This volume is a collection of the key writings of Professor Ramesh Thakur on norms and laws regulating the international use of force.

The adoption of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) principle by world leaders assembled at the UN summit in 2005 is widely acknowledged to represent one of the great normative advances in international politics since 1945. The author has been involved in this shift from the dominant norm of non-intervention to R2P as an actor, public intellectual and academic and has been a key thinker in this process. These essays represent the author's writings on R2P, including reference to test cases as they arose, such as with Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar in 2008.

Comprising essays by a key thinker and agent in the Responsibility to Protect debates, this book will be of much interest to students of international politics, human rights, international law, war and conflict studies, international security and IR in general.

This book explores attempts to develop a more acceptable account of the principles and mechanisms associated with humanitarian intervention, which has become known as the 'Responsibility to Protect' (R2P).

Cases of genocide and mass violence have raised endless debates about the theory and practice of humanitarian intervention to save innocent lives. Since the humanitarian tragedies in Rwanda, Burundi, Bosnia, Kosovo and elsewhere, states have begun advocating a right to undertake interventions to stop mass violations of human rights from occurring. Their central concern rests with whether the UN's current regulations on the use of force meet the challenges of the post-Cold War world, and in particular the demands of addressing humanitarian emergencies. International actors tend to agree that killing civilians as a necessary part of state formation is no longer acceptable, nor is standing by idly in the face of massive violations of human rights. And yet, respect for the sovereign rights of states remains central among the ordering principles of the international community. How can populations affected by egregious human rights violations be protected? How can the legal constraints on the use of force and respect for state sovereignty be reconciled with the international community's willingness and readiness to take action in such instances? And more importantly, how can protection be offered when the Security Council, which is responsible for authorizing the use of force when threats to international peace and security occur, is paralyzed? The author addresses these issues, arguing that R2P is the best framework available at present to move the humanitarian intervention debate forward.

This book will be of interest to students of the responsibility to protect, war and conflict studies, human security, international organisations, security studies and IR in general.

In 2011, Nasser Al-Awlaki, a terrorist on the US 'kill list' in Yemen, was targeted by the CIA. A week later, a military strike killed his son. The following year, the US Ambassador to Pakistan resigned, undermined by CIA-conducted drone strikes of which he had no knowledge or control. The demands of the new, borderless 'gray area' conflict have cast civilians and military into unaccustomed roles with inadequate legal underpinning. As the Department of Homeland Security defends against cyber threats and civilian contractors work in paramilitary roles abroad, the legal boundaries of war demand to be outlined. In this book, former Under Secretary of the Air Force Antonia Chayes examines these new 'gray areas' in counterinsurgency, counter-terrorism and cyber warfare. Her innovative solutions for role definition and transparency will establish new guidelines in a rapidly evolving military-legal environment.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Environmental protection is fundamental for the establishment of sustainable peace. Applying traditional legal approaches to protection raises particular challenges during the transition from conflict to peace. In the jus post bellum context, protection of the environment and natural resources needs to be considered in tandem with a broad range of simultaneously applicable normative frameworks, such as human rights, transitional justice, arms control/disarmament, UN law and practice, development, and domestic law. While certain multilateral environment agreements, such as the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage protect the environment; international humanitarian law and international criminal law continue to treat environmental protection largely from an anthropocentric perspective. This book is the first targeted work in the legal literature that investigates environmental challenges in the aftermath of conflict. Addressing these challenges, it brings together academics, policy-makers, and practitioners from different disciplines to clarify policies and practices of environmental protection and key normative frameworks. It draws on experiences and practices in post-conflict settings to specify substantive principles and techniques to remedy and prevent harm.

-- A passionate critique of Milosevic's trial and the PR machine at the heart of international justice -- 'Study this story...The truth is hard to find, but in John Laughland we are fortunate to have a man blessed with the freedom to seek all facts, and the desire to find the truth.' Ramsey Clark, from the Foreword Slobodan Milosevic died in prison in 2006 during a four-year marathon trial at The Hague for war crimes. John Laughland was one of the last Western journalists to meet him. He followed the trial from the beginning and wrote extensively on it, challenging the legitimacy of the Yugoslav Tribunal and the hypocrisy of 'international justice' in the Guardian and The Spectator. In this short and readable book Laughland gives a full account of the trial -- the longest criminal trial in history -- from the moment the indictment was issued at the height of NATO's attack on Yugoslavia to the day of Milosevic's mysterious death in custody. 'International justice' is supposed to hold war criminals to account but, as the trials of both Milosevic and Saddam Hussein show, the indictments are politically motivated and the judicial procedures are irredeemably corrupt. Laughland argues that international justice is an impossible dream and that such show trials are little more than a propaganda exercise designed to distract attention from the war crimes committed by Western states.

Sustainable development requires consideration of the quality of life that future generations will be able to enjoy, and as the adjustment to sustainable lifestyles gathers momentum, the rights of future generations and our responsibility for their wellbeing is becoming a central issue. In this, the first book to address this emerging area of international law, leading experts examine the legal and theoretical frameworks for representing and safeguarding the interests of future generations in current international treaties. This unique volume will be required reading for academics and students of international environmental law and policy. Emmanuel Agius is Senior Lecturer at the Faculty of Theology and Coordinator of the Future Generations Programme at the Foundation for International Studies, University of Malta. Salvino Busuttil is former Director General of the Foundation for International Studies. Future Generations and International Law is the seventh volume in the International Law and Sustainable Development series, co-developed with FIELD. The series aims to address and define the major legal issues associated with sustainable development and to contribute to the progressive development of international law. Other titles in the series are: Greening International Law, Interpreting the Precautionary Principle, Property Rights in the Defence of Nature, Improving Compliance with International Environmental Law, Greening International Institutions and Quotas in International Environmental Agreements. 'A legal parallel to the Blueprint series - welcome, timely and provocative' David Pearce Originally published in 1997

This book offers an overview of the challenges in the emerging regime of international criminal justice as a tool of sustainable peace. It illustrates the impact of the regime on international law and international relations, focusing on the obstacles to and concerns of its governance in the context of the maintenance and restoration of international peace and security. The author advocates for an appropriate interaction strategy between the United Nations and the Rome Statute institutions as a matter of international mutual concern and for the sake of human security. In multiple and inter-linked country situations the failure of strategies to prevent mass atrocity crimes have severely compromised the safety of civilians, including their individual fundamental rights. In several countries - such as in Libya, Syria, Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Central African Republic, Ivory Coast and Mali - civilians have severely suffered the consequences of such failure.Furthermore, the right of humanitarian intervention that it is sometimes claimed the international community has is now challenged and qualified by the responsibility to protect civilians in situations of mass atrocity crimes. Such an international norm represents unfinished business in global politics and is considered by many to be far from capable of preserving the rule of international law. The preservation of the rule of law requires discussions and the advocacy of global values in international relations, such as multilateralism, collective responsibility, global solidarity and mutual accountability.

Providing a critical introduction to the notion of humanitarianism in global politics, tracing the concept from its origins to the twenty-first century, this book examines how the so called international community works in response to humanitarian crises and the systems that bind and divide them. By tracing the history on international humanitarian action from its early roots through the birth of the Red Cross to the beginning of the UN, Peter Walker and Daniel G. Maxwell examine the challenges humanitarian agencies face, from working alongside armies and terrorists to witnessing genocide. They argue that humanitarianism has a vital future, but only if those practicing it choose to make it so. Topics covered include: the rise in humanitarian action as a political tool the growing call for accountability of agencies the switch of NGOs from bit players to major trans-national actors the conflict between political action and humanitarian action when it comes to addressing causes as well as symptoms of crisis. This book is essential reading for anyone with an interest in international human rights law, disaster management and international relations.

This book offers a discursive analysis of the Turkish Foreign Policy on Humanitarian Interventions (HI) and the doctrine of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). Across the chapters the author addresses important questions, such as: what is the position of the HI and R2P in the Turkish foreign policy discourse? Is there any variation between cases when it comes to the use of these concepts? How do these discourses shape/change/transform or sustain the Turkish identity? Despite the tendency in some countries to incorporate HI and R2P principles into their foreign policy (UK, Netherlands, Canada, Japan), and the fact that some countries are lobbying to make these principles a part of international or UN law, in the developing world these policies and concepts have not gained widespread recognition or approval. Countries like China, Brazil and India approach these concepts with suspicion or with reservation. The same tendency can be observed in the MENA region and in some parts of Africa and Asia. In this book, the author looks at the reasons behind these differences in approach and explores how the concept of identity affects Turkish foreign policy specifically. This study is invaluable for researchers and students of R2P and HI and foreign policy discourse in general.

First Published in 1998, this book presents an analysis of international humanitarian law, the law governing and seeking to mitigate the conduct of armed conflict. Since the first edition of this work came out in 1990 there have been important developments in the law and, sadly, a continuing experience of armed conflict and the humanitarian crises which it represents. As a result, this is not so much an 'updating' as the offering of a new book. International humanitarian law is here taken as coterminous with the jus in bello and covers both its 'Geneva' and 'Hague' elements dealing, respectively with the humanitarian protection and assistance of victims of armed conflict and the controls and restrictions placed upon methods and means of warfare. The rules and principles of international humanitarian law are presented and analysed in the context of their practical application in warfare, with emphasis upon recent experience. The Work is Primarily dedicated to the law relating to international armed conflict but also includes discussion of the relevant law applicable to non-international and 'low level' conflict.

This timely volume seeks to examine two of the most pertinent current challenges faced by asylum seekers in gaining access to international refugee protection: first, the obstacles to physical access to territory and, second, the barriers to accessing a quality asylum procedure - which the editors have termed 'access to justice'. To address these aims, the book brings together leading commentators from a range of backgrounds, including law, sociology and political science. It also includes contributions from NGO practitioners. This allows the collection to offer interdisciplinary analysis and to incorporate both theoretical and practical perspectives on questions of immense contemporary significance. While the examination offers a strong focus on European legal and policy developments, the book also addresses the issues in different regions (Europe, North America, the Middle East, Africa and Australia). Given the currency of the questions under debate, this book will be essential reading for all scholars in the field of asylum law.

International organizations have become major players on the international scene, whose acts and activities affect individuals, companies and states. Damage to interests or violation of rights sometimes occur (such as during peacekeeping operations). Wellens considers the remedies available to potential claimants such as private contractors, staff members or anyone suffering damage. Can they turn to an ombudsman or national courts, or do they have to rely on support by their own state? Are the remedies provided by international organizations adequate? Wellens' study includes suggestions for alternative remedial options.

Disasters can strike often and with unexpected fury, resulting in devastating consequences for local populations that are insufficiently prepared and largely dependent upon foreign aid in the wake of such catastrophes. International law can play a significant role in the recovery after inevitable natural disasters; however, without clear legal frameworks, aid may be stopped, delayed, or even hijacked placing the intended suffering recipients in critical condition. This edited volume brings together experts, emerging scholars, and practitioners in the field of international disaster law from North America, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia to analyze the evolution of international disaster law as a field that encompasses new ideas about human rights, sovereignty, and technology. Chapters focus on specific natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina, Cyclone Nargis, and Typhoon Hainan in addition to volcanic and earthquake activity, wildfires, and desertification. This book begins a dialogue on the profound implications of the evolution of international law as a tool for disaster response."

This book analyses the way in which international human rights law (IHRL) and international investment law (IIL) are deployed - or fail to be deployed - in conflict countries within the context of natural resources extraction. It specifically analyses the way in which IIL protections impact on the parallel protection of economic, social and cultural rights (ESC rights) in the host state, especially the right to water. Arguing that current responses have been unsatisfactory, it considers the emergence of the 'Protect, Respect and Remedy' framework and the Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights (jointly the Framework) as a possible analytical instrument. In so doing, it proposes a different approach to the way in which the Framework is generally interpreted, and then investigates the possible applicability of this 'recalibrated' Framework to the study of the IHRL-IIL interplay in a host country in a protracted armed conflict: Afghanistan. Through the emblematic example of Afghanistan, the book presents a practical dimension to its legal analysis. It uniquely portrays the elusive intersection between these two bodies of international law within a host country where the armed conflict continues to rage and a full economic restructuring is taking place away from the public eye, not least through the deployment of IIL and the inaction - or merely partial consideration - of IHRL. The book will be of interest to academics, policy-makers, and practitioners of international organisations involved in IHRL, IIL and/or deployed in contexts of armed conflict.

A new nuclear arms race is underway between Russia and the United States, one that focuses on the technology of delivery of nuclear warheads. This book describes how and why this race is happening, who still possesses nuclear weapons, and what constraints apply to those weapons under international law. A global nuclear ban treaty entered into force in January 2021, but the nuclear powers kept distant. The last remaining treaty restraining the arsenals of the two nuclear superpowers will expire in less than five years' time and the risk is that other States will turn to nuclear arms for their defence, further fracturing the non-proliferation regime installed after the Cuban missile crisis.

Implementing International Humanitarian Law examines the international humanitarian law rules and their application by the ad hoc tribunals with regard to the substantive laws of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Criminal Tribunal Rwanda (ICTR). The practice of the ICTY and the ICTR and their contribution to international humanitarian law, together with their possible impact on the International Criminal Court, is examined in light of the decisions rendered by the ad hoc tribunals and of the latest international humanitarian law instruments such as the 1996 ILC Draft Code of Crimes Against the Peace and Security of Mankind and the ICC Statute.

This fascinating Handbook explores the interplay between international human rights law and international humanitarian law, offering expert analysis on the increasingly complex issues surrounding their application in armed conflicts across the world. Contributors to this volume provide a comprehensive treatment of the ongoing relationship between human rights law and humanitarian law, from the historical background and origins of the two bodies of law to their various applications today. Divided into four parts - Historical Background, Common Issues, The Need for a Combined Approach, and Monitoring Mechanisms - the Handbook presents a rich and varied spectrum of original research and thought from some of the brightest minds in the field. This groundbreaking volume will surely have great appeal for anyone with a professional or academic interest in human rights law and humanitarian law, from students to professors to practitioners in the field. Contributors include: G. Bartolini, P. Benvenuti, M. Bothe, A.A. Cancado-Trindade, E. Cannizzaro, J. d'Aspremont, E. David, F. De Vittor, G. Distefano, T. Ferraro, G. Gaggioli, R. Giuffrida, R.K. Goldman, V. Gowlland-Debbas, A.-L. Graf-Brugere, H.-J. Heintze, J.-M. Henckaerts, M. Hertig Randall, I. Ingravallo, W. Kalin, R. Kolb, S. Krahenmann, D. Kuwali, L. Moir, M. Nowak, D. Scalia, E. Schwager, D.L. Tehindrazanarivelo, H. Tigroudja, C. Tomuschat, G. Torreblanca, E. Tranchez, L. Vierucci, C. Wiesener

The post-World War Two period has witnessed numerous armed conflicts characterized by extensive violations of relevant obligatory international norms. Responding to these events, the United Nations General Assembly created a per-manent international court in 2003, with jurisdiction over selected international crimes. The International Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia was a precursor to this permanent court. It was established for the purpose of "prosecuting persons responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of the former Yugoslavia." As a precedent for what we may expect in the future, it deserves special attention from a historical, politi-cal, and especially an international law point of view.

The Prosecution of International Crimes comprehensively examines the creation, mandate, and challenges of the Inter-national Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. Derived from a special issue of Criminal Law Forum: An International Journal, a peer-review journal dedicated to the advance-ment of criminal law theory, practice, and reform through-out the world, it is now available in paperback.

This book explores the question of whether peacekeeping commanders can be held accountable for a failure to protect the civilian population in the mission area. This requires an assessment of whether peacekeeping commanders have an obligation to act against such serious crimes being committed under domestic and international law. The work uses the cases of the Dutch and Belgian peacekeeping commanders in Srebrenica and Kigali as examples, but it also places the analysis into the context of contemporary peacekeeping operations. It unfolds two main arguments. First, it provides a critical note to the contextual interpretation given to international law in relation to peacekeeping. It is argued that establishing a specific paradigm for peacekeeping operations with clear rules of interpretation and benchmark criteria would benefit peacekeeping and international law by making the contextual interpretation of international law redundant. Second, it is held that alternative options to the existing forms of criminal responsibility for military commanders should be considered, possibly focusing more clearly on failing to fulfil a norm of protection that is specific to peacekeeping and distinct from protective obligations under international human rights law and international humanitarian law.

Genocide is one of the most heinous abuses of human rights imaginable, yet reaction to it by European governments in the post-Cold War world has been criticised for not matching the severity of the crime. European governments rarely agree on whether to call a situation genocide, and their responses to purported genocides have often been limited to delivering humanitarian aid to victims and supporting prosecution of perpetrators in international criminal tribunals. More coercive measures - including sanctions or military intervention - are usually rejected as infeasible or unnecessary. This book explores the European approach to genocide, reviewing government attitudes towards the negotiation and ratification of the 1948 Genocide Convention and analysing responses to purported genocides since the end of the Second World War. Karen E. Smith considers why some European governments were hostile to the Genocide Convention and why European governments have been reluctant to use the term genocide to describe atrocities ever since.

The protection of civilians is a highly topical issue at the forefront of international discourse, and has taken a prominent role in many international deployments. It has been at the centre of debates on the NATO intervention in Libya, UN deployments in Darfur, South Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and on the failures of the international community in Sri Lanka and Syria. Variously described as a moral responsibility, a legal obligation, a mandated peacekeeping task, and the culmination of humanitarian activity, it has become a high-profile concern of governments, international organisations, and civil society, and a central issue in international peace and security. This book offers a multidisciplinary treatment of this important topic, harnessing perspectives from international law and international relations, traversing academia and practice. Moving from the historical and philosophical development of the civilian protection concept, through relevant bodies of international law and normative underpinnings, and on to politics and practice, the volume presents coherent cross-cutting analysis of the realities of conflict and diplomacy. In doing so, it engages a series of current debates, including on the role of politics in what has often been characterized as a humanitarian endeavour, and the challenges and impacts of the use of force. The work brings together a wide array of eminent academics and respected practitioners, incorporating contributions from legal scholars and ethicists, political commentators, diplomats, UN officials, military commanders, development experts and humanitarian aid workers. As the most comprehensive publication on the subject, this will be a first port of call for anyone studing or working towards a better protection of civilians in conflict.

A soldier obeys illegal orders, thinking them lawful. When should we excuse his misconduct as based in reasonable error? How can courts convincingly convict the soldier's superior officer when, after Nuremberg, criminal orders are ex-pressed through winks and nods, hints and insinuations? Can our notions of the soldier's "due obedience," designed for the Roman legionnaire, be brought into closer harmony with cur-rent understandings of military conflict in the contemporary world? Mark J. Osiel answers these questions in light of new learning about atrocity and combat cohesion, as well as changes in warfare and the nature of military conflict.

Sources of atrocity are far more varied than current law as-sumes, and such variations display consistent patterns. The law now generally requires that soldiers resolve all doubts about the legality of a superior's order in favor of obedience. It ex-cuses compliance with an illegal order unless the illegality--as with flagrant atrocities--would be immediately obvious to any-one. But these criteria are often in conflict and at odds with the law's underlying principles and policies. Combat and peace op-erations now depend more on tactical imagination, self-disci-pline, and loyalty to immediate comrades than on immediate, unreflective adherence to the letter of superiors' orders, backed by threat of formal punishment. The objective of military law is to encourage deliberative judgment. This can be done, Osiel sug-gests, in ways that enhance the accountability of our military forces, in both peace operations and more traditional conflicts, while maintaining their effectiveness.

Osiel seeks to "civilianize" military law while building on sol-diers' own internal ideals of professional virtuousness. He re-turns to the ancient ideal of martial honor, reinterpreting it in light of new conditions, arguing that it should be implemented through realistic training in which legal counsel plays an en-larged role rather than by threat of legal prosecution. Obeying Orders thus offers a compelling answer to the question that has most haunted the moral imagination of the late twentieth cen-tury: the roots--and restraint--of mass atrocity in war.

Between War and Politics is the first book length study of war in the thought of one of the twentieth-century's most important and original political thinkers. Hannah Arendt's writing was fundamentally rooted in her understanding of war and its political significance. But this element of her work has surprisingly been neglected in international and political theory.
This book fills an important gap by assessing the full range of Arendt's historical and conceptual writing on war and introduces to international theory the distinct language she used to talk about war and the political world. It builds on her re-thinking of old concepts such as power, violence, greatness, world, imperialism, evil, hypocrisy and humanity and introduces some that are new to international thought like plurality, action, agonism, natality and political immortality. The issues that Arendt dealt with throughout her life and work continue to shape the political world and her approach to political thinking remains a source of inspiration for those in search of guidance not in what to think but how to think about politics and war. Re-reading Arendt's writing, forged through firsthand experience of occupation and struggles for liberation, political founding and resistance in time of war, reveals a more serious engagement with war than her earlier readers have recognized. Arendt's political theory makes more sense when it is understood in the context of her thinking about war and we can think about the history and theory of warfare, and international politics, in new ways by thinking with Arendt.
This book is a project of the Oxford Leverhulme Programme on the Changing Character of War.

When United Nations Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security was adopted in October 2000, it was hailed by policy analysts and international observers alike as a path-breaking move. It was the first time that the security concerns of women in situations of armed conflict and their role in peace building were placed on the agenda of the UN Security Council. In the field of international security, there is a tendency to relegate discussions on women and children to the margins. This book addresses a broader debate on security and its governance in a variety of contexts while at the same time making the argument that human security cannot be achieved without placing women at the centre of this policy agenda - for perhaps the single most important measure of the effectiveness of security governance is its impact on women. But this is not just a book about women. Rather it is a book about inclusive human security for Africans, which cannot ignore the central place of women. Written by academics and activists from around Africa, this book fills a gap in the growing field of gender and security. Its African-centred approach - both analytically and through derivative experiences - builds a corpus of approaches that will shape interventions, policy advocacy and programmatic approaches on women's rights and security sector governance. This book is aimed at policymakers, NGOs, development agencies, activists focusing on women's rights, peace and security, as well as scholars in Africa, Europe and North America.

The legality of nuclear weapons has been strongly questioned in recent years, particularly by the developing countries and non-governmental organisations. Their concern found expression in the requests by the World Health Organisation and the United Nations General Assembly to the International Court of Justice to pronounce on the legality of their use. On 8 July 1996, the Court handed down two Advisory Opinions; these are the first authoritative international judicial opinions since the development of nuclear weapons in the 1940s. This 1999 book offers a comprehensive study of the opinions. More than thirty internationally respected experts contribute their analyses of the status of nuclear weapons in international law across all its sectors: use of force, humanitarian law, environment and human rights. The contributions also assess the implications of the opinions for international organisations and the international judicial function. Contributors include lawyers, academics, diplomats and advisors to international bodies.