Chapter

Using human shields as a war crime

Marco Pedrazzi

War crimes and the conduct of hostilities : challenges to adjudication and investigation

Cheltenham ; Northampton : E. Elgar, 2013

p. 98-116

English

Marco Pedrazzi outlines and analyzes international treaties and jurisprudence regarding the use of human shields during armed conflicts. He begins by examining provisions prohibiting the use of human shields, including various provisions of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and Additional Protocol I. Though these provisions prohibit such conduct, it is argued only article 8(2)(b)(xxiii) of the International Criminal Court’s statute criminalizes the use of human shields. The author discusses the distinction between voluntary and involuntary human shields, concluding that civilians who participate voluntarily as human shields do not lose civilian status protecting them from attack. The author explains that there are no specific treaty provisions prohibiting the use of human shields in non-international armed conflicts, but argues that this prohibition can be deduced from other rules applicable to armed conflicts. Domestic case law from Germany and Israel indicates the use of prisoners of war as human shields may be criminalized, but this does not apply to civilians. As the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia largely addressed the use of human shields under other categories of war crimes, the author concludes that the Tribunal did not establish that the use of human shields itself is an autonomous war crime. [Summary by students at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law (IHRP)]

• War crimes and the conduct of hostilities : challenges to adjudication and investigation / ed. by Fausto Pocar, Marco Pedrazzi, Micaela Frulli