Rule 149. A State is responsible for violations of international humanitarian law attributable to it, including:

1. (a) violations committed by its organs, including its armed forces;

2. (b) violations committed by persons or entities it empowered to exercise elements of governmental authority;

3. (c) violations committed by persons or groups acting in fact on its instructions, or under its direction or control; and

4. (d) violations committed by private persons or groups which it acknowledges and adopts as its own conduct.

Practice

Volume II, Chapter 42, Section A.

Summary

State practice establishes this rule as a norm of customary international law applicable to violations committed in both international and non-international armed conflicts.

State responsibility for violations committed by the organs of a State, including its armed forces

It is a long-standing rule of customary international law, set forth in Article 3 of the 1907 Hague Convention (IV) and repeated in Article 91 of Additional Protocol I, that a State is responsible for “all acts committed by persons forming part of its armed forces”. This rule is an application of the general rule of State responsibility for internationally wrongful acts, whereby a State is responsible for the behaviour of its organs. The armed forces are considered to be a State organ, like any other entity of the executive, legislative or judicial branch of government. The application of this general rule of attribution of responsibility to international humanitarian law is reflected in the four Geneva Conventions, which specify that State responsibility exists in addition to the requirement to prosecute individuals for grave breaches.