Il right to the truth: un nuovo diritto emergente nel diritto internazionale?

Anno LV, n. 227, gennaio-aprile 2020

The right to the truth, i.e. the right of victims of gross violations and of their families as well as of the society as a whole to know the full and complete truth about the circumstances surrounding serious violations, has emerged as a key priority in the agenda of United Nations and of regional Organizations. In this context, the right to the truth is commonly understood as a general principle of international human rights law and, specifically, as an autonomous, independent and inalienable right. However, international practice and jurisprudence (Inter-American Court of Human Rights and European Court of Human Rights) hardly support this conclusion as well as the existence of a right to the truth in customary international law.
This paper aims at demonstrating that the “right to the truth” does not seem to be conceived as a right strictu sensu in international human rights law but rather as an emphatic formula gathering other fundamental rights.