Vem ska betala ersättning till offren för den iranska nedskjutningen av det ukrainska planet (PS752)?

Jag blev för en stund sedan uppringd av en journalist från TT som ställde frågan om det finns några folkrättsliga bestämmelser om detta.

Iran är förstås moraliskt ansvarigt gentemot det ukrainska flygbolaget (Ukraine International Airlines; UIA) och kanske också ansvarigt enligt iransk lag. Om man inte ersätter bolaget direkt kan den ukrainska staten, som UIA:s hemstat, göra ett folkrättsligt anspråk för bolagets räkning gentemot den iranska regeringen. Om Iran skulle vägra att ersätta fullt ut får det bli en rättssak, inför internationella domstolen i Haag eller i skiljedom; det förutsätter dock att båda parter accepterar en sådan tvistlösning. Det är också möjligt att saken kan tas upp i den internationella civila luftfartsorganisationen ICAO; jag känner dock inte till ICAO:s regler.

Passagerarna (varav 17 svenska medborgare eller i Sverige fast bosatta) har rätt till ersättning från flygbolaget enligt 1999 års Montrealkonvention. Eftersom UIA inte kan lastas för nedskjutningen är beloppet dock begränsat. Om det begränsade beloppet inte täcker en rimlig ersättning bör det vara Iran som är ansvarigt för det överskjutande beloppet. Precis som vad som gäller för flygbolaget kan hemstaterna till de omkomna göra anspråk hos Iran om Iran inte betalar. Dessutom omfattar Irans ansvar gentemot UIA ersättning för de belopp som UIA kan komma att betala till offrens anhöriga.

Här kan till sist tilläggas att när USA skjöt ner ett iranskt passagerarplan 1988 betalade man ut ersättning till offren på ”humanitära” grunder. Man erkände dock inte att man brutit mot folkrätten, utan att det handlade om ett misstag som var ursäktligt. Oavsett hur det förhöll sig med den saken kan man konstatera att Iran inte har försökt att undkomma ansvar på den grunden, varför det nog inte behöver diskuteras om nedskjutningen av ursäktlig,p g a den spända situationen i området eller av andra skäl.

What would it take to justify the killing?

As implied in my previous blogpost, the Pentagon had justified the strike by saying that it was “aimed at deterring future Iranian attack plans.” The DoD had also claimed that Soleimani was “actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region”.

The debate, in particular in the US, now seems to be about whether there was proof about such plans. As I argued Friday (para 5), even if there were such plans, the strike would have been illegal.

Another possible ground is that the US was already involved in a violent encounter with Iran, was also suggested in the statement, since Soleimani allegedly had “orchestrated” attacks against Iraqi and US personnel, including the one on 27 December. If that had been the case, there would already be an armed conflict, and the US could justify the killing under the laws of armed conflict (my para 2). However, the US itself has not claimed that it was acting under those laws, since it has not invoked the laws or armed conflicts, nor used the pertinent terms “belligerency”, “armed attack”, “armed conflict” or the more colloquial word “war” (see here and here). In addition, even if it had invoked those rules, it would still have to show that the armed struggle betweeen the two parties reaches that level.

The killing of Soleimani

1.       Neither the White House nor the Department of Defense (DoD) has offered a legal justification for the killing of general Soleimani. That is probably because it is difficult to find one.

2.       If there is a war (armed conflict) between the US and Iran, then Soleimani, as a general, is surely a legitimate target. However, there is no such war.

3.       There is, perhaps, a civil war (a non-international armed conflict) in Iraq, in which the US is supporting the Iraqi government. (My impression is, though, that the still ongoing violence in Iraq does not reach the level of civil war.) If so, the US has to act under the authority of the Iraqi government, which invited them. It is not at all clear that the killing is within the bounds of what the Iraqi government has approved. The Iraqi prime minister Abdul-Mahdi has condemned the earlier US attack on a Shia militia on 29 December.

4.       Another potential justification is that the US is at war with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), headed by Soleimani, which the US declared to be a terrorist organisation in 2019. However, the US has not declared itself to be at war with all terrorist organisations, but only with those affiliated with al-Qaeda, and this certainly does not apply to the IRGC.

5.       Yet another argument, perhaps suggested by the DoD, is that it was an act of self-defence against an imminent attack, even though the Pentagon does not use such legal terminology. If so, the US has to show that Iran was involved in a plot to attack the US or US forces and that the killing of Soleimani was necessary to prevent such attacks. This seems difficult: If these alleged attacks are already planned, the killing of one general is probably not a useful means to stop them; if they were not planned, they are not imminent. And the right to such “anticipatory self-defence” is controversial. Further, the US needs to explain why it had the right to execute that attack on the territory of a third party, Iraq. In addition, if the US is invoking self-defence it is also inviting Iran to claim that it is now involved in an armed conflict with the US, which means that Iran can use all sorts of military measures against US targets. For all of these reasons, it is understandable that the US did not explicitly invoke such a right.

6.       If there is no war whatsoever, then human rights apply fully. (In war, human rights still apply, but with many exceptions for legitimate belligerent acts.) The US claims that it is not bound by human rights law outside its own territory and jurisdiction, but it is one of very few countries to make that claim, which is not based on the better interpretation of the UN human rights conventions or on international customary law. In fact, that claim is ridiculous since it means that civilians would be better protected in war than in peace. Under human rights law, the act constitutes an illegal extrajudicial killing.

7.       None of this changes the fact that Soleimani has the blood of hundreds if not thousands of people on his hands, not least from the (underreported) brutal crackdown of the demonstrations in Iran in November as well as for his support of the al-Assad regime in Syria. However, as Trump himself has noted, the US is not the world’s policeman. Not only because it no longer wants to, but most of all because it does not have that authority.