Keywords
secession
separatism
human rights
international law
subjects of international law
regime of statehood
How to Cite
Abstract
This paper describes the main events that led to the territorial fragmentation of Republic of Georgia in the first triennium of the nineties. The article presents the legal elements that support the unilateral separation of regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia from a relationship between principle of secession and principle of self-determination in public international law. The purpose of this essay is point out that the persistent human rights violations directed against these regions endow of legitimacy the enforcement of the right of secession as a last resort to protect human rights. The emergence of this type of separatist entities in post-Soviet space are a challenge for international law because they set a redefinition of concepts such as sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of the borders of the state as a main unit of international law and international relations.This journal is registered under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License. Thus, this work may be reproduced, distributed, and publicly shared in digital format, as long as the names of the authors and Pontificia Universidad Javeriana are acknowledged. Others are allowed to quote, adapt, transform, auto-archive, republish, and create based on this material, for any purpose (even commercial ones), provided the authorship is duly acknowledged, a link to the original work is provided, and it is specified if changes have been made. Pontificia Universidad Javeriana does not hold the rights of published works and the authors are solely responsible for the contents of their works; they keep the moral, intellectual, privacy, and publicity rights.
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