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INTERNATIONAL LAW OF VICTIMS
of discrimination, etc.). Secondly, victims’ rights are
“rights which are interpreted
by international bodies under international treaties of human rights”
(p. 123), i.e.
international case-law helps to better understand some aspects of these rights, such
as the duty to investigate, and prosecute and punish, human rights violations.
Finally, they are
“rights that are interrelated and that have links between each other”
(p. 129). Those findings, albeit largely correct, give rise to certain questions, which
unfortunately remain unanswered, and mostly unasked, in the book. If most of
the victims’ rights make part of the
lex lata,
why to engage in a lengthy discussion
of the status of the UN General Assembly resolutions? Are victims’ rights human
rights? And if so, is the status of victim a special status under the human rights law?
Questions of this type, to which more could be added, would deserve to be discussed
in the publication.
The longest chapter in the book, taking up almost half of its pages, endeavours
to set up a
“catalogue of rights afforded to victims by international norms”
(p. 133).
The catalogue is an impressive one, encompassing eleven individual rights (right
of emergency assistance, right of continuing assistance, right to investigation and
prosecution, right to effective access to the law and justice, right to reparation
and compensation, right to the protection of private and family life, right to the
protection of dignity and security, right to information, right to specific training for
those persons assisting victims, right to truth, right to memory), with the option left
to states to extend the protection even further (increased protection). The author
provides a detailed analysis of each specific right, seeking to establish its legal basis
and to identify its content. Such an analysis, however, reveals that most of the rights
would most probably face problems meeting the three characteristics of victims’ rights
mentioned above and, especially, the first characteristic of the right being part of the
human rights
lex lata
. The legal basis given for most of the rights is that of various
soft-law instruments, coupled with occasional, and mostly indirect, references in the
case-law of human rights bodies. Thus the question whether international law of
victims already exists, as the book seems to suggest, or whether it is in the process of
formation, naturally arises, unfortunately without being paid adequate attention by
the author.
A review of a book dealing with an international law subject normally focuses
on the content of the publication. In the case at hand, however, the form – or
rather the language – also needs to be briefly commented upon. The book would
have benefited from a more thorough language revision, as it exhibits a rather
high number of mistakes and misspellings. The reference to “previous” questions
instead of “preliminary” ones, the lack of uniformity in the orthography of certain
expressions (International Law – International law etc.) and other deficiencies of this
type do not make the understanding of the text impossible – at least not for those
with some knowledge of Spanish, who should be able to reconstruct the meaning
of the text on the basis of the original language. Yet, it unsuitably takes attention
away from the content of the book to its form and provokes embarrassment on the