As countries struggle to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the world’s focus is on developing a vaccine. While the virus itself affects all countries and people without discrimination, containing the pandemic carries specific challenges in armed conflict situations.

Once a vaccine does become available, how can we ensure that everyone – including people living in war zones – have equal access to it? And what are the obligations towards the healthcare professionals and facilities involved in administering them? In this post, ICRC legal advisor Alexander Breitegger looks to international humanitarian law for guidance.

In an era in which a number of developed nations have been accused of ill-treating or unlawfully killing captured persons or persons under their control, the need for international bright lines has never been more important.

In this post – part of a joint blog symposium with Just Security and EJIL:Talk! exploring the new ICRC Commentary on the Third Geneva Convention (GCIII Commentary) – Royal New Zealand Air Force Wing Commander Tim Wood explains the importance of the GCIII Commentary based on his firsthand experience as a military lawyer and a peer reviewer.

The object and purpose of the Third Geneva Convention is to ensure that prisoners of war are humanely treated at all times, while allowing belligerents to intern captured enemy combatants to prevent them from returning to the battlefield. But what happens when, in a concrete situation, these two overarching considerations point in different directions?

In this post – part of a joint blog symposium with Just Security and EJIL:Talk! exploring the new ICRC Commentary on the Third Geneva Convention (GCIII Commentary) – ICRC legal advisor Kubo Mačák explores when, and on what legal grounds, a resource-strained Detaining Power might be required to release the prisoners of war in its power. He draws together the legal analysis provided in several articles of the GCIII Commentary and positions it against the backdrop of the applicable rules of international humanitarian law and general international law.

The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown countries into confusion, devastated economies and caused major disruption to almost every aspect of our lives. The world of diplomacy has not been spared the chaos. Politicians, ambassadors and officials have scrambled to adapt to changing circumstances and learn the tricks and techniques of virtual diplomacy. So how do you negotiate, persuade and influence in a virtual world? ICRC Diplomatic Advisers Nicholas Hawton and Shahrokh Shakerian look at the lessons learned so far and make recommendations for the future.

With an ever-increasing number of non-State armed groups and a growing tendency for non-international armed conflicts (NIAC) to be fought by coalitions, it is crucial that our interpretation of international humanitarian law (IHL) continues to reflect realities on the ground.

In this post, ICRC legal advisors Jelena Nikolic, Thomas de Saint Maurice, and Tristan Ferraro suggest that in situations where there is evidence that non-State armed groups (NSAGs) have objectively and effectively adopted a collective approach to fighting against a common enemy, the intensity criterion required by IHL for determining the existence of a NIAC should be assessed on the basis of the aggregation of the military actions carried out between all the NSAGs fighting together and their common enemy, rather than requiring that each bilateral relationship of violence meets the criterion on its own.

The international community agrees that international law applies in cyberspace. But how does it apply? Interpreting established concepts of international law such as sovereignty, countermeasures, combatancy or perfidy in the novel context of cyberspace can be particularly challenging.

In this post, the editors of the Cyber Law Toolkit, an interactive online resource on international law and cyber operations, introduce some of the pressing legal questions raised by the hostile uses of information and communications technologies. The 2020 annual update of the Toolkit – released this week – offers some solutions while highlighting the need for further research.

As the world grapples with new security challenges, it is pertinent now more than ever for global leaders to uphold the rules and principles of international humanitarian law in ensuring that weapons with catastrophic humanitarian consequences, such as nuclear weapons, are eliminated from the earth.

In this post, Fatima Alkali, an Associate Professor of international humanitarian law who currently works in Nile University in Abuja, Nigeria, argues that the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons presents an opportunity to achieve that goal and calls on all States to fulfill their commitment to nuclear disarmament by becoming parties to it.

Jess Markt, ICRC Disability Sport & Inclusion Advisor, is an internationally-acclaimed wheelchair basketball coach who has travelled across the world to help the ICRC train and establish new players and teams — including in India, South Sudan, Afghanistan, Palestine, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Syria, among others. The success of this inspiring work is testimony to the difference the opportunity to play sports can make in the lives of persons with disabilities and to the way society views them. In this blog, Markt underscores the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the lives of persons with disabilities. He elucidates the setbacks its socio-economic consequences could have on their independence, employability, and inclusion — especially in countries that are already dealing with armed conflict and violence.

Efforts to protect students, teachers, and schools during times of armed conflict will get extra attention this week due to the inaugural UN International Day for the Protection of Education from Attack and a dedicated UN Security Council meeting on the topic.

Concrete action to protect education from attack is particularly urgent now as COVID-19 further endangers students’ schooling, argues Bede Sheppard, child rights deputy director at Human Rights Watch.

The Third Geneva Convention (GCIII) provides a framework of rules for the protection of prisoners of war, including that they are ‘entitled in all circumstances to respect for their persons and their honour’ (Article 14). The obligation to respect a prisoner of war’s honour – like the Geneva Conventions as a whole – draws upon the highest notions of humanity. It reminds us that even in the drudgery, the violence, and the darkness of war, there is something innate in every person that is worthy of respect and entitles them to protection.

Interpreting what ‘honour’ means, however, has its challenges. In this post, part of the ‘GCIII Commentary’ blog series marking the ICRC’s updated Commentary on the Third Geneva Convention, ICRC detention delegate Jemma Arman explores why honour and prisoner of war protection are so fundamentally intertwined, as well as some of the challenges of finding modern meaning for the term.