The EU Guidelines on Promoting Compliance with International Humanitarian Law

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
PPl Wrange
Keyword(s):  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
The Eu

The EU Guidelines on Promoting Compliance with International Humanitarian Law

2009 ◽  
Vol 78 (4) ◽  
pp. 541-552 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pål Wrange
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
European Union ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Member States ◽  
The Eu

AbstractIn 2005, the European Union (EU) adopted Guidelines on Promoting Compliance with International Humanitarian Law(IHL). The Guidelines are designed to be implemented by any officer in the foreign services of the EU, including its member states. After outlining the main features of IHL, the Guidelines have provisions on the decision-making process and on possible action to take. The Guidelines, which have been quite widely implemented according toa survey, should be an important tool in keeping IHL issues on the EU's agenda.

scholarly journals Would the World Be a Better Place If One Were to Adopt a European Approach to State Immunity? Or, ‘Soll am Europäischen Wesen die Staatenimmunität Genesen’?

2021 ◽  
pp. 219-233
Author(s):  
Andreas Zimmermann
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
International System ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Constitutional Court ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
State Immunity ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Eu

AbstractThis chapter argues not only that there is no European Sonderweg (or ‘special way’) when it comes to the law of state immunity but that there ought not to be one. Debates within The Hague Conference on Private International Law in the late 1990s and those leading to the adoption of the 2002 UN Convention on Jurisdictional Immunities of States, as well as the development of the EU Brussels Regulation on Jurisdiction and Enforcement, as amended in 2015, all demonstrate that state immunity was not meant to be limited by such treaties but ‘safeguarded’. Likewise, there is no proof that regional European customary law limits state immunity when it comes to ius cogens violations, as Italy and (partly) Greece are the only European states denying state immunity in such cases while the European Court of Human Rights has, time and again, upheld a broad concept of state immunity. It therefore seems unlikely that in the foreseeable future a specific European customary law norm on state immunity will develop, especially given the lack of participation in such practice by those states most concerned by the matter, including Germany. This chapter considers the possible legal implications of the jurisprudence of the Italian Constitutional Court for European military operations (if such operations went beyond peacekeeping). These implications would mainly depend on the question of attribution: if one where to assume that acts undertaken within the framework of military operations led by the EU were to be, at least also, attributable to the troop-contributing member states, the respective troop-contributing state would be entitled to enjoy state immunity exactly to the same degree as in any kind of unilateral military operations. Additionally, some possible perspectives beyond Sentenza 238/2014 are examined, in particular concerning the redress awarded by domestic courts ‘as long as’ neither the German nor the international system grant equivalent protection to the victims of serious violations of international humanitarian law committed during World War II. In the author’s opinion, strengthening the jurisdiction of international courts and tribunals, bringing interstate cases for damages before the International Court of Justice, as well as providing for claims commissions where individual compensation might be sought for violations of international humanitarian law would be more useful and appropriate mechanisms than denying state immunity.

scholarly journals Ensuring compliance with International Humanitarian Law: the EU, France, and Spain

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bettina Steible
Keyword(s):  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Geneva Conventions ◽  
The World ◽  
Women And Children ◽  
Promising Development ◽  
Different Parts ◽  
The Eu

Contemporary armed conflicts in different parts of the world, most notably in Syria, have shown that one of the greatest challenges of International Humanitarian Law (hereafter, ‘IHL’) is the lack of a centralized monitoring mechanism in charge of ensuring that it is correctly applied and enforced. While it is difficult to have access to reliable figures on the number of civilian casualties in armed conflicts, there is no doubt that too many men, women, and children are killed unlawfully every day in blatant violation of IHL. Against this background, the involvement of the European Union (hereafter, ‘EU’) in this field, formalized with the adoption of the Guidelines on Promoting Compliance with IHL in 2005 1, constitutes a promising development for the respect and promotion of IHL. The objective of this thesis is therefore to analyze to what extent the EU and two of its Member States – France and Spain – ensure respect for IHL pursuant to Common Article 1 to the 1949 Geneva Conventions.

scholarly journals EU support to domestic prosecution of violations of International Humanitarian Law

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-66
Author(s):  
Bettina Steible
Keyword(s):  
Collective Responsibility ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Universal Jurisdiction ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Geneva Conventions ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
Third Dimension ◽  
Eu Support ◽  
The Eu

The Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 establish an obligation to ensure respect for International Humanitarian Law (IHL) at all times. This summary obligation is now understood as enshrining a mechanism of collective responsibility whereby all State parties commit to adopt all the necessary and reasonable measures to prevent and stop violations of IHL, but also to prosecute them when they amount to war crimes. This third dimension is comprised in articles 49/50/129/146 of Conventions, which impose an obligation on its State parties to extradite or prosecute (aut dedere aut judicare) alleged perpetrators of grave breaches, including on the basis of universal jurisdiction if needed. As the EU has manifested its interest in ensuring respect for IHL with the adoption of the Guidelines on promoting compliance with IHL, the objective of this article is to analyze whether and to what extent the EU has developed instruments facilitating domestic prosecution of alleged war criminals pursuant to the Geneva Conventions.

The Internal Legal Order of the European Union as a Complementary Framework for its Obligations under IHL

2009 ◽  
Vol 42 (01) ◽  
pp. 168-205 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valentina Falco
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Prima Facie ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
European Security ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
The Eu

When exploring the sources of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) obligations of multinational peacekeeping forces, legal scholars have thus far focused mainly on the UN (and, to a lesser extent, NATO), whilst other organizations have remained largely in the shadows. Whereas the UN Secretary-General's Bulletin on the Observance by UN Forces of International Humanitarian Law has been widely debated and extensively investigated, little or no attention has been paid to self-regulatory solutions adopted by other international and regional organizations.This Article focuses on the European Union (EU), holding that this regional organization—by virtue of its sui generis nature and of its increasing engagement in the field of crisis management—can be regarded as one of the most interesting newcomers to the realm of jus in bello. More specifically, it looks at the EU's internal legal order with a view to verifying whether and to what extent it may complement customary IHL in regulating the conduct of the EU as a military actor. The Article surveys the primary and secondary sources of EU legislation which may prima facie spell out obligations for the EU-led troops engaged in European Security and Defence Policy military operations. Finally, the Article seeks to draw some broader conclusions on the nature of the relationship between EU law and IHL, as well as on the complementarity and inherent normative value of their sources.

scholarly journals Desafíos a la seguridad y protección de los trabajadores humanitarios. El compromiso de los donantes

2017 ◽  
pp. 15
Author(s):  
Ignacio Martín Eresta
Keyword(s):  
Humanitarian Aid ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Basic Premise ◽  
European Consensus ◽  
Humanitarian Space ◽  
Operational Practices ◽  
Operational Integration ◽  
Personnel Policies ◽  
The Eu

<p>The safety of humanitarian workers is a basic premise for the access of victims of disasters to aid; both international humanitarian law and other national and international legal measures specifically protect them. But this security is gradually deteriorating in increasingly complex scenarios, where organizations face those adopting different strategies that combine acceptance, protection and deterrence. The operational challenges are structured on personnel policies, the degree of development and operational integration plans and systems, and operational practices of each organization. In this context, donors have made commitments to the explicit defense policy of humanitarian space and access to affected populations, basically around the Good Humanitarian Donorship, and the European Consensus on humanitarian aid at the EU level. The recent Spanish public policy illustrates some of these commitments.</p><p><strong>Published online</strong>: 11 December 2017</p>

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