Conference Report: 30 Years Additional Protocols to the 1949 Geneva Conventions: Past, Present and Future: 18th Conference of the Legal Advisors to the German Army and of the Representatives of the German Red Cross, 7 and 8 March 2008, Bad Mergentheim (Germany)

Abstract

One of the cornerstones of the law of armed conflicts, known under the term of “international humanitarian law”, is the so-called “Geneva Law”. Bearing in mind the experiences of the Second World War, Geneva Law was an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) initiative to focus codification on the protection of the individual from the ravages of war. Today it mainly consists of the four Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the two Additional Protocols of 8 June 1977. However, since the end of the 1970s, further development of the codified body of international humanitarian law has slowed, not least because the international community, given the number of armed conflicts taking place, has become reluctant to accept further obligations.