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Transforming a Prima Facie NIAC into an IAC: Finding the Answer in IHL
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 October 2020
Abstract
In some non-international armed conflicts (NIACs) a foreign state is involved in favour of an armed group. This poses a challenge to classifying these armed conflicts under IHL. This article argues that evaluating the actions of a foreign state is best carried out by application of the ‘overall control’ test as developed by the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the Tadić case. The advantages of this approach are twofold. First, it is a more realistic benchmark for generating the required evidence than the complete dependency or effective control tests developed by the International Court of Justice. Second, using this test makes it less likely for a state to escape its responsibilities under IHL when it acts through armed groups in a prima facie NIAC on the territory of another state. To arrive at this conclusion, the article first critically discusses the different control tests. It then advances that Article 4 of Geneva Convention III 1949 and Article 29 of Geneva Convention IV 1949 themselves contain a threshold of control that can be used to identify foreign state participation in a prima facie NIAC.
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- Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press in association with The Faculty of Law, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Footnotes
I wish to thank Dr Pontus Winther, and I am grateful to the anonymous reviewers and Professor Yaël Ronen for their helpful comments on an earlier version of this article.
References
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42 ibid [86].
43 ibid [93].
44 ibid [109] (emphasis added).
45 ibid [110].
46 ibid [109].
47 ibid [110].
48 ibid [115].
49 ibid [116]; see also Cassese (n 22) 652–53.
50 See also Nicaragua (n 20) separate opinion of Judge Ago, [15]–[16].
51 Nicaragua (n 20) [216].
52 ibid [219].
53 ibid [216].
54 Tadić (n 17).
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57 Tadić (n 17) [87].
58 ibid [97] (‘It is nevertheless imperative to specify what degree of authority or control must be wielded by a foreign State over armed forces fighting on its behalf in order to render international an armed conflict which is prima facie internal … Should the conflict eventually be classified as international, it would inter alia follow that a foreign State may in certain circumstances be held responsible for violations of international law perpetrated by the armed groups acting on its behalf’).
59 ibid [98].
60 ibid [104].
61 ibid [117].
62 ibid [120].
63 ibid [121].
64 ibid [131].
65 ibid [137].
66 ibid [162].
67 Charter of the United Nations (entered into force 24 October 1945) 1 UNTS XVI (UN Charter).
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70 ibid [379].
71 ibid [384].
72 Kirss (n 25) 157.
73 Genocide case (n 29) [386].
74 ibid [388]–[389].
75 ibid [391].
76 ibid [392].
77 ibid [393].
78 ibid [394].
79 ibid [396].
80 ibid [397].
81 ibid [400].
82 ibid [403].
83 ibid [406]; see also Genocide case (n 29) dissenting opinion of Vice President Al-Khasawneh, [37]–[39].
84 Genocide case (n 29) [404].
85 Armed Activities on the Territory of the Congo (Democratic Republic of the Congo v Uganda) Merits, Judgment [2005] ICJ Rep 168, [24], [28].
86 ibid [160].
87 Hague Convention (IV) respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land and its Annex: Regulations concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land (entered into force 26 January 1910) Martens Nouveau Recueil (ser 3) 461 and Regulations annexed to it.
88 Armed Activities on the Territory of the Congo (n 85) [177].
89 Jorritsma, Remy, ‘Where General International Law Meets International Humanitarian Law: Attribution of Conduct and the Classification of Armed Conflict’ (2018) 23 Journal of Conflict and Security Law 405, 418CrossRefGoogle Scholar (‘immutable connection that exists between belligerency in an IAC, and the responsibility that comes with it’).
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94 Ferraro and Cameron (n 17) 76.
95 Cameron and others (n 16) 126, 141.
96 ibid. See also ICRC, ‘How is the Term “Armed Conflict” Defined in International Humanitarian Law?’, ICRC Opinion Paper, March 2008, 5, https://www.icrc.org/en/doc/assets/files/other/opinion-paper-armed-conflict.pdf; IACHR, Juan Carlos Abella v Argentina, Case 11.137, Report No 55/97, Inter-AmCHR, OEA/Ser.L/V/II.95, Doc 7 Rev (18 November 1997), [152]; ICTR, Prosecutor v Alfred Musema, Judgment and Sentence, ICTR-96-13-A, Trial Chamber I, 27 January 2000, [256]–[258].
97 Tadić (n 17) separate opinion of Judge Shahabuddeen, [17].
98 Yves Sandoz, Christophe Swinarski and Bruno Zimmerman (eds), Commentary on the Additional Protocols of 8 June 1977 to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 (ICRC and Martinus Nijhoff 1987), Commentary to Article 43, paras 1659–72.
99 Sassòli (n 91) 86–87, 251, 253–54.
100 ibid.
101 ICRC Study (n 92) 530–37.
102 Talmon (n 17) 496 (‘The question of whether or not an act of a secessionist entity can be attributed to an outside power thus becomes a question of how one defines “control”’).
103 Milanovic, too, considers that ‘it is for IHL to fashion a test which determines when the relationship between a state and a non-state actor is such that a NIAC is to be internationalised, and that test may well be that of overall control’: Milanovic (n 12) 36.
104 Sassòli (n 91) 174; Watts (n 26) 891.
105 See generally Crawford, Emily, Identifying the Enemy: Civilian Participation in Armed Conflict (Oxford University Press 2015) 73, 158CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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107 ibid.
108 Tadić (n 17) [91].
109 Jean Pictet (ed), Commentary: III Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War (ICRC 1960) 57–58 (Commentary GC III (1960)).
110 Tadić (n 17) [92].
111 ibid [92].
112 ibid [93].
113 ibid [94].
114 ibid [95].
115 Commentary GC III (1960) (n 109) 57.
116 ibid 57.
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119 US Office of General Counsel, Department of Defense, ‘Department of Defense Law of War Manual’, June 2015, para 4.6.4.1.
120 Commentary GC III (1960) (n 109) 57–58.
121 Provision of supplies or other logistical support only would not be enough to determine that a group belongs to a state in question: see Watts (n 26) 898.
122 ICRC, Commentary on the Third Geneva Convention of 1949 (Cambridge University Press and ICRC 2021 forthcoming), para 1008, https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/applic/ihl/ihl.nsf/Comment.xsp?action=openDocument&documentId=1796813618ABDA06C12585850057AB95#_Toc42431478. See, however, Mačák (n 14) 173–74 (who considers that ‘in comparison with the “overall control” standard, the belonging requirement sets a much lower threshold. While the former standard requires the outside power to have a share in the organization, coordination or planning of the operations of the armed group in question, the requirement of “belonging” only demands acceptance, whether express or tacit, that the armed group is fighting on behalf of the outside power. Hence, in any conflict internationalized by a connection qualifying as “overall control”, this connection will always meet the requirement of belonging, as well’).
123 Emphasis added.
124 Final Record of the Diplomatic Conference of Geneva, 1949, vol 2, Section A, Committee III, Report, 822.
125 Tadić (n 90) separate and dissenting opinion of Judge McDonald, [20] and [31]–[34]. Other Judges at the ICTY did not discuss IHL provisions that would be helpful in classifying a prima facie NIAC as an IAC. Instead the focus lay on the possibility of the application of the grave breaches regime in NIAC, and the application of the IHL of IAC to NIACs by the warring parties through special agreements: see further Tadić, Decision on the Defence Motion (n 1) separate opinion of Judge Abi-Saab; and separate opinion of Judge Li, [19].
126 Tadić (n 90) separate and dissenting opinion of Judge McDonald, [33]–[34].
127 ibid.
128 Commentary GC IV (1958) (n 9) 211.
129 ibid 212 (emphasis added); see also Gal, Tom, ‘Unexplored Outcomes of Tadić: Applicability of the Law of Occupation to War by Proxy’ (2014) 12 Journal of International Criminal Justice 59, 66CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
130 See additionally the clarification of the ICTY allegiance theory and protected persons status: Sassòli (n 91) 291–92.
131 ICRC Study (n 92) 15, also 16.
132 ILC (n 25) para 50; Sassòli, Marco and Olson, Laura M, ‘The Judgment of the ICTY Appeals Chamber on the Merits in the Tadic Case’ (2000) 82 International Review of the Red Cross 733, 740Google Scholar; Sassòli (n 91) 175. See, however, Iris van der Heijden, ‘Other Issues Relating to the Treatment of Civilians in Enemy Hands’ in Clapham, Gaeta and Sassòli (n 12) 1241, 1253 (‘In order to discover whether a state is responsible for the treatment accorded to protected persons, reference may be made to the ILC Articles on State Responsibility, as well as to the case law of the ICJ and ICTY, where discussion is still ongoing as regards the degree of control necessary for attribution to a state of the acts and omissions of individuals not having the formal status of an organ of the state. A possible solution might be to argue that the test of control applies differently in each situation. The test for the degree of control by a state over an individual who is not a de jure organ of the state might then differ, so that one would apply the overall control test for the classification of the conflict, whereas the effective control test would apply as regards the attribution of acts for the purposes of state responsibility’).