Chapter 2 • The Major Universal Human Rights Instruments and the Mechanisms for Their Implementation 3.11 The Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, 1992 The Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, 1992, provides that “no State shall practise, permit or tolerate enforced disappearances” (art. 2(1)) and that “each State shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent and terminate acts of enforced disappearance in any territory under its jurisdiction” (art. 3). It further provides that “no order or instruction of any public authority, civilian, military or other, may be invoked to justify an enforced disappearance” and that “any person receiving such an order or instruction shall have the right and duty not to obey it” (art. 6(1)). Furthermore, “the right to a prompt and effective judicial remedy as a means of determining the whereabouts or state of health of persons deprived of their liberty and/or identifying the authority ordering or carrying out the deprivation of liberty is required to prevent enforced disappearances under all circumstances”, including situations where the State is facing “a threat of war, a state of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency” (art. 9(1) read in conjunction with art. 7; emphasis added). Such crisis situations cannot in any circumstances be invoked to justify disappearances (art. 7). 3.12 The Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“The Declaration on Human Rights Defenders”), 1998 The Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, 1998, the so-called Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, was elaborated over a 13-year period, and is of particular significance in that it underscores the right of everyone, “individually and in association with others, to promote and to strive for the protection and realization of human rights and fundamental freedoms at the national and international levels” (art. 1). It underlines States’ “prime responsibility and duty to protect, promote and implement all human rights” (art. 2), and inter alia defines existing norms concerning the right “to participate in peaceful activities against violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms” (art. 12(1)). Each person has, moreover, a right “to be protected effectively under national law in reacting against or opposing, through peaceful means, activities and acts, including those by omission, attributable to States that result in violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms, as well as acts of violence perpetrated by groups or individuals that affect the enjoyment” of those rights and freedoms (Art. 12(3); emphasis added). By resolution 2000/61, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights decided to request the Secretary-General to appoint a special representative to “report on the situation of human rights defenders in all parts of the world and on possible means to enhance their protection in full compliance with the Declaration” (operative paragraph 3). 66 Human Rights in the Administration of Justice: A Manual on Human Rights for Judges, Prosecutors and Lawyers