The last few years have been a momentous period in the life of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. One milestone was the adoption of its new Statutes by the Twenty-fifth International Conference of the Red Cross (Geneva, October 1986). Furthermore, the increasingly universal nature of the Movement and the desire to present a united front in the face of the changes and upheavals taking place in the modern world, and the “solidarity of image” which exists between the various components of the Movement and which was stressed in Resolution No. 8 of the Council of Delegates (Rio de Janeiro, November 1987), have all had an appreciable influence on the Movement's information policy—and hence that of the ICRC.

The common terms “internal disturbances” and “internal tensions” cover a whole range of situations all characterized by acts of violence related to human rights violations and resulting in human suffering. These situations, now so common and widespread throughout the world, are typified by direct confrontations between police and opponents of a regime or by any of a variety of ethnic, racial, religious, ideological, economic or social tensions, which may likewise give rise to police action as a preventive measure.

Much has been written on the question of orders from a superior officer. The problem is too complex for any simple reply. The national legislation to which soldiers are subject renders any member of the armed forces who refuses to carry out an order liable to presocution for a penal offence. In serious cases and especially in time of war military penal codes generally provide that the judge may sentence the offender to death. However the plea of superior orders does not necessarily relieve a military subordinate of penal responsibility for a violation of international humanitarian law committed in carrying out those orders.

October 1965: At the XXth International Conference of the Red Cross in Vienna the delegates stood and listened in deep silence to the solemn proclamation of the Fundamental Principles of the Red Cross, which they subsequently adopted unanimously in a storm of applause. I swore then that I would be faithful to those Principles for the whole of my Red Cross life. It seemed easy enough at the time; it was only what Red Cross workers had been doing ever since the Red Cross was founded.

For almost two decades, the International Red Cross Movement has been engaged in a continuing process of self-examination regarding its contribution to peace and disarmament. At the same time, public attention is being focused on, and sometimes even captivated by, various bilateral and multilateral efforts to achieve progress in nuclear and non-nuclear arms control in fields such as the reduction of strategic and intermediate-range nuclear weapons, nuclear and chemical weapon-free zones, confidence- and security-building measures, and so on. The two lines of action are usually dealt with individually without proper consideration of the manifold interconnections existing between them. Only recently have efforts been made to clarify the relationship between the two. The purpose of this article is to bring them together and to do so by asking the question: To what extent can the effort to promote and implement international humanitarian law be seen as a contribution in terms of arms control?

The protection of refugees and displaced persons is guaranteed by many universal and regional instruments of international law. The rules are there, but for several years the humanitarian organizations charged with implementing them have constantly had to face new situations brought about by the scale and frequency of mass population movements, especially in the Third World, and new types of violence which affect both the status and the possibilities for protection of the people concerned. Very often, the solutions arrived at by these bodies have taken the form of assistance rather than protection, the one not always easily distinguishable from the other.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) was set up in 1951 with the main function of providing protection for refugees. This mandate corresponded to the task immediately confronting it, that of solving the refugee problem affecting Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War.

In a sporadic way since 1919, then systematically from the late 1960s, the ICRC has endeavoured to carry out its humanitarian activities in situations of internal disturbances and tensions, in particular to give protection and assistance to persons imprisoned in such circumstances and commonly referred to as “political detainees”.

The ICRC's rules of conduct in such situations were presented at the Twenty-third International Conference of the Red Cross (Bucharest, 1977) as part of the document entitled “The ICRC, the League and the Report on the Re-appraisal of the Role of the Red Cross”.

In the town of Moena, Italy, province of Trent, not far from the Austrian border, there is preserved a handwritten document entitled «A Soldier's Life—the Campaign of 1859». In it are described the advance and retreat of the 6th Rhaetian (Alpine) Kaiserjaeger Battalion of the Austro-Hungarian army, terminating in the battles of Morando and Solferino and the armistice of Verona. The author, Pellegrino Chiocchetti (1835-1892), took part in the campaign of 1859 as a simple soldier, conscripted to fight on the Austrian side, against the French and Italian armies. At that time, his home province in northern Italy was under Austrian domination and the official language was German.

At the Twenty-fifth International Conference of the Red Cross (Geneva, 1986) the ICRC presented its report on the identification of medical transports, including the action taken to implement Resolution VIII of the previous International Conference. The report stressed that in a naval conflict the protection of medical transports at sea largely depended on the technical means of identification available.

By adopting its Resolution III entitled “Identification of medical transports”, the Twenty-fifth Conference recognized the need for continuous efforts to ensure that the means used to signal and identify medical personnel, units and transports keep pace with technical advances.

Ever since its foundation, the ICRC has made considerable efforts to develop humanitarian law and to ensure that it is accepted by the States. Indeed, its activity in this field is acknowledged both by the Statutes of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and by those of the ICRC itself. However, the ICRC is aware of the fact that the treaties which constitute humanitarian law, even if they are duly accepted by the States, could well remain a dead letter unless internal legal and practical measures are taken within State systems to guarantee their application.

This year marks the 125th anniversary of the founding of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The theme for World Red Cross and Red Crescent Day on 8 May was “125 years at work…and still developing”. This theme was chosen to underline the universalization of the Movement and the continuous growth in its activities on behalf of the victims of armed conflict and natural disaster. But development is also an expression of the solidarity between the Movement's components as soon as it is necessary to bring immediate assistance to the victims of man-made or natural catastrophy and to put forward medium or long-term plans aimed, in accordance with the Movement's Fundamental Principles, at preventing these calamities and ensuring the welfare of communities.

The commemoration of the 125th Anniversary of the Movement will last until October 1989 and will provide a unique opportunity to make the general public, and especially young people, aware of the ideals and the humanitarian activities of the Red Cross and Red Crescent; it must also be a time to reflect upon the task accomplished by the Movement in 125 years of existence and on its prospects for the future.

Development means attaining the capability to act today, so as to be able to cope with a specific situation tomorrow: in other words, development in its true perspective, in its universal context. A developed organization or institution is therefore one which is able to carry out its tasks efficiently. Development is achieved in a planned and systematic manner, through a continuing process that meets the changing needs and priorities of the future.

From time to time, States are affected by outbreaks of internal violence. Such upheavals are usually referred to as internal disturbances or tensions, disorders, states of emergency, revolutions or insurrections. These expressions all refer to situations that appear contrary to justice, order, stability and internal peace. There have been many examples of the kind in the past, and we know from the media that they continue to occur. Almost every nation in the world has a history marked by periods of insecurity and protest accompanied by outbreaks of violence.

In 1977 the Thirtieth World Health Assembly decided that the main social goal of governments and WHO should be “the attainment by all citizens of the world by the year 2000 of a level of health that will permit them to lead a socially and economically productive life”.

The International Conference on Primary Health Care (PHC), meeting in Alma Ata, USSR, in 1978, asserted that health is a human right and that health care should be accessible, affordable and socially relevant.

Red Cross doctrine and human rights doctrine have gradually converged, revealing spheres of activity and formal research common to both. It may be interesting to consider to what degree the idea of protection of human rights was present in the minds of the founders of the Red Cross, and how their original purposes were extended until they included some basic aspects of protection of the human individual.

The refugee does not enjoy special protection in IHL except in several provisions which will be considered below, nor is there any particular definition of a refugee as a person protected by IHL. The refugee is above all a civilian person and is protected as such by the relevant provisions of IHL. The sole criterion, for the purposes of the Fourth Geneva Convention, is in fact the absence of protection by any government. The term “refugee” is thus given a broad connotation. In international public law there are two defined categories of refugee, to which a third category is usually added by analogy.

Cape Verde, a small archipelago formed by ten islands and eight islets, is located 455 km off the west coast of Africa, between the Tropic of Cancer and the Equator. It has an area of 4,033 sq km and a population of 320,000.

The dry climate and sparse rainfall characteristic of these volcanic islands, which constitute a prolongation into the Atlantic of the arid Sahel region, are extremely unfavourable to agriculture.

This article examines the mandate to protect and assist refugees in armed conflicts and internal disturbances. It is a modest attempt to clarify the web of overlapping roles and mandates of humanitarian bodies, in particular the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement (“the Movement”) and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). It purports to re-assess the evolution of their mandate and its extension. On the one hand, there is a need to define concrete principles, based on past and present practice, for humanitarian action. On the other, there must be sufficient leeway for flexibility and pragmatism in situations for which there is no comprehensive prognosis. The article concludes by demonstrating the interdependence and complementarity of humanitarian organizations which have to proffer protection and assistance where no other body can act.