It was 300 years ago, in 1673, that Cornelius van Bynkershoek, the great Dutch lawyer and author on public and international law, was born. It is proper to commemorate this jurist of great reputation as he was still called in 1812 by an American court. For the Red Cross, being a product and perhaps the most important instrument, to-day, of international humanitarian law, should not forget that one of its main sources lies in the doctrine of international law, or law of nations, as it was developed by the great authors of former days, the founders of international law. Although everyone will have in mind the name of Hugo Grotius, that of van Bynkershoek seems quite unknown. There may be some reason for this, but before trying to explain this anomaly we must try to get to know van Bynkershoek a little better.

Under the title of Weapons that may Cause Unnecessary Suffering or have Indiscriminate Effects, the International Committee has published a summarized report on the work of a group of experts whom it convened in Geneva, this year, on the subject of modern weapons.

We have the honour to inform you that the International Committee of the Red Cross, on 24 October 1973, officially recognized the Central African Red Cross Society.

At the outset of hostilities in the Middle East, the ICRC took various steps in Geneva and through its delegation in the field.

The mission of the International Committee of the Red Cross to Chile, composed of six delegates including one doctor, pursued its visits in October to places of detention in that country. The ICRC delegates made several visits to the National Stadium in Santiago and also to Valparaiso. A first round of visits was made to the north and south of Chile, followed later by a further round of visits. Altogether, the ICRC delegates went to eighteen places of detention and saw more than ten thousand detainees. Everywhere they were able to talk with detainees of their choice, without witnesses.

On 27 September 1973, the “Vietnam Presse” agency published an article entitled “The International Red Cross approves the treatment of communist prisoners in South Vietnam”, mentioning a visit by the ICRC delegation in the Republic of Vietnam to the Chi-Hoa “correction centre” in Saigon. The ICRC delegation did indeed, on 14 June 1973, go to that institution built for the detention of several thousand detainees but, as “Vietnam Presse” admits, the delegation had access to only 83 prisoners of war (officially described as Vietnamese communist prisoners) who had been sentenced to imprisonment for penal law offences during their captivity in a prisoner-of-war camp. The delegation did not see any other detainees and was therefore unable to make any statement concerning their number or conditions of detention.

In its desire to contribute actively to disseminating the principles of the Red Cross and the Conventions among schoolchildren the world over, the International Committee took the initiative of publishing and offering National Societies an 80-page school textbook with illustrations suited to each country. The school textbook was complemented by a “Teacher's Manual” to serve as a guide for teachers. By 31 October 1973, fifty-eight countries of Africa, Asia and the Middle East were using the textbook, and more than two million copies had been published in seventeen languages.