30th Sanremo Round Table on Current Issues of IHL
The 2007 Round Table on current issues of international humanitarian law, held in Sanremo from 6 to 8 September 2007, addressed the issue of “The Conduct of Hostilities. Revisiting the Law of Armed Conflict 100 Years after the 1907 Hague Conventions and 30 Years after the 1977 Additional Protocols“.
In defiance of International Humanitarian Law, civilian persons and objects continue to be deliberately targeted. Civilians are also too often victims of other violations of rules on the conduct of hostilities, including acts or threats of violence the primary purpose of which is to spread terror among the population, indiscriminate attacks, and starvation. This, in a geopolitical post-Cold War scenario in which new types of conflicts emerged. Inter-ethnic and inter-religious clashes have multiplied. New types of weapons have appeared. New treacherous threats have gained momentum beginning with international terrorism. In this framework, the Hague Conventions are 100 years old. The Additional Protocols to the Geneva Conventions are 30 years old. Are these instruments still appropriate? How can their respect be guaranteed in the face of such unprecedented atrocities and violence? Has the time come to update the present body of norms of international humanitarian law? This Round Table has tried to find answers to these questions through serious debates, conducted in an informal atmosphere.
The Round Table gathered together around 300 participants from the different regions of the world including military experts, academics and representatives of governments, international organizations, IHL practitioners and NGOs which spent two to discuss IHL related detention key issues.