Caracas Chronicles

Quico says: Colombia has taken a justified pounding over the way it flouted International Law in attacking Raul Reyes’s Ecuadorean jungle hideout. The states brandishing the sanctity of International Law in that case, however, appear far less inclined to cite UN Security Council Resolution 1,373 – through which the security council:

1. Decides that all States shall:

(a) Prevent and suppress the financing of terrorist acts;

(b) Criminalize the wilful provision or collection, by any means, directly or indirectly, of funds by their nationals or in their territories with the intention that the funds should be used, or in the knowledge that they are to be used, in order to carry out terrorist acts;

(c) Freeze without delay funds and other financial assets or economic resources of persons who commit, or attempt to commit, terrorist acts …

…

2. Decides also that all States shall:
(a) Refrain from providing any form of support, active or passive, to entities or persons involved in terrorist acts, including by suppressing recruitment of members of terrorist groups and eliminating the supply of weapons to terrorists;

(b) Take the necessary steps to prevent the commission of terrorist acts, including by provision of early warning to other States by exchange of information;

(c) Deny safe haven to those who finance, plan, support, or commit terrorist acts, or provide safe havens;

(d) Prevent those who finance, plan, facilitate or commit terrorist acts from using their respective territories for those purposes against other States or their citizens;

…

(f) Afford one another the greatest measure of assistance in connection with criminal investigations or criminal proceedings relating to the financing or support of terrorist acts, including assistance in obtaining evidence in their possession necessary for the proceedings;

(g) Prevent the movement of terrorists or terrorist groups by effective border controls and controls on issuance of identity papers and travel documents, and through measures for preventing counterfeiting, forgery or fraudulent use of identity papers and travel documents…

Resolution 1,373 was approved under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, and is therefore legally binding for all UN member states, much like the principle of territorial integrity.

Of course, chavismo argues the resolution is irrelevant, because planting bombs, kidnapping people, using indiscriminate weapons such as landmines, etc. do not constitute “terrorist acts.” Trouble is, a later UN Security Council resolution (1,566) defined terrorism as:

…criminal acts, including against civilians, committed with the intent to cause death or serious bodily injury, or taking of hostages, with the purpose to provoke a state of terror in the general public or in a group of persons or particular persons, intimidate a population or compel a government or an international organization to do or to abstain from doing any act.

(In one of these weird twists of international law, turns out this definition is not binding on the international community…but still…)