conception of the ties of legal positivism. Yes, on one hand, the juridical category of
human beings’ international legal personality contributed to the instrumentalization of
the vindication of the rights of human beings, which arise from International Law, - on
the other hand the corpus juris of universal human rights provided the individual’s
legal personality with a much more ample dimension, no longer conditioned by the
right that results from the State’s public power.35
34.
It is important to mention here the contribution, regarding the intangibility of
the international legal personality of human beings, of the 17th Advisory Opinion of the
Inter-American Court of Human Rights, on the Juridical Condition and Human Rights
of the Child (of 08.28.2002): the Court made it clear that the Law necessarily
acknowledges the legal personality of all human being (whether it is a child or
teenager), regardless of their existential condition or of the scope of their legal
capacity to exercise their rights for themselves (capacity to exercise). In effect, the
acknowledgment and consolidation of the human being’s position as a full subject of
International Human Rights Law constitutes, in our days, - as I have been stating for
several years, - an unequivocal and eloquent statement of the advances in the
ongoing process of humanization of International Law itself (jus gentium).36
5.
The Conceptualization
International Human Rights Law.
of
Victim
and
the
Contribution
of
35.
The victim is the human being victimized in the rights inherent qua person.
The conceptualization of victim, the same as that of person (supra), has its historical
roots throughout the centuries. Etymologically, the term victim (from the Latin
victima) was originally used with regard to the person that was sacrificed (in rituals)
or destined to be sacrificed. As of the XVII century, it acquired the sense of the person
injured, tortured, or murdered by another. In the XVIII century, the term went on to
refer to the person injured or oppressed by another, or by any power or situation. The
term “victimize” was used in the XIX century (as of 1830).37 In the XX century, the
new discipline of victimology focused its attention on the victim,38 - in opposition to
criminology, which was focused on the criminal.
36.
Sometimes we refer to the victim as the “injured party”, as per certain current
human rights treaties; the victim is the human being that has suffered an injury or
damage, individually or in the company of other human beings, as a consequence of
an act – or omission – that is internationally illegal.39 In a historical perspective, the
.
A.A. Cançado Trindade, "A Consolidação da Personalidade e da Capacidade Jurídicas do
Indivíduo...", op. cit. supra n. (33), pp. 280-281; A.A. Cançado Trindade, "La Persona Humana
como Sujeto del Derecho Internacional: Avances de Su Capacidad Jurídica Internacional en la
Primera Década del Siglo XXI", in Jornadas de Derecho Internacional (Buenos Aires, November
2006), Washington D.C., OAS/ General Secretariat, 2007, pages 246-249.
35
. Cf., among my various articles in this sense, e.g., A.A. Cançado Trindade, A Humanização do
Direito Internacional, Belo Horizonte/Brasil, Edit. Del Rey, 2006, pages 3-409.
36
. Cf. The Oxford English Dictionary, 2a. ed., tomo XIX, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1989, p.
607; Asociación H. Capitant, Vocabulario Jurídico (dir. G. Cornu), Bogotá, Temis, 1995, p. 904;
G. Gómez de Silva, Breve Diccionario Etimológico de la Lengua Española, México, El Colegio de
México/FCE, 1996 [reimpr.], page 719.
37
.
Cf. E. Neuman, Victimología - El Rol de la Víctima en los Delitos Convencionales y No
Convencionales, Buenos Aires, Edit. Universidad, 1994, pages 27-28.
38
.
Cf. Union Académique Internationale, Dictionnaire de la terminologie du Droit
international, Paris, Sirey, 1960, pp. 448-449; J. Salmon (dir.), Dictionnaire de Droit
international public, Bruxelles, Bruylant, 2001, page 1131.
39