A/HRC/32/39
to include such issues, provided there is a recognized basis. Moreover, the Guiding
Principles on Business and Human Rights highlight that there are strong policy reasons for
home States to set out clearly the expectation that businesses respect human rights abroad,
especially when the State itself is involved in or supports those businesses. The reasons
include ensuring predictability for business enterprises by providing coherent and
consistent messages, and preserving the State’s own reputation.46 While the extraterritorial
scope of a prominent national example, the Alien Tort Statute in the United States, has
recently been limited, there are a number of other potential avenues, such as in the
European Union, that allow for extraterritorial claims to be pursued against corporations for
human rights abuses.47
4.
Internal accountability mechanisms
117. As part of the due diligence aspect of the Guiding Principles on Business and
Human Rights, companies are encouraged to set up internal grievance mechanisms, also
referred to in some instances as “operational-level” or “project-level” grievance
mechanisms. The mechanisms are usually set up to allow those that are affected by the
actions of the company to bring allegations of non-compliance with internal policies and
procedures to the attention of the company. Several of the voluntary initiatives, including
the International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers, also require
companies to set up internal grievance mechanisms to monitor compliance with the
principles of the initiatives, considered to be external unless incorporated into those of the
company.48 Notwithstanding the potential of internal grievance mechanisms to offer another
course of redress to victims of corporate human rights abuse, the functioning of those
mechanisms has met with great scepticism in the ranks of civil society.
118. Most internal grievance mechanisms currently require claimants to sign a legal
waiver that keeps victims from pursuing further legal action. 49 While the use of such
grievance mechanisms has produced some successes in particular circumstances, human
rights abuses of certain magnitudes, including violations of the right to life, cannot be
adequately addressed through an internal grievance mechanism, and in such cases legal
waivers can represent a deliberate impediment to accountability.
IV. Conclusions
119. The use of force by private security providers is not uncommon, and can be a
necessary element to some of the services they provide. However, the unregulated or
improper use of force by such providers can severely jeopardize the protection of the
right to life. Where the use of force by private security providers is regulated under
the domestic laws and regulations of States that specifically concern private security,
46
47
48
49
20
John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, 2010). Available from
www.hks.harvard.edu/m-rcbg/CSRI/publications/workingpaper_59_zerk.pdf.
See Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, principle 2.
J. Kirshner, “A call for the EU to assume jurisdiction over extraterritorial corporate human rights
abuses”, Northwestern Journal of International Human Rights, vol. 13, No. 1 (2015), pp. 1-26.
See International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers, article 66.
See “Rape victims must sign away rights to get remedy from Barrick”, MiningWatch (30 January
2013). Available from http://miningwatch.ca/news/2013/1/30/rape-victims-must-sign-away-rightsget-remedy-barrick. See also K. McVeigh, “Canada mining firm compensates Papua New Guinea
women after alleged rapes”, Guardian, 3 April 2015. Available from
www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/03/canada-barrick-gold-mining-compensates-papua-newguinea-women-rape.
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