The law of war

 

The law of war:

The law of war refers to the body of legal principles and rules that govern the conduct of armed conflicts. It is also known as international humanitarian and aims to protect civilians, combatants who are no longer taking part in the hostilities and restrict the means and methods of warfare.

The law of war compasses various treaties, customary international law and other sources. The primary sources include the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their additional protocol as well as customary international law. These treaties outline the obligation of states during armed conflict and provide rules for the treatment of wounded and sick individuals, prisoners of war and civilians.

There are included following key principles in the law of war that are distinction in which parties to conflict distinguish between civilians and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives. Attacks must be directed only at military objectives and civilians and civilian objects must be protected from the effects of hostilities, proportionality in which the use of force must be proportionality to the military objectives and must not cause excessive harm to civilians or civilian objects, military necessity in which the use of force and the choice of methods and means of warfare must be necessary to achieve a legitimate military objective, prohibition of indiscriminate attacks in which parties to a conflict are prohibited from using weapons or tactics that do not distinguish between military targets and civilians or which cause excessive harm to civilians, prohibition of torture and cruel treatment in which the law of war strictly prohibits torture, cruel treatment and degrading in inhuman treatment of individuals including prisoners of war and detainees, protection of non-combatants in which civilians and those no longer taking part in hostilities such as wounded, sick and shipwrecked individuals must be protected and provided with necessary medical care and prohibition of attacks on protected objects in which certain objects such as hospitals, cultural heritage sites and civilian infrastructure essential for the survival of the civilian population are protected from war.   

These principles and rules aim to mitigate the suffering caused by armed conflicts, safeguards human dignity and promote humanitarian values in time of war. Violations of the law of war can result in criminal liability and prosecution by international courts and tribunals.

Some treaties related law of war:

·         Paris declaration on maritime war - 1856.

·         Geneva Convention for the amelioration of the condition of the sick and wounded in warfare on land - 1864.

·         St. Petersburg declaration concerning the non-use of explosive and incendiary bullets - 1968.

·         Hague Convention on the laws and customs of war - 1899 and 1907.

·         Geneva protocol for the prohibition on the use in war of asphyxiating poisonous and other gases and bacteriological methods of warfare - 1925.

·         Geneva Conventions concerning the protection of victims of war - 1949.

·         Hague Convention for the protection of cultural property in the event of armed conflict - 1954.

·         Convention on the prohibition of the development, production and stockpiling of bacteriological (biological) and toxic weapons and their destruction - 1972.

·         Convention on the prohibition of military or any other hostile use of environmental modification techniques - 1977.

·         The Convention of conventional weapons and its five protocols – 1980.

·         Chemical weapons Convention – 1993.

·         Ottawa Convention on antipersonnel mines – 1997.

·         Optional protocol to the Convention of the rights of child on involvement of children in armed conflict – 2000.

Major contents under law of war:

i) Commencement of war: declaration, ultimatum, activities (pre information with grounds and reasons) America with 29 states -> Iraq 1991, Libya 1986, Germany -> Poland 1938, Denmark and Norway, USSR 1941, North Korea -> South Korea 1950, China -> Indea 1962, etc. intervention were without declaration.

ii) State of war: war is prohibited, if starts emerged state of war, declaration or not, participate or not, starting point of struggle emerges state of war. America-> Iraq, Afghanistan, N Korea, India->Pakistan etc.

iii) Battle-field and neutrality: Place where war conducts is called battlefield- land, sea and air except the area of neutral state.

iv) Enemy character: individual (residence/citizenship), institutions, company, ship and goods should be defined their character during the war time.

v) Combatants and non-combatants: war should be conduct only by the combatants, (civilians, crew of ships, aircraft, doctors, medicine ship, war correspondents etc. who do not participate in the war are non-combatants. Guerillas, volunteer detachments and others who want to be lawful combatants- they should be under a responsible leader, use of clear symbol, have weapon openly, obey to war law and regulations and war related other things.

vi) Law of land warfare: no activities against non-combatants, no unnecessary violence, no inhuman behavior, no use of weapon that makes death more difficult,  not to attack on sick, wounded, unable, not to use poison, poisonous weapon, gas and other devices, not to attack hospital, educational area, child care centers, unsecured village and cities, no bombard or attack to much far from the battlefield, let pre-information,  no misuse of flag or symbol, no attack on dead body and seize property, not to prison civilians.

vii) Belligerent occupation: the place where a party captures others' territory and administered but not sovereignty, cannot change citizenship, people are loyal to their previous nation, should maintain peace, law and order, can seize personal property, food supply, additional tax, case filed of law breaker, punish who involve conspiracy. It has also duties.

viii) Law of aerial warfare: no law of aerial warfare, aerial warfare is most important and dangerous, laws are similar to land warfare, no bombard on unsecured village and cities, science, art, cultural, religious and welfare related buildings, civilians, only attack military activities, no attack out of its jurisdiction.

ix) Law of maritime: Paris Declaration 1856, Hague Convention 1907, Geneva Submarine Protocol 1936 are main instruments for law of maritime. Personal, mercantile, governmental ships of enemy can be attacked but not to destroy written documents, crew members and other persons in the ship.

x) Right of visit and search: During the maritime warfare belligerent states can visit and search in all ships to identify the real character of neutral states. They can observe the nature of neutrality, war contraband, goods and persons in the ships, their destination and other un-neutral activities of the ship. If refused in searching it will be considered that is involved in un-neutral activities and seized them.

xi) Right of angary: Properties of neutral state laying on its jurisdiction a belligerent has the right to seize, use and destroy those properties for the purpose of war is the right of angary. Ships, aircrafts and other means of transport including other properties that may use in war by the enemies can be seized used and destroyed. The right of angary covers in its own jurisdiction, enemy's jurisdiction and high seas that transformed into warfare land.

xii) Prisoners of war: Persons belonging to armed forces of the enemy state captured by another belligerent state are prisoners of war. They should be treated humanely without any discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, birth, socio-politic status, national origin etc. Armed forces, militias, volunteers, crew members of military and civil aircrafts, correspondents, merchant marine, supply contractors, resistance movement, guerillas and civilians beyond the belligerent occupation can also get the legal status of war prisoners if they are as the legal combatants.

xiii) Termination of war: The war is terminated in the following conditions: Ceasefire, Cessation of hostilities, unilateral declaration, Capitulation, Conquest and Peace treaty.

ivx) War crime: All the activities against law of war lie under war crimes.

Thus, the body of customs, practices, usages, conventions, protocols, treaties is called the law of war.