Evolution of International Legal Instruments’ Approach towards Terrorism: Legal Gaps and their Implications

The International community officially paid attention to terrorism in early 1960s, in term of legal and international aspects of the issue, through ratifying the first-ever international convention in this regard, i.e, the Tokyo Convention (1963). By adopting resolution 3034 (1972), the UN General Assembly introduced the issue in the UN literature. Half a century after the first global attention to this phenomenon, and despite ratification and adoption of some 150 conventions and UN resolutions, international community still suffers from lack of a coherent legal approach in fighting terrorism. This article aims to analyze the evolution of terrorism in international legal instruments, and provide an assessment on the legal gaps and their implications on self-defence and fighting terrorism.