Extradition and fundamental rights: the perspective of the European Court of Human Rights

This paper provides a critical examination of the approach of the European Court of Human Rights to the process of extradition. It focuses upon the application of the European Convention of Human Rights to the processes of extradition, in the recent cases of Mamatkulov and Abdurasulovic v. Turkey and Shamayev and Others v. Georgia and Russia, in order to reveal the inconsistencies and difficulties of the position of the European Court of Human Rights. These difficulties and inconsistencies are shown, in turn, to be the product of a broader, two-fold characterisation of extradition. This characterisation defines extradition as a process that involves the individual in an essentially administrative, non-criminal procedure. This definition is the result of the application of the Court's earlier case law, in particular, Maaouia v. France. This application is one in which formal extradition proceedings are held to belong, together with deportation and expulsion, to a wider category of state procedures that, as an integral part of state sovereignty, control the entry, residence and expulsion of aliens.