international humanitarian law case study

Compendium of case studies of international humanitarian law

17-10-1994 PublicationRef. 0517 Horst Seibt

This work presents international humanitarian law, following the general outline of the publication Basic rules of the Geneva Conventions and their additional Protocols. It includes some 60 case studies with corresponding exercises. Special attention is paid to the provisions common to the four Conventions and to Protocol I; protection of the wounded, sick and shipwrecked; the rules governing the conduct of combatants; protection of prisoners of war; protection of civilians in time of war; and protection of the victims of non-international armed conflicts.

• Author(s): Horst Seibt
• Copyright: ICRC
• Release year: 1994
• Production locations: Geneva
• Languages available: English (available online only)
• Type of product: Book
• Reference: 0517

145 pp., tabl., 16 x 23 cm

Related sections

• The Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols
• Treaties and customary law

Related publications

• Commentary on the Additional Protocols of 8 June 1977 to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949
• Commentary on the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949. Volume I
• Commentary on the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949. Volume II.

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Exploring the application of international law to humanitarian crises and examining the role that the law plays in protecting human security during times of emergency.

Current Issue: Volume 14, Issue 2, November 2023

Editorial Russell Buchan, Emily Crawford and Rain Liivoja

Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Committed by Non-State Armed Groups Against Women/Girls and LGBTI+ Persons in Non-International Armed Conflicts: Peru’s Case Juan-Pablo Pérez-León-Acevedo

Law, Language and War

Introduction to the Symposium on Law, Language and War Emily Crawford

The Terminology of the Law of Warfare: A Linguistic Analysis of State Practice Emily Crawford, Annabelle Lukin, and Jacqueline Mowbray

The International Laws of War: Linguistic Analysis from the Perspectives of Register, Corpus and Grammatical Patterning Annabelle Lukin and Alexandra García Marrugo

International Humanitarian Law: Necessity, Distinction and the ‘Standard of Civilisation’ Matt Killingsworth

Filling the Gaps: The Expansion of International Humanitarian Law and the Juridification of the Free-Fighter Amanda Alexander

Another Look at the Gendered Constitution of the Laws of War: Semantic Fields, Hegemonic Masculinities and the Reproduction of Heteronormativity Frédéric Mégret

The Language of the Protection of Civilians Mandate and the Primary Responsibility of the State: A Legal Norm for Peace and Security Tamer Morris

Book Reviews

Jelena Aparac, Business et droits de l’homme dans les conflits armés Javier Tous

D. Kretzmer and Y. Ronen, The Occupation of Justice: The Supreme Court of Israel and the Occupied Territories (2nd edition) Natia Kalandarishvili-Mueller

The Russian Federation in Global Knowledge Warfare pp 213–231 Cite as

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and the International Humanitarian Law. Case Study: Russia

• Marek Kohv 5 &
• Archil Chochia 6  
• First Online: 25 July 2021

972 Accesses

1 Citations

Part of the book series: Contributions to International Relations ((CIR))

Rapid developments in the field of military technology, specifically unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), are raising several questions. One of those being potential violation of core principles of International Humanitarian Law (IHL), due to minimization of human intervention in the battle and subsequent shift of decision-making process to the technology. On the other hand, Russia has recognized the importance of emerging military technologies and it has been heavily investing in the sector to make up technological backlog with other countries. Current research will examine the usage practices of UAVs for targeted killings, developments in the field and what are the possible conflicting situations with IHLs core principles, focusing on Russia. The authors argue that while Russia is striving to obtain the capability of lethal UAVs, Russian state security apparatus’s pre-existing negligence towards international law and obligations will lead to potential violations of core principles of IHL. In short-medium period, maturing its technologies and tactics to use UAVs for military operations make additional contribution to violations.

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Kohv, M., Chochia, A. (2021). Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and the International Humanitarian Law. Case Study: Russia. In: Mölder, H., Sazonov, V., Chochia, A., Kerikmäe, T. (eds) The Russian Federation in Global Knowledge Warfare. Contributions to International Relations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73955-3_11

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Published : 25 July 2021

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Research guide for ihrc at addis ababa school of law (ethiopia), law of armed conflict, ihl & national security, ihl & human rights law, ihl & cyber crimes, detention in non-international armed conflicts.

• Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism
• Conflict Resolution
• Research Tips

International humanitarian law (aka "laws of armed conflict" or "laws of war") is the set of rules that regulates conduct in armed conflict and seeks to limit effects of armed conflict. The main sources of IHL rules and regulations are treaties and customary international law. 

A treaty is “an international agreement concluded between States in written form and governed by international law, whether embodied in a single instrument or in two or more related instruments and whatever its particular designation." ( VCLT, Art. 2 ) For assistance with treaty terminology, see the UN Treaty Glossary .

Key treaties relevant to international humanitarian law include: 

• The Hague Conventions (and Annexed Regulations) of 1899 and 1907
• The Geneva Conventions and Protocols  (four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and Additional Protocols)

Customary International Law

Customary international law refers to rules of law derived from consistent state practice of international acts over time occurring out of a sense of legal obligation. Thus, a rule of customary international law is demonstrated by showing evidence of two elements: state practice (objective element) + and opinio juris (subjective element). 

• ICRC Customary IHL Database : online version of ICRC's study on customary international humanitarian law with two sections: rules and practice.

The law of armed conflict (aka international humanitarian law) is the body of international law that regulates behavior during armed conflict. 

Relevant subject headings to find books on the law of armed conflict include:

• Humanitarian law
• War (International law)
• Military weapons (International law)

Journal Articles (Open Access)

• Vol. 51 Issue #3 of the Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law was a special issue on the law of armed conflict. Other articles from this issue can be accessed here . 
• Eric Talbot Jensen, The Future of the Law of Armed Conflict: Ostriches, Butterflies, and Nanobots , 35 Mich. J. Int'l L. 253 (2014).
• UN Audiovisual Library of International Law: Law of Armed Conflict Provides access to a video lecture series pertaining to the law of armed conflict.
• Rule of Law in Armed Conflict Project Website that monitors situations of armed conflict.

National security can be defined as "the ability of a state to cater for the protection and defence of its citizenry." [ UN Chronicle, National Security vs. Global Security ] The issue of whether protecting national security is a legitimate ground to detain and restrict the liberties of persons in armed conflict situations gives rise to international humanitarian law and human rights law questions. 

Books & Supplements

• International Humanitarian Law Teaching Supplement - National Security Law Document produced by the International Humanitarian Law Clinic at Emory University School of Law on the integration of national security and IHL.

Research Papers

• Zelalem Mogessie Teferra, National Security and the Right to Liberty in Armed Conflict: The Legality and Limits of Security Detention in International Humanitarian Law , 98 Int'l Rev. Red Cross 961 (2016). 

International human rights law deals with the protection of individuals and groups against violations of civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights under international law. International human rights law is a public international law topic. Human rights law and IHL are complementary with some overlapping aims and objectives. Please see the ICRC's What is the difference between IHL and human rights law?  webpage for an overview of their origins and scope of application.

Online Casebooks

• ICRC - IHL and Human Rights Provides an overview and bibliography of cases and documents pertaining to IHL and human rights law.

Research Guides

• PLRC Research Guide on International Human Rights Law Research Research guide that provides an overview of how to conduct international human rights research. This guide was created for Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, so some of the resources on this guide are restricted to the Northwestern Law community.

Events & Lectures

• Center for Strategic & International Studies: Restoring Humanitarian Access in Ethiopia Video and transcript of event held in February 2021 by CSIS focused on the challenges to humanitarian access in Ethiopia.
• African Human Rights Law Journal Open access, peer-reviewed journal published twice a year (July & December) by the Pretoria University Law Press (PULP), which took over from Juta as publisher in 2013. It is published in association with the Centre for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria.

Cyber warfare refers to war that is waged within cyberspace rather than through military hostilities on the ground. 

• Jonathan Horowitz, Cyber Operations under International Humanitarian Law: Perspectives from the ICRC , 24 Am. Soc'y of Int'l L. (2020).
• U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Cybercrime Repository Database containing national legislation and cases pertaining to cyber crime.

Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions 1949 addresses conflicts not of an international character where one or more non-State armed groups are involved. For analysis of treaty provisions, see the ICRC Treaties, State Parties and Commentaries Database . 

Book Chapters

• Frederic Megret, Detention by Non-State Armed Groups in Non-International Armed Conflicts: International Humanitarian Law, International Human Rights Law and the Question of Right Authority , in  International Humanitarian Law and Non-State Actors: Debates, Law and Practice, (Ezequiel Heffes, Marcos D. Kotlik & Manuel Ventura eds.) (forthcoming). 
• Knut Dörmann, Detention in Non-International Armed Conflicts , 88 Int'l L. Studies 349 (2012). 
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• Discussion Forum

Experiential Learning in the International Humanitarian Law classroom

This post was written by Rebecca Sutton, who taught the Somalia in Crisis role play during the Re-Imagining International Humanitarian Law course at University of Western Ontario Law School.  This is the first post in a series; in subsequent posts we will hear from students in the course as they reflect on their experiences with the role play.

Introduction

In 2011, a series of intense closed-door meetings took place between U.S. aid workers, diplomats, intelligence advisors, the Department of Justice, national security officials, and other federal government representatives. The daunting question that lay before them was how to respond to the famine that the UN had recently declared in Somalia . In the preceding months, hundreds of thousands of Somalis had left their homes to go in search of food, water, and shelter across the desert. Meanwhile, organizations seeking to deliver humanitarian aid to these vulnerable populations had their access impeded by al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda-affiliated group on the U.S. terrorist list . The legal backdrop to these negotiations was the adjudication of U.S. material-support-to-terrorism laws by the U.S. Supreme Court in Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project .

For some participants in the 2011 meetings, U.S. national security was the paramount concern shaping decision-making in response to the famine. From this vantage point, the delivery of humanitarian assistance was to be guided primarily by counter-terrorism concerns—the potential financing of terrorism a particular worry. Other U.S. stakeholders countered that the focus must instead be placed squarely on saving lives. In this view, the highest priority was ensuring that Somalia’s famine-stricken populations had access to the humanitarian services needed to survive the crisis.

These competing views came to the fore once again in the winter of 2017, this time in the form of a role-play in a JD classroom in Canada. As part of an intensive law course entitled Re-Imagining International Humanitarian Law (IHL) , upper-year JD students at Western Law School took part in a simulation of the U.S. response to the 2011 famine. This multi-day exercise was based on the Harvard Case Study Somalia in Crisis: Famine, Counter-Terrorism and Humanitarian Aid , authored by Naz Modirzadeh, Dustin Lewis, Molly Gray, and Lisa Brem, in connection with Harvard Law School’s Program on International Law and Armed Conflict .

As a Visiting Professor at Western Law School, I integrated the Somalia Case Study into my IHL teaching for three reasons: to contextualize IHL as a legal regime, to ground the teaching of law in real-world application, and to spark curiosity about IHL’s future trajectory. First, the case study invites law students to contextualize IHL’s application in two ways: in the context of a particular international crisis, and alongside other legal regimes that apply in armed conflicts and humanitarian emergencies. Second, as a pedagogical tool, this type of role-play also takes the law out of the books. It offers students an experience akin to the international Jean Pictet Competition in IHL , in which a relatively small number of law students participate annually. Third, at its best, experiential learning has the potential to facilitate deeper thinking of what IHL could be, and may spur students to articulate ideas about prospects for reform.

Having provided some background context, the aim of this discussion is to let law students speak for themselves. I have invited the JD students from my Re-Imagining IHL course to share their own reflections on how they experienced this Somalia simulation exercise. In the personal accounts that follow, students elucidate how they navigated issues such as competing stakeholder interests, consensus building, and the possibility of a ‘humanitarian exception’ to U.S. counter-terrorism legislation. I suggested that role-play exercises such as the Somalia Case Study help to contextualize IHL, introduce students to law’s real-world application, and potentially galvanize ideas about legal reform. As the student testimonials in the following posts will highlight, such exercises also bring to light the politics of law and expose students to the manifold ways in which power shapes and influences law’s implementation. For many JD students who participated in the Somalia simulation, IHL’s humanitarian promise was brought into question as it was subsumed by other pressing concerns such as national security. Students experienced first-hand the frustration of having a particularly powerful stakeholder hold fast to an unpopular position, and they also found that negotiation skills could take on more importance than ‘objective facts’ like human suffering. Evidently, this kind of role-play activity may leave law students feeling perplexed or disillusioned—perhaps especially when one’s participation the course has been galvanized by a humanitarian impulse. At the same time, such simulations have the potential to facilitate an escape from the disenchantment that a purely doctrinal or black letter IHL course might generate. I would argue that ultimately, so long as the end result is not apathy, it is essential for students to grapple with this kind of complexity. In my view, this is a first step towards understanding IHL as a practice.

A special thanks is due to graduate students Anaise Muzima and Kirsten Stefanik, who served as volunteer judges for the Somalia simulation and edited the student contributions. Read Part 2.

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