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Kaunda v. President of the Republic of South Africa. Case CCT 23/04. 2004 (10) BCLR 1009

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2017

Mary Coombs
Mary Coombs*
Affiliation:
University of Miami School of Law
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Type
International Decisions
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 99 , Issue 3 , July 2005 , pp. 681 - 686
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 2005

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References

1 Kaunda v. President of the Republic of South Africa (CC Aug. 4, 2004). The South African Constitution and the judgments of the Constitutional Court are available at <http://www.concourt.gov.za>.

2 Id., paras. 2–5.

3 Id., para. 21.

4 Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, sec. 233.

5 Kaunda, para. 44.

6 Mohamed v. President of the Republic of South Africa, 2001 (3) SALR 893 (CC).

7 Kaunda, paras. 44–49.

8 Id., para. 52.

9 Id., para. 26 (citing special rapporteur’s First Report [to the International Law Commission] on Diplomatic Protection, draft Art. 1(1), UN Doc. A/CN.4/506, at 11 (2000)).

10 Id., para. 23 (citing Barcelona Traction Light & Power Co. (Belg. v. Spain), Second Phase, 1970 ICJ Rep. 3, paras. 78–79 (Feb. 5)).

11 Id., para. 29.

12 Id., paras. 62–63.

13 The opinion of Justice Ngcobo first argued that the Bill of Rights provisions of the South African Constitution, the human rights embodied in treaties to which South Africa is a party, and the general commitment of South Africa to the values of human dignity, equality, and human rights should inform the Court’s answer to the question of whether there is a duty of diplomatic protection as a needed remedy for these rights. He then found the textual basis for such a right in the intersection of sections 3(2) and 7(2). Id., paras.173–76, 186–88. The opinion of Justice O’Regan similarly grounded itself in assertions of South Africa’s deep commitment to the advancement of human rights, but relied, like the majority, only on section 3(2). While that section could be construed as providing only that all citizens are equally entitled to whatever rights, privileges, and benefits the state provides, O’Regan concluded that the constitutional commitment to the promotion of human rights calls for finding substantive content in the provision, including a right to diplomatic protection. Id., para. 238.

14 Id., para. 77; see also id., paras. 175 (Ngcobo, J.), 244 (O’Regan, J.).

15 BverfGE 55, 349 (1980), available in English translation at 90 ILR 387.

16 R. v. Sec’y of State for Foreign & Commonwealth Aff., [2002] All ER (D) 70 (C.A.).

17 See, e.g., Kaunda, paras. 73–74 (discussion of Hess), 75 (discussion of Abbasi).

18 Id., para. 63.

19 Id., paras. 79–80.

20 Id, para. 69.

21 Id., paras. 164 & 188 (Ngcobo, J.), 238 (O’Regan, J.), 275 (Sachs, J.). Neither Ngcobo nor O’Regan defined “egregious.”

22 Id., para. 92.

23 Id., paras. 116–21 (citing reports by Amnesty International, the International Bar Association, and the UN Commission on Human Rights).

24 In fact, the applicants were all released by Zimbabwe and turned over to South Africa in May 2005. Tawanda Kanhem, Mercenaries’ Release Marks End of an Era, Herald Online (Zimbabwe) (May 24, 2005), at <http://www.zimupdates.co.zw/archives/archives.html>. One may assume, though there is no public report, that diplomatic efforts by the South African government helped achieve this outcome. While most of the applicants were subsequently freed, eight are facing charges in South Africa. Eight ‘Mercenaries’ Face Charges in South Africa, Agence France-Presse English Wire (June 3, 2005).

25 “Although the abolitionist movement is growing stronger at an international level, capital punishment is not prohibited by the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights or the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and is still not impermissible under international law.” Kaunda, para. 98.

26 Id., para. 142.

27 Id., para. 133.

28 See, e.g., Erasmus, Gerhard & Davidson, Lyle, Do South Africans Have a Right to Diplomatic Protection? 2000 S. Afr Y.B. Int’l L. 113 Google Scholar. The existence of such an obligation by a state toward its citizens had been suggested as early as Vattel in The Law of Nations, bk. II., ch. VI, §71 (Berry & Rogers 1787) (1758) (“Whoever uses a citizen ill, indirectly offends the state, which ought to protect this citizen, and his sovereign should revenge the injuries, punish the aggressor, and, if possible, oblige him to make entire satisfaction; since otherwise the citizen would not obtain the great end of the civil association, which is safety.”).

29 John Dugard, the distinguished South African jurist, had pressed this position as the International Law Commission’s special rapporteur on diplomatic protection, see First Report on Diplomatic Protection, paras. 28–31, UN Doc. A/CN.4/506 (2000), but the Commission rejected his proposal, id., para. 87.

30 Kaunda, paras. 44 (Chaskalon, C.J.), 214 ((O’Regan, J.). This distinction is implicit in the definition of diplomatic protection, see id., para. 26 (Chaskalon, C.J.), as limited to responding to “internationally wrongful act[s].”

31 Id., paras. 41–42, 54–56.

32 Id., paras. 44–45 (Chaskalon, C.J.), 187 ((Ngcobo, J), 228 (O’Regan, J.). As the Kaunda court noted, the courts of odier states have also dealt with the question of when constitutional rights may be claimed in regard to extraterritorial government action. See, for example, the Supreme Court of Canada’sjudgment in R. v. Cook, [ 1998] 2 SCR 597. The U.S. Supreme Court has found that some constitutional rights do not apply in full extraterritorially, see, e.g., United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. 259 (1990)

33 Kaunda, paras. 40, 44 (Chaskalon, C.J.), 229 (O’Regan, J.).

34 See supra note 25.

35 Kaunda, para. 99.

36 See, e.g., id., paras. 65, 69, 127, 133, 202.

37 The opinions suggest that the need for such oversight is especially pronounced in the context of undefined “gross” or “egregious” abuses. See id., paras. 70, 163–64, 210, 238, 275.

38 See the list of means of diplomatic protection in Dugard’s first report to the International Law Commission, supra note 29, para. 43 (quoted in Kaunda, para. 27).

39 See Kaunda, paras. 79–80, 192–93.

40 Erasmus & Davidson, supra note 28, at 120; Hopkins, Kevin, Diplomatic Protection and the South African Constitution: Does a South African Citizen Have an Enforceable Constitutional Claim Against the Government? 16 S. Afr. J. Pub. L. 387, 394–95 (2001)Google Scholar.

41 BverfGE 55, 349 (1980), available in English translation at 90 ILR 387, 398.

42 R. v. Sec’y of State for Foreign & Commonwealth Aff., [2002] All ER (D) 70, para. 37 (C.A.) (quoting R. v. Sec’y of State for Foreign & Commonwealth Aff. ex parte Pirbhai, 107 ILR 462, 479 (C.A. 1985)).

43 Id., para. 107.