POS.3099 International Humanitarian Law
International Humanitarian Law (IHL), also known as the Law of Armed Conflict, regulates the conduct of warfare or hostilities between States. IHL may be viewed as the rules that govern warfare or as the international community's effort to balance the desire of States to prevent unnecessary suffering and destruction on one hand with the need to wage warfare effectively on the other. IHL sets forth the law protecting civilians, prisoners of war, the wounded, sick, and shipwrecked, as well as governing the conduct of hostilities between combatants. This body of law applies to international armed conflicts (conflicts between States) and to non-international armed conflicts (civil wars or conflicts between States and certain non-state groups). To understand the applicable law, this course will touch upon how conflicts are characterized in terms of their international or non-international nature. Although the best-known examples of IHL are the Geneva Conventions, this course will trace the history of humanity's attempts to regulate warfare through the law from the earliest examples to the present day. This course will examine the fundamental principles underlying IHL, as well as war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.