Mapping State Responsibility for Complicity in Extraordinary Rendition

Abstract

In addition to the difficulties involved in establishing the facts of complicity in extraordinary rendition, a further challenge encountered by victims and human rights groups has been that of establishing legal responsibility on the part of European States for facilitating implementation of the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Programme. In seeking to understand the applicable legal principles, the chapter first explores the rules of State responsibility for complicity in wrongful acts as they have been framed within the overarching context of international law (ARSIWA) and in international human rights law. It concludes that human rights bodies, in particular the ECtHRts, have begun to apply an imputational, risk-based rule of State responsibility for complicity that is clearly wider than the traditional approach expressed in ARSIWA.