"Preface" [2014] ELECD 398; in Saul, Ben (ed), "Research Handbook on International Law and Terrorism" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2014) ix

Book Title: Research Handbook on International Law and Terrorism

Editor(s): Saul, Ben

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9780857938800

Section Title: Preface

Number of pages: 3

Extract:

Preface


the old problem of terrorism has long tested international law, at least
since european states grappled with requests to extradite political offend-
ers from the mid-nineteenth century. For much of the twentieth century,
international law took a low-key approach to terrorism, refraining from
according it legal significance or developing a specialised regime to counter
it.1 Instead, general international law was applied, even if implementation
was often inadequate. the only special norms developed were the many,
but modest, transnational criminal cooperation treaties adopted from
the 1960s. terrorism was chiefly regarded as a domestic law enforcement
problem, not a form of warfare or a challenge to global security.
the dramatic terrorist attacks on the United states of 11 september
2001 (`9/11') signalled an escalation in the intensity and reach of contem-
porary religious terrorism. It provoked a rapid, albeit haphazard, rethink
of the traditionally cautious international legal approach. at the multilat-
eral level this manifested in new, universal obligations imposed on states
by the United nations security council, to counter terrorist financing,
strengthen criminal repression, and constrain the mobility and support
networks of terrorists. Individual states also pushed the boundaries of
their rights and obligations under the existing law, including in areas such
as self-defence, torture, detention, rendition, military trials, and targeted
killings. these developments provoked much controversy and resistance,
especially on human rights grounds, from international, regional, domes-
tic and non-state actors. the predominant resort to a war paradigm also
tended to erase or ...