المسؤولية الدولية المدنية عن تفشي الأمراض الوبائية : جائحة كوفيد-19 نموذجا

الملخص EN

This research deals with the extent to which civil state responsibility for epidemic diseases can be held.

A special focus will be on the Covid-19 pandemic that originated in the People's Republic of China, as a model of a case study.

To achieve the aim, this issue was initially analyzed on the basis of the provisions of civil state responsibility in the light of public international law via addressing its concept and international legal basis.

A brief explanation given to the international legal texts on the pillars and key-conditions of international responsibility and associated effects, on the one hand.

On the other hand, a special emphasis placed on the provisions of the articles of World Health Organization’s Constitution and the International Health Regulations, in order to assess whether such international legal rules are binding to the member states or not; i.e.

clarifying the extent to which international rules have jurisdiction of the topic under discussion in terms of applying the international legal rules.

Furthermore, this paper analyzed the international judiciary attitude on epidemic diseases in general and the Covid-19 pandemic in particular.

Rather, it presented and interpreted some relevant judicial precedents (case law) before the International Court of Justice as well as the extent to which a civil legal action can be filed against the Chinese government before this International Court due to its violation of both principles of rapid notification and the precautionary approach under international health law and its failure, timely, to inform the international community of the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak that caused, and still is, in the death of several lives and a lot of money wasted all over the world.