MedicalDevices/DeviceRegulationandGuidance/HowtoMarketYourDevice/InvestigationalDeviceExemptionIDE/ucm051345.htm (accessed July 22).Google Scholar Such early or extended access options include emergency use, compassionate use, off-label use, and humanitarian exemptions.2DiPALS Study Group CollaboratorsSafety and efficacy of diaphragm pacing in patients with respiratory insufficiency due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (DiPALS): a multicentre, open-label, randomised controlled trial.Lancet Neurol. 2015; 14: 883-892Google Scholar Although such applications can provide accelerated access for patients, in the USA this process is administered by the FDA, and although efforts have been made to streamline applications, many think that the process is still overly bureaucratic. This may, in some part, have contributed to the proliferation of right-to-try legislation across many US states.3FDA to simplify ‘Compassionate Use’ drug applications.Medscape. Feb 04, 2015; (accessed July 22).Google Scholar Under this legislation, terminally ill patients who have exhausted other available treatments will have a means to apply, through their physician, to the manufacturer of drugs that have passed phase 1 of a clinical trial, bypassing the need for federal approval and moving the decision to grant access onto the pharmaceutical company. Following on from individual state laws, on July 9, 2015, the Right to Try Act of 2015, which aims to prohibit federal government agencies from taking action to prevent terminally ill patients from accessing experimental drugs, was introduced to US Congress.4States move to give terminally ill ‘right-to-try’ drugs.USA Today. Feb 20, 2015; Google Scholar, 5http://www.fdalawblog.net/fda_law_blog_hyman_phelps/2015/07/the-right-to-try-act-of-2015-a-serious-challenge-to-fda-control-of-expanded-access-.html (accessed July 22).Google Scholar Understandably, these legislatures have divided commentators on issues of patient rights and the undermining of the FDA's authority. These arguments aside, the eventual outcomes of these deliberations will doubtless have a huge effect on patients, physicians, federal agencies, and pharmaceutical companies alike.

A Classification of Growth Friendly Spine Implants

Various types of spinal implants have been used with the objective of minimizing spinal deformities while maximizing the spine and thoracic growth in a growing child with a spinal deformity. The aim of this study was to describe a classification system of growth friendly spinal implants to allow researchers and clinicians to have a common language and facilitate comparative studies. Growth friendly spinal implant systems fall into 3 categories based upon the forces of correction the implants exert on the spine, which are as follows: Distraction-based systems correct spinal deformities by mechanically applying a distractive force across a deformed segment with anchors at the top and bottom of the implants, which commonly attach to the spine, rib, and/or the pelvis. The present examples of distraction-based implants are spine-based or rib-based growing rods, vertical expandable titanium rib prosthesis, and remotely expandable devices. Compression-based systems correct spinal deformities with a compressive force applied to the convexity of the curve causing convex growth inhibition. This compressive force may be generated both mechanically at the time of implantation, as well as over time resulting from longitudinal growth of vertebral endplates hindered by the spinal implants. Examples of compression-based systems are vertebral staples and tethers. Guided growth systems correct spinal deformity by anchoring multiple vertebrae (usually including the apical vertebrae) to rods with mechanical forces including translation at the time of the initial implant. The majority of the anchors are not rigidly attached to the rods, thus permitting longitudinal growth over time as the anchors slide over the rods. Examples of guided growth systems include the Luque trolley and Shilla. Each system has its benefits and shortcomings. Knowledge of the fundamental principles upon which these systems are based may aid the clinician to choose an appropriate treatment for patients. Having a common language for these systems may aid in comparative research. Vertical expandable titanium rib prosthesis is used with humanitarian exemption. The other devices mentioned in this manuscript are not approved for growing constructs by the Food and Drug Administration and are used off-label.

Economic sanctions

Economic sanctions have been referred to as a blunt instrument that the international community has often wielded without full consideration of the impact that these measures will have on the population of the targeted countries, particularly the weakest elements of society. Case studies of sanctions against Cuba, Iraq, and Yugoslavia have demonstrated the impact that sanctions can have on the availability of food, clean water, and medicine, causing many to conclude that all sanctions have extensive public health consequences. In this article, we examine the generalizability of these conclusions in a quantitative cross-national study of sanctions and their public health effects. Additionally, we compare these effects to those associated with both civil and interstate conflicts as critics have recently suggested that sanctions are not a humane alternative to armed warfare. We find that when sanctions have a large economic effect on the target they can have severe public health consequences. These consequences are substantively similar to those associated with major military conflicts. However, when sanctions have little or no economic effect on the target, they also have no substantive effect on public health. Building on recent work to explore the human consequences of war, this work also helps to demonstrate the importance of smart sanctions and humanitarian exemptions in sanctions policy.

Humanitarianism and the Quest for Smarter Sanctions

Just as economic sanctions appear to have become the coercive instrument of choice for the United Nations in the decade since the Gulf War, there has been increasing concern as to their effect — whether upon the civilian population within target states or upon the economic interests of historic trading partners. Such concerns have now found their way into policy-making within the United Nations and elsewhere, leading to the development of a new orthodoxy: the future of sanctions lies in their being made 'smart', 'targeted' and hedged with 'humanitarian exemptions'. This article seeks to outline the strands of this new policy initiative and evaluate its implications. It is argued that, given the continued uncertainty as to the effectiveness of sanctions as a coercive tool, the argument for smartening sanctions seems to rest primarily upon the claim that they are necessarily more 'humane'. It seems, furthermore, that the framework within which this idea of 'humanity' is to be deployed is that of humanitarian law. This, however, leads to the central problem, namely, that given the broad discretion assumed by the Security Council in the choice of measures to be adopted under Chapter VII, the role of humanitarian arguments will invariably be confined to one of ameliorating adverse consequences, rather than of limiting the capacity to impose those measures in the first place. In such a guise, they act less as a constraint upon the capacity of the Security Council to impose sanctions, and more as a vehicle for justifying their deployment. The response of the United Nations to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait is regarded by many as marking the dawn of a new era for the Organization as regards its role in maintaining international peace and security. A central feature of this apparent regeneration has been the deployment of economic sanctions under Article 41 of the UN Charter. The use of sanctions has, of course, been a continuing feature of international relations for many centuries, and in one form or another they continue to be deployed on a unilateral basis for a variety of strategic ends. There is nothing new here. But the Gulf War does seem to have represented a turning point as regards the deployment of collective sanctions under auspices of the United Nations (and under its influence, other regional organizations). In the period prior to 1990, the Security

Sanctions and Humanitarian Exemptions: A Practitioner's Commentary

Sanctions and Humanitarian Exemptions: A Practitioner's Commentary

International Protection of Refugees and Sanctions: Humanizing the Blunt Instrument

In this article, the author draws on recent practice and examines the history of sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council under Chapter VII of the Charter, with respect to threats to the peace, breaches of the peace, and acts of aggression. Noting that the Council's power to resort to sanctions is not subject to any particular limitations, she identifies a number of dilemmas in their use, possible limitations resulting from the provisions of general international law, and the extent to which sanctions have an impact on the international protection of refugees. Various proposals have been made to ‘finetune’ sanctions regimes or otherwise provide for humanitarian exemptions, and the author describes the practice of UNHCR and the sanctions committee for Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro), which offers one model for the future.