United Nations General Assembly 1987 resolution on international terrorism

The United Nations General Assembly 1987 resolution on international terrorism is presented as both a forceful condemnation of terrorism and a test of whether counterterrorism rules apply equally to powerful states. Adopted in December 1987 by 153 votes to two, it paired a call for vigorous action against terrorism with language affirming the rights of peoples subjected to colonial rule, racism, or foreign occupation. The United States and Israel opposed that qualification, which Noam Chomsky identifies as a central obstacle to a universal convention.

Adoption and disputed provision

In December 1987, amid heightened concern about international terrorism, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution condemning the practice in the strongest terms and calling on every nation to act vigorously against it. The vote was 153 in favor, with the United States and Israel against and Honduras abstaining. The broad condemnation was therefore accompanied by an unusually pointed dispute over the limits and application of the category.

The contested passage stated that the resolution should not prejudice the rights to self-determination, freedom, and independence derived from the United Nations Charter. It specified peoples forcibly deprived of those rights, particularly those under colonial and racist regimes or foreign occupation, and preserved their right to struggle to free themselves and to seek and accept support, subject to the Charter and other principles of international law. The text thus joined opposition to terrorism with a qualification about political struggle and the circumstances of domination.

The dispute over who counts as a terrorist

Chomsky argues that the United States and Israel did not accept the rights affirmed in the disputed passage; he adds that their ally South Africa had also rejected them. The disagreement was not only over how strongly to condemn terrorist acts, but over whether people living under colonial rule or occupation could claim a right to resist and seek assistance under international law.

The resolution’s political context also involved the classification of organizations and states. Washington called the African National Congress a terrorist organization, while South Africa was not placed alongside Cuba and other countries in the category of “terrorist nations.” Chomsky’s point is that the official American interpretation prevailed in practice, with serious human consequences: the same term could be applied to a liberation movement while the state enforcing the conditions it opposed escaped the corresponding label.

The obstacle to a universal convention

Chomsky connects the disputed clause to later efforts to establish a comprehensive convention against terrorism. He argues that the reason negotiations remained difficult was carefully omitted from reports: the United States would not accept language resembling the 1987 passage, and neither would its allies. In his account, even a definition resembling those in the United States Code or military manuals could not secure agreement if it retained a provision that might limit the conduct of powerful states and their clients.

The resolution therefore matters in the book not simply as an earlier international condemnation, but as an illustration of the tension between universal rules and selective application. Its overwhelming vote did not settle what forms of political violence or resistance the rules would cover. Instead, the opposition to its qualification foreshadowed the problem that Chomsky sees at the heart of counterterrorism: an agreement may be possible only after its language exempts the powerful and those they support.