The Role of Human Rights in the Regulation of Private Military and Security Companies

Activity of PMSCs entail in principle a number of different levels of international responsibility: that of the PMSCs as single entities, that of their employees in their individual capacity, and that of the States which in different capacities are connected to their services, i.e., the hiring State, the territorial State - if different from the latter - and the home State, being the one where the company is registered and based. This chapter examines the human rights standards applicable to PMSCs operations with respect to all these different layers of obligations arising from treaty law and customary international law. These layers include, at least, the obligation to respect and protect the rights and freedoms recognised by the relevant international instruments and the duty to remedy their possible violation. © The several contributors. All rights reserved.