Karima Bennoune

This semester Professor Karima Bennoune is teaching a seminar on Terrorism and International Law, a course she conceived of in the fall of 2001 as an academic response to 9/11 and which she first taught as a visiting professor at the University of Michigan Law School in spring 2002. Among the questions the class will explore are what is terrorism and how can this type of violence be effectively punished and prevented. Bennoune’s article “Terror/Torture,” which addresses the issue of protecting human rights while countering terrorism, was designated one of the top 10 global security law review articles of 2008 by Oxford University Press. Her book about Muslim opponents of fundamentalism and terrorism is forthcoming from Norton in 2012.


What is the principal lesson you want students to learn from the class?

I would hope that my students understand that terrorism is an utterly deplorable atrocity, yet it is one to which there are legal responses. The relevance of the rule of law sometimes gets overlooked when discussing terrorism, and it is critical to recognize that there is a legal response even to something as grave as terrorism. International law is both a very important tool and a very important limit in the fight against terrorism. International law can help states combat terrorism but it also rules out counterterrorism tactics that violate the law, such as the torture or ill treatment of detainees. It is critical in a democratic society that questions about the application and limitations of international law in fighting terrorism be debated in a thoughtful way from diverse points of view.

What has been the impact of 9/11 on international law?

Some of the first responses of the international community were the resolutions adopted first by the United Nations Security Council on September 12, 2001 and then by the General Assembly on September 14, 2001 that condemn the terrorist attacks of 9/11. By the end of September the Security Council had adopted Resolution 1373, a robust set of strategies to combat terrorism. Resolution 1373 has been effective in some ways by pushing member states to comply with international norms in fighting terrorism, such as by inhibiting the financing of terrorist groups.

Unfortunately, the international response to 9/11 has also had some negative impact on human rights around the world. The key question is how we maximize the effectiveness of the international response to terrorism while also minimizing the potential harm to human rights.

How does terrorism impact human rights?

All too often we only think about human rights and terrorism from the perspective of judging the state response to terrorist acts. But many human rights can be affected by terrorism itself, including the rights to life and security, but also the right to vote, to freedom of expression and assembly and movement, the right to an education, and the rights to be free from violence against women and free consent in marriage. It is important to think about terrorism as a human rights violation and not only as a threat to security.

There has not been enough of a discussion about the human rights of victims and survivors of terrorism, such as 9/11’s first responders who have developed illnesses. That is part of the discussion about terrorism to which I want to make a contribution in my scholarship.

Posted 9/2/11