Contesting Reservations: The Role of Treaty Monitoring Bodies in Safeguarding Human Rights

Abstract

Reservations to international treaties have long been used to protect state sovereignty, yet in the sphere of human rights they generate complex legal and normative dilemmas that test the universality and integrity of core rights and freedoms. The relevance of this study stems from this very tension, as it seeks to analyze how treaty monitoring bodies and regional courts interpret and assess reservations, and what implications this has for the effectiveness of international human rights protection. The methodology combines general scientific, dogmatic, statistical, and legal interpretation methods in analyzing the evolution of treaty bodies’ approaches to reservations in human rights law. This study is of particular importance for Kazakhstan, whose unusual treaty practice, marked by the absence of reservations, creates both opportunities to demonstrate visible adherence to international obligations and vulnerabilities to rigorous external oversight. The novelty of the article lies in its examination of this “strategic silence” and its implications for Kazakhstan’s engagement with international oversight mechanisms. Ultimately, the study concludes that reservations simultaneously function as a safeguard of sovereignty and as a barrier to the universality of human rights, and severability of incompatible reservations by treaty monitoring bodies.