Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law 

About: Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law is an academic journal. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): International humanitarian law & International law. It has an ISSN identifier of 1389-1359. Over the lifetime, 205 publications have been published receiving 2007 citations.

Jurisdiction and Cooperation in the Statute of the International Criminal Court: Principles and Compromises

Abstract: At the Rome Conference on the adoption of the Statute of the International Criminal Court (hereinafter, the Statute and the ICC), the negotiators faced basically three types of problems. First, a considerable number of primarily technical difficulties stemmed from the differences between national systems of criminal law. This type of problem was characteristic for the discussions on general principles of criminal law (Part 3 of the Statute), criminal procedure (Parts 5, 6 and 8) and enforcement (Part 10). Second, a more limited number of disputed questions resulted from deeply-rooted differences in legal culture. This was true for the most important controversies on penalties (Part 7), in particular for the hotly debated death penalty, and for some specific points relating to the general principles of criminal law, in particular, the treatment of voluntary intoxication. Third, delegations were forced to break the impasse with regard to a set of unresolved key issues of a highly political nature. This article deals with two sets of issues belonging to the latter category: jurisdiction and cooperation.The respective places of jurisdiction and cooperation within the Statute, i.e., Articles 5, 12 and 13 (in Part 2) and Articles 86 to 102 (all of Part 9), tend to conceal the intimate interrelation between them. On a little closer look, though, the links between jurisdiction and cooperation become obvious. Functionally, the implementation of any set of jurisdictional rules defining the Court's sphere of activity depends on a complementary cooperation regime.Systematically, the key elements of the jurisdictional regime constitute starting points in framing the cooperation regime.

International Humanitarian Law and United Nations Military Operations

Abstract: The application of international humanitarian law to United Nations military operations is a subject that has attracted considerable interest almost from the inception of the United Nations. While the basic premise that United Nations forces should, at the very least, respect the ‘principles and spirit’ of international humanitarian law conventions has long commanded general acceptance, there has been considerable controversy both about the legal basis for this proposition — in particular, whether this duty of respect is something derived from general international law or the result of a specific and voluntary undertaking by the United Nations — and about the exact meaning of ‘principles and spirit’ in this context.

The So-called ‘Right’ of Humanitarian Intervention

Abstract: Humanitarian intervention, a long-standing issue in international legal writing and in state practice, has become a major focus of international legal thinking and military action. Since the early 1990s, there have been new and unexpected elements in the practice of intervention, in its authorization, and in debates about it. Action by outside military forces in several territories — northern Iraq, Somalia, Haiti and Kosovo — has provoked questions about whether there is a right of humanitarian intervention. In addition, the debate on the subject has been spurred by the strong sense that there were crises (most notably, the genocide in Rwanda in 1994) in which the international community should have intervened promptly but failed to do so.

The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict

Abstract: On 25 May 2000, the United Nations General Assembly, adopted, without a vote, the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (‘the Optional Protocol’). The adoption of the Optional Protocol was the culmination of a long process, extending over some ten years and originating in the dissatisfaction felt by a number of states and NGOs at the level of protection afforded to children by the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child (‘the CRC’). The Optional Protocol marks a significant step towards the prohibition of the recruitment of children into armed forces and groups and their participation in hostilities. However, its contents were the result of a compromise that left many dissatisfied, and questions remain about the likely efficacy of the Optional Protocol in ending the phenomenon of child soldiers. Critics see the Optional Protocol as the product of a dialogue between developed states, western-based NGOs and the United Nations' bureaucracy, who prefer standard-setting to tackling the root causes of the use of child soldiers.

Targeted killing or less harmful means? – israel's high court judgment on targeted killing and the restrictive function of military necessity

Abstract: In November 2000, a few weeks after the outbreak of a major uprising in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, the Israeli government officially acknowledged it was operating a policy of targeted killing against selected Palestinian militants. On 14 January 2002, an Israeli (PCATI) and a Palestinian (LAW) human rights group jointly submitted a petition to the Israeli High Court to halt the policy and to issue an interim order suspending its implementation. The Court subsequently refused to issue the requested interim order and, when it finally delivered its judgment in the case on 14 December 2006, at least 213 targeted persons and 137 bystanders had been killed and hundreds of others injured in operations of targeted killing. In its judgment, the Court neither banned nor justified the state policy as a whole, but ruled that the lawfulness of targeted killings must be examined separately for each operation.