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In exceptional circumstances, derogations from human rights are permitted and necessary. A condition for the validity of derogating measures, in the light of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights, is represented by the notification of the Secretary General of the United Nations and of the Secretary General of the Council of Europe.

Unlike human rights interferences, which constitute a restriction on human rights during normal periods, human rights derogations are severe and widespread restrictions in exceptional cases. They are authorized only in one of the four exceptional states expressly and exhaustively listed in the Constitution: the state of war, the state of mobilization of the armed forces, the state of siege and the state of emergency. The state of alert, regulated only by law, does not represent a state in which derogatory human rights measures can be used.

The decrees establishing and extending the state of emergency contain an article expressly enshrining the human rights covered by the derogating measures. Although the wording of the text indicates that the list is exhaustive, in reality in the annexes to decrees other human rights are also covered by the derogating measures. This renders the "law" (in the autonomous European sense) establishing the derogating measures as lacking clarity.