The Geneva Conventions are often misunderstood. First, when many people write and speak of them they use the singular context when there are in fact four conventions. The convention most often referred to is the third since it is concerned with the treatment of prisoners of war but the other three contribute to form a human rights structure within which war should be executed. The Geneva Conventions are also the origin of the International Red Cross.

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The Geneva Conventions consist of treaties formulated in Geneva, Switzerland that set the standards for international law for humanitarian concerns. The conventions were the results of efforts by Henri Dunant, who was motivated by the horrors of war he witnessed at the Battle of Solferino.

Accusations of violation of the Geneva Conventions on the part of signatory nations are brought before the International Court of Justice at the Hague.

The conventions and their agreements are as follows:

• First Geneva Convention (1864): Treatment of battlefield casualties.
• Second Geneva Convention (1906): Extended the principles from the first convention to apply also to war at sea.
• Third Geneva Convention (1929): Treatment of prisoners of war
• Fourth Geneva Convention (1949): Treatment of civilians during wartime.

This First Convention also mandated the foundation of the International Committee for the Red Cross. The text is given in the Resolutions of the Geneva International Conference.

The first three conventions were revised, a fourth was added, and the entire set was ratified in 1949; the whole is referred to as the “Geneva Conventions of 1949″ or simply the “Geneva Conventions”. Later conferences have added provisions prohibiting certain methods of warfare and addressing issues of civil wars. Nearly 200 countries are “signatory” nations, in that they have ratified these conventions.

Clara Barton was instrumental in campaigning for the ratification of the First Geneva Convention by the United States; the U.S. signed in 1882. By the Fourth Geneva Convention some 47 nations had ratified the agreements.

The first Geneva Convention covered the treatment of battlefield casualties. It was adopted in 1864 as part of the founding of the Red Cross.

The convention was inspired by the experiences of a Swiss businessman, Henri Dunant, who witnessed the sufferings of 40,000 soldiers wounded during a bloody conflict in 1859 between French and Austrian armies near the northern Italian town of Solferino. There was no mechanism in place to arrange truces to retrieve the wounded, who were typically left to perish of their wounds or of thirst.

Dunant rallied nearby vilagers to render what relief they could, insisting on impartiality between the sides. He later wrote a book, A Memory of Solferino, that described the horrors he had seen and called for the establishment of civilian volunteer relief corps to care for the wounded in battle.

In 1863, the Geneva Society for Public Welfare took up his cause and created a committee of five, which became known as the International Committee of the Red Cross. In 1864, this committee brought together the representatives of 16 European states who adopted the first Geneva Convention, a treaty designed to save lives, alleviate the suffering of wounded and sick military personnel, and protect civilians in the act of rendering aid. The conference also established the red cross on a white field (the reverse of the Swiss flag) as the protective emblem for those serving the wounded.

The second Geneva Convention covered the treatment of wounded, sick and shipwrecked members of armed forces at sea.

It was written and adopted at the diplomatic conference held at Geneva from April 21 to August 12, 1949, for the purpose of revising the Xth Hague Convention of October 18, 1907 for the Adaptation to Maritime Warfare of the Principles of the Geneva Convention of 1906.

The Third Geneva Convention regarded the treatment of prisoners of war. It was adopted in 1929 as an extension to the rights guaranteed by the Hague Convention of 1907. It was revised in 1949, with the modified form adopted on August 12, 1949 by the Diplomatic Conference for the Establishment of International Conventions for the Protection of Victims of War, held in Geneva from April 21 to August 12, 1949, and entered into force on October 21 1950.

One of the more specific provisions is the exact definition of “lawful combatant“, which has been subject to a number of discussions in view of a number of public military conflicts in the 2000s, including the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. The provision is section 4A(2), which defines a lawful combatant as:

(a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates;

(b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance;

(c) that of carrying arms openly;

(d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.

Because many of the people fighting do not have uniforms (and thus cannot routinely be distinguished from the civilian population, as would be required by (b) above) it is claimed that they are not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Convention as they are not “lawful combatants” (see Illegal combatant).

Exemptions

There exists exemptions to the Third Convention for “High Contracting Parties” to this convention. In the case of a conflict between a signatory and a non-signatory the signatory shall remain bound until such time as the non-signatory no longer acts under the strictures of the convention.

(Art 2) “…Although one of the Powers in conflict may not be a party to the present Convention, the Powers who are parties thereto shall remain bound by it in their mutual relations. They shall furthermore be bound by the Convention in relation to the said Power, if the latter accepts and applies the provisions thereof.”

Excerpts

• (Art 3): “The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.” (this is not restricted to prisoners of war)
• (Art 13): “Prisoners of war must at all times be humanely treated.”
• (Art 13): “…Prisoners of war must at all times be protected, particularly against acts of violence or intimidation and against insults and public curiosity.”
• (Art 17): “No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on prisoners of war to secure from them information of any kind whatever. Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted or exposed to unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind.”
• (Art 39): “Prisoners of war, with the exception of officers, must salute and show to all officers of the Detaining Power the external marks of respect provided for by the regulations applying in their own forces.”
• (Art 42): “The use of weapons against prisoners of war, especially against those who are escaping or attempting to escape, shall constitute an extreme measure, which shall always be preceded by warnings appropriate to the circumstances.”

The Fourth Geneva Convention relates to the protection of civilians during times of war and under any occupation by a foreign power.

Under the 1949 Geneva Conventions collective punishments are a war crime. Article 33 states: “No protected person may be punished for an offense he or she has not personally committed,” and “collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.” Israel rejects the Fourth Geneva Convention or the Additional Protocols applicability to the West Bank de jure.

By collective punishment, the drafters of the Geneva Conventions had in mind the reprisal killings of World Wars I and II. In the First World War, Germans executed Belgian villagers in mass retribution for resistance activity. In World War II, Nazis carried out a form of collective punishment to suppress resistance. Entire villages or towns or districts were held responsible for any resistance activity that took place there. The conventions, to counter this, reiterated the principle of individual responsibility. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) Commentary to the conventions states that parties to a conflict often would resort to “intimidatory measures to terrorize the population” in hopes of preventing hostile acts, but such practices “strike at guilty and innocent alike. They are opposed to all principles based on humanity and justice.”

The law of armed conflict applies similar protections to an internal conflict. Common Article 3 of the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 requires fair trials for all individuals before punishments; and Additional Protocol II of 1977 explicitly forbids collective punishment.

The convention was published on August 12, 1949, at the end of a conference held in Geneva from April 21 to August 12, 1949.

It is frequently cited as the legal basis for the claim that Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip constitute war crimes. It is also cited as the legal basis for the claim that the demolition of homes of Palestinian suicide bombers constitutes a war crime. Israel maintains that the definition of “occupation” in the text of Article 2 precludes this interpretation since these are stateless territories which do not belong to a High Contracting Party.

See also

• International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
• laws of war
• war crime
• collateral damage
• atrocity
• human rights

Other meanings

• An important gaming convention is known as Gen Con.

References and external links

• Geneva Conventions countries.
• RedCross and Geneva Conventions
• Text of the second convention
• UN Site for text of Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War
• Text of the fourth convention

Wikipedia Information

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