A citizens’ initiative was launched in 2016 in the Swiss canton of Basel-Stadt, demanding that the rights catalogue in the Cantonal Constitution be complemented by a fundamental right to life and a right to bodily and mental integrity for non-human primates. This initiative became the subject of a three-year legal dispute that ended with a decision of the Swiss Federal Supreme Court in September 2020, ruling that the initiative is legally valid and must be put to the people for a vote. This case note discusses the key developments in the dispute, including the groundbreaking decision by the Constitutional Court of Basel-Stadt, which held that cantons are free to ‘expand the circle of rights holders beyond the anthropological barrier’. The authors, who were involved in the drafting of the initiative and acted as legal advisers in the judicial proceedings, offer first-hand insights into legal strategies and shed light on the importance of the case in the context of the ongoing efforts to secure rights for primates around the world.

2016 年，瑞士巴塞尔施塔特州发起了一项公民倡议，要求在州宪法中的权利目录中补充一项基本的生命权以及非人类灵长类动物的身体和精神完整权。该倡议成为为期三年的法律纠纷的主题，最终以瑞士联邦最高法院于 2020 年 9 月的一项裁决而告终，裁定该倡议具有法律效力，必须交由人民投票表决。本案例说明讨论了争议的关键发展，包括巴塞尔城市宪法法院的开创性决定，该决定认为各州可以自由地“将权利人的范围扩大到人类学障碍之外”。作者们，