17 International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sassòli Marco
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter assesses the relationship between international human rights law (IHRL) and international humanitarian law (IHL). While IHRL, unlike IHL, was not founded specifically to protect people affected by armed conflicts, both branches of international law apply simultaneously during such conflicts. This raises the question of how they interrelate and also how possible contradictions between them can be resolved. Today, genuine armed conflicts are mainly not of an international character. In such situations, the relationship between IHL and IHRL is particularly controversial and difficult to determine. Nevertheless, both IHL and IHRL lead, in most cases, to the same results. In the few instances where results differ, states could do a lot to harmonize their obligations under both branches, by resorting to derogations permitted under IHRL, one of the means offered by international law to harmonize their IHRL obligations with their IHL obligations. Beyond this, legal reasoning allows for differentiated solutions on when and on which issues one or the other branch prevails.

Parallel Application of International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law: An Examination of the Debate

2007 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 648-660 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noam Lubell
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
Critical Examination ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Relationship

This article provides a critical examination of the debate over the relationship between international humanitarian law and international human rights law. On the question surrounding the very fact of co-application, it appears that the dominant view supports the co-applicability of the two legal regimes. Opinion is however far from settled on the scope of application of international human rights law, especially insofar as it relates to the issue of extra-territorial applicability. The approach taken in the event of co-applying the two frameworks to specific circumstances, and whether and how one is to use the doctrine of lex specialis, reveals further questions in need of coherent answers. Finally, there remain particular areas in which the co-application faces challenges that must be surmounted, if it is to prove a useful approach. These include the issues of the so-called “war on terror,” the distinction between the jus ad bellum and the jus in bello, non-international armed conflicts, and more. Whilst the co-application of the two regimes is now almost undisputed, it appears therefore that obstacles remain that must be dealt with in order for the relationship of the regimes to be of a fully harmonious nature.

scholarly journals Humanity and Human Rights: The Contours of International Law

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Eyassu Gayim
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Law Of Nations ◽  
International Human

Laws regulate conducts by responding to social and political requirements. This holds true for the law of nations as well. Contemporary international law follows two separate tracks when it comes to regulating human rights and humanitarian questions. If international human rights law and international humanitarian law are intended to protect the dignity and worth of human beings, as it is often said, why follow separate tracks? Does humanity really exist? If it does, how does it relate to human rights? If the two are distinct, where do they converge? This article highlights these questions by revisiting the contours of international law.

The Banality of Humanity (as an Absolute)

2019 ◽  
pp. 297-304
Author(s):  
Knut Traisbach
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Laws Of War ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Human

This chapter is a comment on a reflection by Frédéric Mégret on the limits of the laws of war. It proposes a jurisprudence of limits that focuses less on absolute ideals but on the compromising and enabling space ‘in-between’ these absolutes. Relying on Hannah Arendt’s views on different conceptions of humanity, the comment critically engages with a thinking in terms of inherent opposing interests and oscillations between them. A conception of limits as reproducing inherent absolutes is disabling and passive. Instead, limits can be understood as facilitating a space that enables us to judge and to act, also through compromise. International humanitarian law and international human rights law, perhaps more than other areas of international law, depend on preserving and actively seeking this politically relevant space.

25. International humanitarian law

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandesh Sivakumaran
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Two Bodies

This chapter examines international humanitarian law, the principal body of international law which applies in times of armed conflict, and which seeks to balance the violence inherent in an armed conflict with the dictates of humanity. International humanitarian law protects the civilian population from the ravages of conflict, and establishes limitations on the means and methods of combat. The chapter is organized as follows. Section 2 considers the nature of international humanitarian law and identifies some of its cardinal principles and key rules. Section 3 explores the similarities and differences between international humanitarian law and international human rights law, comparing and contrasting their historical origins and conceptual approaches. Given that international humanitarian law applies during armed conflict, Section 4 considers whether there is a need for international human rights law also to apply. Section 5 ascertains the relationship between the two bodies of law and Section 6 considers some of the difficulties with the application of international human rights law in time of armed conflict.

scholarly journals The Relationship between IHL and IHRL in Peacekeeping Operations: Articulating the Emerging AU Position

2017 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Fowkes
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Peacekeeping Operations ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Two Bodies

AbstractModern peacekeeping is increasingly expansive, and much of it occurs in Africa. The African Union's attitude to the challenges of regulating this modern peacekeeping is therefore an important source for the associated legal debates, but one that is often neglected (in part because the sources are limited and often in draft form). This article seeks to articulate and then critique the AU's emerging view on the application of international humanitarian law and international human rights law to peacekeeping activity and the relationship between the two bodies of law in this context. It argues that the AU's emerging position treats international humanitarian law as a narrowed lex specialis, only displacing international human rights law in relation to peacekeepers while they are actively engaged in armed conflict. Even this position, however, underestimates the extent to which the pervasive rights-based concerns in AU sources imply a still more pervasive application of international human rights law to its peacekeeping activities.

The Interplay between International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law in Situations of Armed Conflict

2007 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 310-355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cordula Droege
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Human ◽  
Historical Developments

International human rights law and international humanitarian law are traditionally two distinct branches of law, one dealing with the protection of persons from abusive power, the other with the conduct of parties to an armed conflict. Yet, developments in international and national jurisprudence and practice have led to the recognition that these two bodies of law not only share a common humanist ideal of dignity and integrity but overlap substantially in practice. The most frequent examples are situations of occupation or non-international armed conflicts where human rights law complements the protection provided by humanitarian law.This article provides an overview of the historical developments that led to the increasing overlap between human rights law and humanitarian law. It then seeks to analyse the ways in which the interplay between human rights law and humanitarian law can work in practice. It argues that two main concepts inform their interaction: The first is complementarity between their norms in the sense that in most cases, especially for the protection of persons in the power of a party to the conflict, they mutually reinforce each other. The second is the principle of lex specialis in the cases of conflict between the norms.

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