* Nils Melzer (Legal Adviser, International Committee of the Red Cross), “Clarifying the Notion of Direct Participation in Hostilities” (June 1, 2009)
The ICRC has released its long-anticipated report on the meaning of “direct participation in hostilities” (DPH). A link to the report, as well as links to a corresponding “Q&A” document and to the reports generated by a series of preliminary meetings on this topic, are posted here.
I will circulate a summary of the substance of the report tomorrow (I hope). In the meantime, I will simply note what the ICRC has to say about the sponsorship and nature of the report in its opening pages:
“First, the Interpretive Guidance is an expression of solely the ICRC’s views. While international humanitarian law relating to the notion of direct participation in hostilities was examined over several years with a group of eminent legal experts, to whom the ICRC owes a huge debt of gratitude, the positions enunciated are the ICRC’s alone. Second, while reflecting the ICRC’s views, the Interpretive Guidance is not and cannot be a text of a legally binding nature. Only State agreements (treaties) or State practice followed out of a sense of legal obligation on a certain issue (custom) can produce binding law.” (p. 6)
By Robert M. Chesney
Robert M. Chesney is Charles I. Francis Professor in Law at UT-Austin School of Law. Chesney is a national security law specialist, with a particular interest in problems associated with terrorism. Professor Chesney recently served in the Justice Department in connection with the Detainee Policy Task Force created by Executive Order 13493. He is a member of the Advisory Committee of the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Law and National Security, a senior editor for the Journal of National Security Law & Policy, an associate member of the Intelligence Science Board, a non-resident senior fellow of the Brookings Institution, a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a member of the American Law Institute. Professor Chesney has published extensively on topics ranging from detention and prosecution in the counterterrorism context to the states secrets privilege. He served previously as chair of the Section on National Security Law of the Association of American Law Schools and as editor of the National Security Law Report (published by the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Law and National Security). His upcoming projects include two books under contract with Oxford University Press, one concerning the evolution of detention law and policy and the other examining the judicial role in national security affairs.
View all of Robert M. Chesney's posts.
