The intervention in Grenada in 1983 by a joint task force composed of US forces and soldiers of member States of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States is the latest in a series of armed interventions carried out by members of the United Nations without being authorized by competent UN organs but nevertheless claiming to be non-violative of the UN Charter. The reason for this claim was allegedly (among others) that the interventions were ‘humanitarian’ in character. In this recent instance, the intervention was said by US officials to be necessary ‘to stop an authentic reign of terror’ ‘to assist in the establishment and the restoration of democratic institutions, particularly when they have been cruelly and violently destroyed’ and to ‘rescue others from bloodshed and turmoil and to prevent humankind from drowning in a sea of tyranny’

The 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (hereinafter the 1979 Convention) was adopted unanimously by the United Nations General Assembly on 18 December 1979. It can be seen as the culmination of the work of the UN Commission on the Status of Women in its function of preparing international legal instruments on the status of women. The Convention brings together in a single international instrument the various international conventions already in existence which define the sphere of womens rights and brings into the legislative ambit many of the recommendations which have been adopted over the years by the Commission since its inception in 1946.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights provides for a modicum of international supervision of its States parties through the scrutiny of their periodic reports by the Human Rights Committee. This measure, which may be described as one of ‘international implementation’, operates in concert with the ‘domestic implementation’ requirement included in Article 2 of the Covenant. The ‘international implementation’ aspect entails some abridgement of the sovereignty of States parties and thus represents a noteworthy development in international politics. The companion aspect of ‘domestic implementation’ is, however, it is submitted, of far greater and more enduring significance for the promotion and protection of human rights. For, the availability and the exercise of the rights of the Covenant depend, as a matter of practical fact, upon their incorporation into the domestic system and the constraints — legal and social — that that system may place upon their exercise. The Covenant's rights are intended to be legal rights implemented by States parties and exercised by individuals within domestic legal systems. In addition:

‘Not only are the domestic remedies likely to be speedier and perhaps less expensive; in many cases they may be more effective, because a national court of appeal or Supreme Court can usually reverse the decision of a lower court, whereas the decision of an international organ does not have that effect, even though it will engage the international responsibility of the State concerned.’