Extrajudicial Killing

The killing of a person by state agents, such as police or military personnel, or by others acting with state authorization, acquiescence or consent, carried out without any lawful arrest, trial or judicial process, distinguishing it from a lawful use of lethal force in genuine self-defense or in the course of a properly conducted judicial execution. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions documents and investigates such killings worldwide, and the practice has been recorded in a wide range of contexts, including so-called death-squad activity, targeted killing of political dissidents, and disputed police shootings during law enforcement operations, with a state's failure to investigate a suspicious killing by its own agents itself treated under international human rights law as a separate violation.