This article examines the historical evolution, legal foundations and contemporary practice of National Information Bureaux (NIBs), institutions that States are required to establish under the Geneva Conventions to collect, centralize and transmit information on enemy combatants hors de combat and certain categories of enemy civilians who have fallen into the State’s hands. It traces the origins of NIBs from early wartime initiatives in the nineteenth century to their codification in the 1949 Geneva Conventions, particularly Article 122 of Geneva Convention III and Article 136 of Geneva Convention IV. NIBs are intended to facilitate the exchange of information on prisoners of war and interned protected persons, to respond to enquiries concerning their fate and whereabouts, and to assume certain other tasks related to these categories of persons. Drawing on historical sources and contemporary State practice, the article shows that the establishment and functioning of NIBs remain uneven. States most frequently establish NIBs in the context of international armed conflicts, in particular conflicts with neighbouring States or military interventions abroad. These bodies are usually embedded within governmental structures, and their activities often extend beyond the tasks envisaged in the Geneva Conventions, frequently prioritizing issues relating to the State’s own nationals. By contrast, there is no documented practice of establishing NIBs in non-international armed conflicts, although some States have created institutions performing partially comparable tasks. Peacetime practice is also limited, with a relatively small number of States establishing or preparing NIBs through standby institutional arrangements. Two models have emerged: the State-operated model, in which NIB functions are assigned to ministerial or other governmental bodies, and the auxiliary-humanitarian model, in which these tasks are entrusted to National Red Cross or Red Crescent Societies. The article concludes by identifying key challenges in the contemporary operation of NIBs and suggesting measures to strengthen their effectiveness.

This paper explores how unrecognised separatist entities in Eurasia – de facto regimes such as Transnistria, South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, and the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics – engage with international law. It examines whether, and to what extent, these regimes comply with international law, analysing court decisions and legislation to move beyond simplistic views of non-recognition or assumed legality. The findings reveal that de facto regimes tend to mirror the international law approaches of the states they are most closely connected to – whether the territorial state (e.g. Ukraine) or an outside state exercising effective control over the entity (e.g. Russia or Armenia). This pattern is explained by the theory of “acculturation to statehood”: through sustained legal and institutional interaction, these regimes internalise and replicate the legal systems of their reference states. The study contributes to a more nuanced understanding of the role of de facto regimes in the international legal order.

Los estudios sobre la relación entre música y fuerzas militares suelen estar mediados por enfoques tradicionales que analizan la música marcial o sus usos para los fines de la institución. Sin embargo, existe una producción musical de integrantes activos y retirados de las fuerzas militares que no es marcial, que no necesariamente está institucionalizada y que se aleja de los usos y temáticas que usualmente se asocian a la música militar. El estudio de estas producciones complejiza y enriquece los enfoques tradicionales sobre la relación entre música y fuerzas militares. Este texto presenta los hallazgos de la recopilación y análisis de 463 canciones compuestas y/o interpretadas por militares activos y retirados en Colombia entre 1989 y 2021, junto con entrevistas a algunos de estos artistas. Los hallazgos sugieren que abordar este tipo de música, que pocas veces es reconocida como ‘militar’, permite conocer la perspectiva del soldado como individuo en contextos de guerra y posconflicto; facilita la comprensión de la relación entre música institucional y no institucional y los distintos usos que se le da; y abre líneas de investigación sobre la forma en la que estas producciones entran en diálogo con géneros musicales, identidades regionales y el mercado artístico en el que participan.

In their analyses of specific cases involving armed conflict, the European Court of Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights have acted as monitoring bodies for international humanitarian law (IHL) by factoring that body of law into their interpretation of human rights and State obligations set out in the European and American Conventions on Human Rights. In this article, the author argues that, in such cases, the two courts also acted as monitoring bodies for the rules of IHL designed to protect the dead and missing in both international and non-international armed conflicts. This monitoring function is apparent in the two courts’ judgments, which uphold the obligations of States to search for and identify the dead and missing in armed conflicts, to bury the remains of the dead and to investigate unlawful deaths and cases of forcible disappearance. The author concludes that not only has IHL bolstered the interpretation of the European and American Conventions on Human Rights, but that those two instruments and their interpretation have expanded the content and scope of the rules of IHL that protect the dead and missing in armed conflict.

This article explores the role of Article 6(5) of Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions in balancing justice and peace during transitions from armed conflict to peace. It argues that the provision, which encourages the granting of broad amnesties at the cessation of hostilities, requires a re-evaluation of the obligation to investigate, prosecute and punish under international law. By analyzing the legal context and scope of Article 6(5), as well as its application in transitional justice models such as in Colombia, the article highlights how the principle of peace can be prioritized alongside justice without undermining victims’ rights. The discussion critically addresses maximalist interpretations of justice, presenting a nuanced approach that foregrounds restorative justice and the importance of reconciliation in post-conflict societies.

Around the world, armed conflict is increasingly occurring in capital cities and governments are relying on pro-government, rurally recruited, militia to suppress anti-government political violence. Pendle and Maror draw lessons from South Sudan where recruits from rural areas were brought to Juba to help defend the government. Drawing on ethnographic observations and qualitative interviews with combatants, this article uses “rural radicalism” to argue that patterns of violence by these rurally recruited forces were shaped by histories of rural violence over previous decades and can be read to include a political objective that challenges the inequities in safety and security between rural areas and the capital city.

Le présent article se propose de concevoir l’influence de la notion de légitimité au-delà du rôle lui étant communément attribué en droit international humanitaire (DIH), en s’intéressant particulièrement à la relation entre ce dernier et les causes de la guerre, la nature des acteurs impliqués dans les conflits armés ainsi que les motivations des parties. En remettant notamment en question de l’idée d’une stricte séparation entre jus in bello et jus ad bellum, il est soutenu que les tentatives visant à isoler le DIH de ces questions de légitimité sont à la fois vaines, mais également à rebours de l’évolution et des logiques du régime. Il est en revanche défendu que la notion de légitimité en DIH se manifeste à travers deux modes de légitimation — l’un dérivant du statut, l’autre de la cause — à partir desquels la distribution de droits, devoirs, immunités, privilèges ou encore statuts s’opère et se voit justifiée au sein du régime. Ce faisant, de nombreux discours empruntant au second registre, souvent qualifiés d’aberrations du point de vue du DIH, ou dont la nature juridique est contestée, s’avèrent finalement être des arguments juridiques parfaitement valides et ancrés dans l’évolution et les logiques du DIH.

International humanitarian law (IHL) does not address business entities, except in situations where they directly participate in hostilities, and there is no reference to business actors in the International Committee of the Red Cross's recent Guidelines on the Protection of the Natural Environment in Armed Conflict. Yet, there has been an increasing reaffirmation of specific “duties”, “obligations” or “responsibilities” imposed on private companies operating in conflict zones. For instance, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights suggest that business entities should respect IHL rules in addition to human rights during armed conflicts, and the third revised draft of the international legally binding instrument on transnational corporations and other business enterprises refers to IHL as an interpretative framework of human rights obligations of States and businesses. The International Law Commission's 2022 Draft Principles on the Protection of the Environment during Armed Conflicts are even more specific, providing that corporations should exercise due diligence concerning the protection of the environment when acting in conflict-affected areas. However, these references to IHL as applicable to business activities remain vague and lack elaboration. This paper intends to close this gap by clarifying whether and, if so, the extent to which IHL imposes environmental obligations upon private companies in conflict situations. It submits that business entities bear environmental duties during armed conflicts deriving from IHL rules and other complementary sources of international law. The paper further discusses the content of the obligation of business entities not to harm the environment as well as their due diligence obligation.

This article seeks to demonstrate the nexus between agent-related technology and the protection of the environment in armed conflicts, looking at how agent-based modelling and simulation (ABMS) can be used as a tool to protect the environment in armed conflicts. It further analyzes the precautionary principle and due regard, as relevant rules, and explains the legal benefits of deploying ABMS to protect and preserve the natural environment. The article argues that the deployment of ABMS helps States to better understand the environmental effects of conflicts, reassess their military activities and comply with the relevant applicable rules and norms.