This chapter begins with the history of the international recognition of terrorism as a crime, including through the adoption of global and regional counter-terrorism treaties, and United Nations (UN) Security Council resolutions. The chapter then turns to a discussion of the challenges associated with defining terrorism, including its material and mental elements, and with national prosecutions. The chapter also explores terrorism as a war crime, a crime against humanity, and a crime under customary international law. The chapter’s consideration of torture begins with the definition found in the UN Convention Against Torture, and considers the obligation to prosecute or extradite (aut dedere aut judicare) under that treaty. It also discusses torture as an international crime under the ICC Statute and other statutes of international criminal tribunals. The chapter ends with an examination of ecocide as an emerging crime.

How does international law protect human rights?  We trace the development of human rights, focusing on the international response to the atrocities of World War II and the rapid pace of human rights conventions.  We demonstrate how the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights started a wave of other conventions designed to codify the treatment to which every human is entitled.  Not every state can achieve the wide array of protections these documents outline, but the UN has established methods for reporting violations that provide some minor satisfaction. The last half of the chapter is devoted to a discussion of regional human rights mechanisms, focusing on the European, Inter-American, and African systems and noting their jurisdictional differences. Finally, the development of mechanisms to respond to genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity are detailed, including the criminal tribunals set up for specific atrocities and the International Criminal Court.

Chapter 16 shows torture to be a lose-lose practice, its results virtually always unreliable. It is shown to be contrary to customary international law, the domestic and military laws of virtually every state, as well as the Geneva Conventions, the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and, of course, LOAC. Yet torture persists. After describing torture, international examples are detailed, including from CIA black sites. Excuses for torture are given and rebutted. Particular attention is given to US uses of torture after 9/11, none of which has been shown to have been useful, contrary to presidential assertions. Israel’s torture experience is covered, as is the French experience in Algeria. Waterboarding is clearly identified as torture, with several examples provided. The “ticking time bomb” scenario is argued to be an intellectual fraud, despite its being a frequent excuse for both liberals and conservatives to promote it. US military practice is also detailed. Cases and Materials include a real-world Sri Lankan ticking time bomb experience and a copy of a chilling US Department of Justice memorandum describing – and authorizing! – CIA black site methods of torture.

Chapter three examines China’s role in the drafting and adoption of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture.By covering the drafting of two different international agreements that occurred nearly a decade apart, this chapter illuminates China’s evolving posture as it shifted from a novice acting as a taker during the CAT negotiations to a more experienced regime participant attempting to constrain the regime during the negotiations over OPCAT.This chapter also documents the emergence in the late 1990s of a group of countries with shared views about resisting the kind of visiting authority envisioned in OPCAT, and the PRC’s cooperation with this group.I also briefly discuss the PRC’s interactions with the Committee against Torture to demonstrate that even though the PRC has been a taker toward this body it is not necessarily in substantive compliance with this convention.