Human Rights, Free Movement, and the Right to Leave in International Law

This article starts from a rights-based premise: freedom of movement is an established human right recognised in a range of international instruments. The right to leave one's own country is one aspect of this general concern with free movement. This article addresses the status of this right under international law, a right that is enshrined in several different international instruments and has attracted considerable attention. This article explores how the Human Rights Committee, the only United Nations human rights treaty body that has examined the right to leave in significant detail, has interpreted this right in light of state practice. This article considers whether international law requires, or allows, states to prevent their nationals from leaving their own states by unauthorized or irregular means and whether such prevention could be construed as a violation of the right to leave. This article also examines whether states can legitimately prosecute migrants when they leave their own states with documents that they know to be fraudulent. The legitimacy of exit visas and regulations related to holders of state secrets is also explored. Finally, this article presents some thoughts on the continuing significance of the right to leave.