scholarly journals The changing rules of jus ad bellum : conflicts in Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 130
Author(s):  
W Scholtz
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Armed Attack ◽  
Coercive Measures ◽  
Jus Ad Bellum ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Uk

This article focuses on three instances of the use of armed force in international relations. The three instances that are explored are the intervention by NATO in Kosovo, the armed attack by mainly the USA and the UK against Afghanistan and the war against Iraq in 2003. The purpose of this investigation is to examine the legality of the coercive measures in order to ascertain the effects that these actions had in relation to article 2(4) of the UN Charter. The proposed justifications for the attacks differ and these are carefully scrutinized against the jus ad bellum as to determine the legality of the attacks. The notion of humanitarian intervention was used as a ground for justification by various international scholars to explain the use of force in Kosovo, but this concept is not recognized in terms of international law. The attack on Afghanistan was based on article 51 of the UN Charter. The attacks were directed at Afghanistan as this state harboured the terrorists responsible for the attacks on the USA. The mere harbouring of terrorists does not give rise to the use of armed force on the basis of article 51 and as such the use of coercive measures against Afghanistan was illegal. The use of force in Iraq was mainly based on the doctrine of pre-emptive force which is alien to international law. The USA and its coalition partners also acted in contravention with the jus ad bellum in this regard. The author poses certain proposals in relation to the jus ad bellum and stresses the importance of article 2(4) which must ensure that international relations are not once more regulated by the use of armed force. 

10. International law and the use of force

2021 ◽  
pp. 219-246
Author(s):  
Nicole Scicluna
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Responsibility To Protect ◽  
Territorial Integrity ◽  
Jus Ad Bellum ◽  
Self Defence

This chapter explores the justness, legitimacy, and legality of war. While 1945 was a key turning point in the codification of jus ad bellum (i.e. international law on the use of force), that framework did not emerge in a vacuum. Rather, it was the product of historical political contingencies that meant that codification of the laws of war was contemporaneous, both geographically and temporally, with the solidification of the norms of sovereign nation-statehood and territorial integrity. The chapter focuses on the UN Charter regime and how it has shaped the politics of war since 1945. Importantly, the Charter establishes a general prohibition on the use of force in international relations. It also grants two exceptions to the prohibition: actions undertaken with Security Council authorization and actions taken in self-defence. Today, many of the most serious challenges to the Charter regime concern the definition and outer limits of the concept of self-defence. Another set of challenges to the Charter regime concerns the contested concept of ‘humanitarian intervention’. The chapter then looks at the development of the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ doctrine.

The Use of Armed Force: Contemporary Challenges in Light of Professor Skubiszewski’s Legacy

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 109-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michał Kowalski
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Public International Law ◽  
Jus Ad Bellum ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Inter State

The text explores the legacy of Professor Krzysztof Skubiszewski on the use of force with special focus on his contribution to the 1969 Manual of Public International Law edited by Professor Max Sørensen, which still serves as a reference in contemporary scholarship. Firstly, an attempt to identify Professor Skubiszewski’s approach to the use of force problems is made. It is claimed that the main feature which makes this approach still attractive is perceiving jus ad bellum in a systemic way. The remaining parts of the text take this approach as a starting point for dealing with contemporary jus ad bellum challenges. Two examples are particularly focused on in this respect: the problem of humanitarian intervention and the challenged inter-State paradigm of the use of force.

scholarly journals The Challenge of Cyber Attacks in the “Information Age” and the Jus Ad Bellum

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 79
Author(s):  
Pshtiwan Mohammed Qader
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Information Age ◽  
Cyber Attacks ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Critical Infrastructures ◽  
Cyber Attack ◽  
Armed Attack ◽  
Self Defense ◽  
The Right

The present paper examines the problem of cyber-attacks under existing international law. It takes the view that the (United Nations) UN Charter provisions on the use of force can be extended to cyber-attacks by means of interpretation although the relevant provisions do not explicitly address such issue. This Article argues that cyber-attacks resulting in material damage or destruction to property, death or injury to persons, or severe disruption of the functioning of critical infrastructures can be characterized as use of armed force and therefore violate the prohibition contained in article 2(4) of the Charter. However, cyber-attacks not resulting in the above consequences may be illegal intervention in the internal affairs of other states if such attacks are coercive in nature. In addition, the current study discusses that a cyber-attack which amounts to a use of armed force per se is not sufficient to give the victim state the right to self-defense, unless its scale and effects are equivalent to those of a conventional armed attack. Finally, the study concludes that an international cyber treaty is truly necessary to more effectively address cyber-attacks.

The Justification and Critique of Coercion as World Order Politics

2021 ◽  
pp. 489-500
Author(s):  
Christopher Daase ◽  
Nicole Deitelhoff
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
World Order ◽  
International Order ◽  
Physical Force ◽  
Coercive Measures ◽  
Economic Coercion ◽  
Normative Expectations

The present chapter turns from the justification of war (the use of force) to the justification of coercion. It proceeds on the assumption that to stabilize the current international order requires less ‘legitimate force’ and more ‘legitimate coercion’ since in most institutions the enforcement of norms—as the very basis of order—does not only or even primarily rely on physical force but on various forms of political and economic coercion. The chapter distinguishes various forms of coercion and reconstructs debates in International Law and International Relations with regard to their legality, legitimacy, and effectiveness. Doing so, Christopher Daase and Nicole Deitelhoff intend to broaden the debate on world order by redirecting the focus from the use of force to the use of less violent coercive measures. Specifically, the chapter introduces a concept of sanction as a means of communicating normative expectations to the normative community rather than executing punishments.

11. Use of force

2019 ◽  
pp. 144-159
Author(s):  
Ilias Bantekas ◽  
Efthymios Papastavridis
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Responsibility To Protect ◽  
Collective Security ◽  
Armed Attack ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
Significant Achievement ◽  
Self Defence

This chapter examines under what circumstances States may use armed force under customary international law and Arts 2(4) and 51 UN Charter. After noting that the use of armed force is generally prohibited and only limited to self-defence, and then only if the target State is under an armed attack, we show that several States have expanded the notion of armed attack. Besides self-defence, the Security Council may authorize the use of armed force through a process of collective security. Several examples of collective security are offered, as well as the ICJ’s position on what constitutes an armed attack. In recent years, the range of actors capable of undertaking an armed attack has included terrorists. Moreover, the development of the doctrine of the responsibility to protect is a significant achievement.

2 The prohibition of the use of force

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gray Christine
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Cyber Attacks ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
Territorial Integrity ◽  
Political Independence ◽  
Economic Coercion

This chapter examines the prohibition of the use of force contained in Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, which provides that ‘All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations’. States and commentators generally agree that the prohibition is not only a treaty obligation but also customary law. However, there are disagreements between states on the interpretation and application of Article 2(4): does ‘the use of force’ include not only armed force but also economic coercion and, more recently, cyber attacks. Can humanitarian intervention ever be lawful? Is Responsibilty to Protect now a substitute for humanitarian intervention?

After Bangladesh: The Law of Humanitarian Intervention by Military Force

1973 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
pp. 275-305 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas M. Franck ◽  
Nigel S. Rodley
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Military Force ◽  
Armed Attack ◽  
Self Defense ◽  
The Law

In the Bangladesh crisis, two important objectives of international law appeared to be in conflict: that of peace and that of justice. The former objective is set out in the rules of the U.N. Charter against the use of force by states except in self-defense against an armed attack. The second is found in the provisions of the Charter and in various resolutions, declarations, and covenants pertaining to fundamental human rights and self determination.

Unilateral Military Action in the Syrian Arab Republic: A Right to Humanitarian Intervention or a Crime of Aggression?

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 323-343
Author(s):  
Manisuli Ssenyonjo
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Convincing Evidence ◽  
Legal Basis ◽  
Syrian Arab Republic ◽  
Legal Position ◽  
Uk Government ◽  
The Uk

On 29 August 2013 the UK government officially endorsed humanitarian intervention as a legal basis for using force against Syria. The UK government stated that if its action in the Security Council is blocked, the UK would still be permitted under international law to take ‘exceptional measures’ in order to alleviate the scale of the overwhelming humanitarian catastrophe in Syria by deterring and disrupting the further use of chemical weapons by the Syrian regime. The UK government claimed that such a legal basis is available, under the doctrine of humanitarian intervention, provided three conditions are met: (i) there is convincing evidence, generally accepted by the international community as a whole, of extreme humanitarian distress on a large scale, requiring immediate and urgent relief; (ii) it must be objectively clear that there is no practicable alternative to the use of force if lives are to be saved; and (iii) the proposed use of force must be necessary and proportionate to the aim of relief of humanitarian need and must be strictly limited in time and scope to this aim (i.e. the minimum necessary to achieve that end and for no other purpose). It concluded that all three conditions would clearly be met in the case of Syria. This article argues that UK’s legal position is flawed and not supported by the permitted exceptions to the prohibition on the use of force under Charter of the United Nations.

R2P and International Law

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nigel S. Rodley
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Human Rights Violation

Reluctant for its first two decades to consider states’ human rights performance, the UN gradually developed an extensive network of machinery to examine human rights violations in some states and categories of violation in all states. Action was limited to investigation and condemnation. The overwhelming majority of states and commentators rejected the notion of ‘humanitarian intervention’ that had had some currency until the UN Charter’s proscription of the use of force by states. It took the UN sixty years to accept that the Security Council could and should take necessary coercive measures, including armed force, to confront the most extreme forms of human rights violation or atrocity such as genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. In doing so, it sanctified a new doctrine and codified its scope. Political and material realities seem to require sober expectations about the UN’s actual ability to protect populations from these atrocities.

scholarly journals Humanitarinės intervencijos samprata ir teisėtumas Jungtinių Tautų chartijos kontekste

Teisė ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 75 ◽  
pp. 176-186
Author(s):  
G Abija Grigaitė
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Legal Grounds ◽  
Moral Questions

Humanitarinė intervencija ir jos teisėtumas šiuolaikinėje tarptautinėje teisėje kelia tiek teisinių, tiek poli­tinių, tiek moralinių žmonijos egzistavimo klausimų. Straipsnyje analizuojama humanitarinės interven­cijos samprata, teoriniai jos pagrindai ir teisėtumas tarptautinės teisės kontekste. Pagrindinis straipsnio tikslas – pabandyti nustatyti, ar tarptautinė teisė, susijusi su ginkluotos jėgos panaudojimu, nustato tei­sinius pagrindus vienašališkai humanitarinei intervencijai vykdyti. Daugiausia dėmesio skiriama Jungti­nių Tautų chartijai, jos nuostatoms, ypač chartijos 2 straipsnio 4 daliai, draudžiančiai bet kokį ginkluotos jėgos panaudojimą vienai valstybei prieš kitą, išskyrus išimtis, kurias pati chartija leidžia. Humanitarian intervention and its legacy in the contemporary international law raise legal, political and moral questions. The article focuses on the concept of humanitarian intervention, its theoretical background and legacy in the international law framework. The main purpose of this article is to try to identify wheather international law regulating use of force in international relations establishes legal grounds for the unilateral humanitarian intervention to occur. The main focus is put on the UN Charter, its article 2 paragraph 4, which forbids any use or threat of force between states, except cases which the UN Charter permits.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document