Faṣlnāmah-i Pizhūhish-i Huqūq-i ̒Umūmī (Feb 2015)
Attribution of Private-Persons’ Wrongful Acts to a State: Standard of Control in Jurisprudence of Iran-U.S Claims Tribunal
Abstract
Attribution of private-person’s act to a state is accepted in international law insome exceptional matters. Acting under the direction or control of the state is oneof those exceptional cases; by proving state control over private persons andentities, their actions are attributable to the state. However for understanding therequired level of the control and direction, we shall review and inquiry the judicialjurisprudence in order to make these theoretical concepts more tangible. Iran-U.Sclaims tribunal, as the most prominent international arbitration, has separatedjurisdiction and the merit phase in some of its cases.From jurisdictional point ofview, the tribunal has applied a looser standard while in the merit, tribunal’sapproach has more affinity for theory of effective control. In such cases, as ageneral rule,stateshave notbeenliable for the conduct of non-state actors unlessthe tribunal could find the conduct in question intensely controlled by the state.Indeed the tribunal, in place of determining standard of control in these kinds ofcases, has not lowered the threshold for imputing private acts to statesbut treatedwith it in an exceptional manner. The purpose of present article is to examinestandard of direction and control, while the focus is on the jurisprudence of Iran-U.S claims tribunal.
