The United Nations and Human Rights

In his book, International Law and Human Rights, the late Sir Hersch Lauterpacht, eminent international scholar and former judge at the International Court of Justice, strongly rejected the view that the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations referring to human rights and fundamental freedoms were devoid of any legal commitment, that they were to be considered a mere declaration of principle. He wrote: "These provisions are no mere embellishment of a historic document; they were not the result of an afterthought or an accident of drafting. They were adopted, with deliberation and after prolonged discussion before and during the San Francisco Conference, as part of the philosophy of the new international system and as a most compelling lesson of the experience of the inadequacies and dangers of the old."