Ben Keith to Speak at ISHR Retreat on Transnational Repression and INTERPOL Abuse

Ben Keith has been invited to speak at a closed retreat on transnational repression, convened by the International Service for Human Rights on 22 and 23 June 2026. The session gathers Chairs of the United Nations Treaty Bodies, Special Rapporteurs and other mandate holders to agree how international law should respond to states that pursue their critics across borders. Ben will address the legal tools that authoritarian governments exploit to do so, from abused INTERPOL Notices to renditions.

What is transnational repression?

Transnational repression is the practice of states reaching beyond their own borders to silence, surveil, harass, detain or forcibly return people who criticise them. It targets exiled journalists, dissidents, lawyers and political opponents, and it works as much through fear as through arrest. A single misused alert on an international database can freeze a person’s bank account, cost them a job, or strand them at a border for days.

The mechanisms are varied and often wear a veneer of legality. A government can file an INTERPOL Red Notice or Diffusion under the guise of an ordinary criminal matter when the real purpose is to harass an opponent who has fled. It can lodge a politically motivated extradition request. It can pressure a host state to deport someone, or arrange an extra-legal rendition that bypasses any court at all. Each of these borrows the language of law enforcement and mutual legal assistance, which is precisely what makes them hard to challenge.

INTERPOL sits at the centre of much of this work. Article 3 of its Constitution forbids any intervention of a political, military, religious or racial character, and the Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files exists to strike out Notices that breach it. In practice, the system is gamed. We act for clients who learn of a Red Notice only when they are detained while travelling, and who then face months of work to have the record deleted and the underlying allegations exposed as politically driven.

At IHR Advisors, we act for individuals caught in cross-border repression: removing abusive INTERPOL Red Notices through the CCF, resisting politically motivated extradition and removal, and bringing the relevant UN mechanisms to bear. If you or someone you advise is facing pressure of this kind, the earlier we are involved, the more options remain open.

With thanks to the International Service for Human Rights for convening the discussion. The original announcement is on LinkedIn.

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