The European Union restrictive measures against serious human rights violations in the Mediterranean: ¿a normative power?

Abstract

Over the last decade, the European Union has been engaged in a practice of some relevance in the application of restrictive measures in response to serious human rights violations committed in a number of states, and more particularly in the countries of the southern Mediterranean; in this region, the cases of Libya and Syria in particular stand out. More recently, the EU has established a targeted mechanism of thematic or horizontal restrictive measures, specifically designed to address serious human rights violations, which has already been implement against some two dozen natural and legal persons and entities, including two individuals responsible for such violations in Libya. In both cases, it is a matter of resorting to measures of retorsion and decentralized countermeasures admitted by general international law, aimed at achieving the cessation and reparation –in the interest of the beneficiaries of the obligation breached- of serious human rights violations. In its external action, the European Union thus assumes the role of a normative power committed to promoting and respecting human rights, albeit with evident double standards or different standards when deciding to use such restrictive measures. On this point, the EU is request to develop in the coming years a more coherent and uniform external action in the application of restrictive measures in response to serious human rights violations. Both at a universal level and, more particularly, in its relations with the states in its southern neighbourhood, whose political, economic and social stability is of fundamental importance to the EU.