UNHCR's ELIGIBILITY GUIDELINES FOR ASSESSING THE ...

coherent system or a series of systematic and repeated acts. Thus, acts of torture 765
committed in a systematic manner or on a widespread scale, targeting political suspects or
other civilians, could constitute crimes against humanity as envisaged by Article 1F(a). It is
important to note that crimes against humanity can be committed in the context of an
internal or international armed conflict, as well as outside a situation of armed conflict. 766
Crimes against humanity were committed throughout the ruling of the former regime
(1979-2003) in situations of international and internal armed conflict as well as during
government campaigns aiming at systematically suppressing political opponents or
minority groups. 767 Torture was used systematically and on a widespread scale in Iraq
under the former regime of Saddam Hussein. 768
3. Serious Non-Political Crimes (Article 1F[b])
The gravity of serious non-political crimes as stipulated in Article 1F(b) should be judged
against international standards, not simply by its categorization in the host country or
country of origin. Examples of “serious” crimes include homicide, rape, torture and armed
robbery. A serious crime should be considered non-political when other motives (such as
personal reasons or gain) predominate. Where no clear link exists between the crime and its
alleged political objective or when the act in question is disproportionate to the alleged
political objective, non-political motives are predominant. In the Iraq context, acts such as
assassinations, abductions or torture committed by State security forces, armed opposition
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Article 1 of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment defines torture as
“any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such
purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third
person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for
any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or
with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity”.
See the Convention Against Torture, available in UNHCR’s Refworld at http://www.unhcr.org/cgibin/texis/vtx/refworld/rwmain?docid=3ae6b3a94.
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See UNHCR, Background Note on Exclusion, at paragraphs 33–36 and Annex C, see above footnote 741.
767
See consistent reporting by the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on the Human
Rights Situation in Iraq, http://www.unhchr.ch/huridocda/huridoca.nsf/FramePage/Iraq+En?OpenDocument.
A Dutch court in The Hague ruled in 2005 that the killing of thousands of Kurds in Iraq in the 1980s was an
act of genocide. It said that it had “no other conclusion than that these attacks were committed with the intent
to destroy the Kurdish population of Iraq”; see: BBC News, Killing of Iraq Kurds “genocide”, 23 December
2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4555000.stm. See also: HRW, Genocide in Iraq – The Anfal
Campaign Against the Kurds, July 1993, http://www.hrw.org/reports/1993/iraqanfal/. There are also claims
that the destruction of the marshlands in Southern Iraq constituted “genocide”; see, for example, Prof. Joseph
W. Dellapenna, The Iraqi Campaign Against the Marsh Arabs: Ecocide as Genocide, Villanova University
School of Law, 31 January 2003, http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forum/forumnew92.php; USIP, The Marsh Arabs of
Iraq: Hussein’s Lesser Known Victims, 25 November 2002, http://www.usip.org/newsmedia/releases/2002/
nb20021125.html.
768
See consistent reporting by the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on the Human
Rights Situation in Iraq, available at http://www.unhchr.ch/huridocda/huridoca.nsf/FramePage/Iraq+En?
OpenDocument.
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