National Implementation of United Nations Sanctions: A Comparative Study

This work is a comparative study of domestic implementation of Security Council mandatory sanctions taken under Article 41, Chapter VII of the UN Charter, including the establishment of the two international criminal tribunals, the ICTY and ICTR, and recent resolutions on the combating of the financing of terrorism. The book examines implementation in 16 select States in Europe, America, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, underlining also the particular problems arising from sanctions implementation by the European Union, by a permanently neutral and former non-Member State – Switzerland - and by States confronted with special economic problems within the meaning of Article 50 of the UN Charter.

Three interrelated themes are addressed. The first, of a theoretical nature, concerns the question of whether implementation of Security Council resolutions, particularly where perceived to be in fulfilment of community objectives, poses problems which are in some way distinct from those raised by the implementation of other conventional international law obligations, thereby shedding a different light on the traditional relationship between international and municipal law. The second concerns the effectiveness of the decisions of the Security Council viewed from the perspective of the effective mise en œuvre of these decisions in national law. The third theme concerns the legitimacy of Security Council resolutions as seen from the viewpoint of domestic legal systems, that is the extent to which Security Council decisions encroach on internationally or constitutionally protected individual rights and the potential role played by domestic courts in reviewing the decisions of the Security Council. The latter has assumed particular importance in the framework of the combating of the financing of terrorism.

This work, which brings together the research results of 29 academics and experts, is the second publication within the framework of a project on Security Council sanctions carried out under the auspices of the Graduate Institute of International Studies. The first, which looked at a broad set of issues, was entitled United Nations Sanctions and International Law and was published by Kluwer Law International in 2001.

'The publication of this collective work indeed fills a gap in the literature on Security Council sanctions...the book also constitute a useful research tool, while, when coupled with the previous relevant collective work edited by Professor Gowlland-Debbas, it can serve as comprehensive statement of the law on UN sanctions.'
Antonios Tzanakopoulos, Global Law Books, 2005.