Taking care to protect the environment against damage: a meaningless obligation?

Abstract

Little attention is paid to the obligation of 'care' in Article 55(1) of Additional Protocol

The analytical framework of water and armed conflict: a focus on the 2006 Summer War between Israel and Lebanon

“…Based solidly on the tenet of non-discrimination (Pejic, 2001), Article 54 (Para. 2) and Article 55 of the same Protocol call for the 'protection of the natural environment' and 'objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population' during times of armed combat (ICRC, 1994; see also Hulme, 2010; Rieu-Clarke, Moynihan, and Magsig, 2012, Table 6.2). Destruction of civilian water infrastructure in times of war is also considered to be a violation of the right to an adequate standard of living, as stated in the ICESCR (Article 11(1)), 2 as well as in the UNGA's Human Right to Water (Tignino, 2011), and in the United Nations Watercourses Convention (UNWC) of 1997 (McCaffrey, 2007)-the latter is discussed in greater detail below.…”

The obligation to prevent environmental harm in relation to armed conflict

“…19 It has been suggested that the natural environment is protected by general LOAC rules 20 in as much as it "affects the civilian population". 21 The first mention of the natural environment in Article 35(3) is placed "neatly beside the most fundamental provisions on means and methods" 22 in AP I. In this way, it evades the possible limitation of only being applicable to attacks which affect objects on land.…”