The use of weapons against prisoners of war, especially against those who are escaping or attempting

to escape, shall constitute an extreme measure, which shall always be preceded by warnings
appropriate to the circumstances.

Weapons
A large variety of weapons exist, and they can be used in many different ways.
International humanitarian law regulates the use of weapons:
 Some weapons are simply prohibited, as such: not only is their use strictly
prohibited, but so is their production, transfer, and stockpiling.
 Other weapons are authorized, but their use is regulated by prohibiting
certain forms of use; for instance, any use that is indiscriminate or
disproportionate is prohibited.
 States must examine whether any new weapon is compatible with the
principles of international humanitarian law, in consultation with the
ICRC.

Humanitarian Law Limits the

Choice of Weapons
In general, humanitarian law prohibits any weapon “of a
nature to cause superfluous injury or unnecessary
suffering” and any that may have indiscriminate or
excessively injurious effects. This is an ancient principle,
linked to the axiom that “the right of the parties to the
conflict to choose methods or means of warfare is not
unlimited” (API Art. 35).
Humanitarian law may therefore prohibit the use,
production, stockpiling, or selling of certain kinds of
weapons.

Humanitarian Law Limits the Ways

Weapons Are Used
The four 1949 Geneva Conventions and their two 1977
Additional Protocols set forth the restrictions on the use of
weapons. Today, these rules are mandatory for all States.
Some of the main rules are as follows:
 Parties to the conflict must distinguish between civilian
and military objects. The weapons they use must always
allow them to respect this distinction.
 Weapons must not be used in a way that would not be
justified by a genuine military requirement or that would
be disproportionate to the military advantage sought or
to the supposed military threat. The aim of these
provisions is to limit superfluous, gratuitous, or
unnecessary damage or suffering.
 During attacks, parties to the conflict (in particular, their
commanders) are under the obligation to take certain
precautions to limit their possible effects on civilians and
civilian objects.
▸ Attacks ▸ Duty of commanders
Customary international humanitarian law also regulates
the use of weapons. Rule 70 of the study on the rules of
customary international humanitarian law published by the
ICRC in 2005 (customary IHL study) provides that “the use
of means and methods of warfare which are of a nature to
cause superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering is
prohibited”; while Rule 71 states that “the use of weapons
which are by nature indiscriminate is prohibited.” Those
two rules are applicable in both international and non-
international armed conflicts.
Another important landmark in restricting the use of
weapons, in a more general way, was the adoption of the
Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of
Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be
Excessively Injurious or Have Indiscriminate Effects (known
as the Convention on Conventional Weapons), in Geneva on
10 October 1980 (ratified in April 2013 by 116 State Parties),
and its Additional Protocol on Blinding Laser Weapons,
adopted in Vienna on 13 October 1995 (ratified by 104 State
Parties in April 2013).

Categories of Weapons
Different kinds of weapons are available. Some weapons are
authorized, except certain uses thereof (edged weapons and
firearms), while others are strictly prohibited (incendiary,
biological, and chemical weapons). The general rule that
prohibits attacks against civilians is applicable to the use of
all weapons.

Edged Weapons
These are any offensive or cutting blades or other weapons
made of metal or steel, such as knives, swords, machetes,
daggers, or bayonets. Their use is restricted by the general
rules of humanitarian law, which prohibit attacking non-
combatants, killing or wounding treacherously, and causing
superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering (Art. 23 of
Hague Convention IV; API Arts. 35–37).

Firearms
This is a very broad category of weapons, including all those
that shoot cartridges or explosive projectiles, such as
shotguns, cannons, bombs, missiles, cluster munitions, and
so on. Only some of these weapons are prohibited:
 explosive projectiles that weigh less than four hundred
grams (fourteen ounces), as established by the 1868 St.
Petersburg Declaration Renouncing the Use, in Time of
War, of Certain Explosive Projectiles;
 bullets that expand or flatten easily in the human body,
as set forth in the 1899 Hague Peace Declarations;
 any weapon the main effect of which is to injure by
fragments that are not detectable by X-rays once inside
the human body, as established by Protocol I to the 1980
 Convention on Conventional Weapons (Protocol on Non-
detectable Fragments);
 cluster munitions, as established by the Convention on
Cluster Munitions adopted in Dublin in 30 May 2008 and
entered into force in August 2010, which prohibits all
use, stockpiling, production, and transfer of cluster
munitions. As of June 2015, 92 States have ratified it. In
order to monitor the application of the Convention, it has
been decided that States Parties shall meet regularly in
order to take decisions in respect of any matter with
regard to the application or implementation of the
Convention, including the operation and status of the
Convention. The First Assembly of State Parties was held
in Vientiane, in Laos, from 9 to 12 September 2010. The
second Assembly was in Beirut, Lebanon, from 12 to 16
September 2011. Moreover, a Review Conference shall be
convened by the Secretary-General of the United Nations
five years after the entry into force of this Convention
(Art. 12). The purpose of this Review Conference is, inter
alia, to review the operation and status of this
Convention.
On 30 April 2010, the Central African Convention for the
Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons, Their
Ammunition, Parts, and Components That Can Be Used for
Their Manufacture, Repair, and Assembly, known as the
Kinshasa Convention, was signed in Brazzaville, Republic of
the Congo, at the Thirty-fifth Ministerial Meeting of the
United Nations Standing Advisory Committee on Security
Questions in Central Africa. The eleven signatories are
Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic,
Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, the
Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Sao Tomé, and Principe and
Equatorial Guinea. The Convention has not yet entered into
force and will do so once it is ratified by six signatories. The
purpose of this Convention is to prevent, combat, and
eradicate the illicit trade and trafficking in small arms and
light weapons (SALW), in order to combat armed violence
and ease the human trafficking caused in Africa by this illicit
trade of SALW (Art. 1, paras. 1, 3).
The obligations resting upon States Parties are, inter alia, to
prohibit any transfer of SALW to non-state armed groups
(Art. 4); to designate a national body that shall be
responsible for handling issues relating to the issuance of
transfer authorizations both to public institutions and to
qualified private actors (Art. 5); to draw up an end-user
certificate that shall be issued for all import shipment (Art.
6); to prohibit and penalize the possession, carrying, use,
and trade of SALW by civilians within their respective
territories (Art. 7); and to conduct semiannual inspections
to evaluate and inventory stockpiles of SALW in the
possession of armed and other authorized security groups
and to collect, seize, register, and destroy any SALW that are
surplus, obsolete, or illicit (Art. 15). In order to monitor the
application of the Convention, State Parties shall support
the establishment by the Economic Community of Central
African States, of a group of experts responsible for follow-
up and appraisal of the implementation of activities (Art.
32).
Customary humanitarian law also prohibits the use of
certain types of firearms in international and non-
international armed conflicts. Rule 77 of the customary IHL
study states that “the use of bullets which expand or flatten
easily in the human body is prohibited”; Rule 78 provides
that “the anti-personnel use of bullets which explode within
the human body is prohibited”; Rule 79 states that “the use
of weapons the primary effect of which is to injure by
fragments which are not detectable by X-rays in the human
body is prohibited”; while Rule 80 states that “the use of
booby-traps which are in any way attached to or associated
with objects or persons entitled to special protection under
international humanitarian law or with objects that are
likely to attract civilians is prohibited.”

Incendiary Weapons
These weapons come under the category of firearms. Their
aim is to set fire to objects or to cause burn injuries to
humans. As with all weapons, it is prohibited to use them
against individuals and objects protected by humanitarian
law (e.g., civilians and civilian goods, including forests).
It is also prohibited to use them against combatants and
military objectives that are located “within a concentration
of civilians,” as per Protocol III to the 1980 Convention on
Conventional Weapons (Protocol on Incendiary Weapons).
Rule 84 of the customary IHL study provides that “if
incendiary weapons are used, particular care must be taken
to avoid, and in any event to minimize, incidental loss of
civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian
objects,” and Rule 85 states that “the anti-personnel use of
incendiary weapons is prohibited, unless it is not feasible to
use a less harmful weapon to render a person hors de
combat.” Those two rules are applicable in both
international and non-international armed conflicts.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

This denomination includes three categories of weapons:
biological, chemical, and nuclear.
Since these are indiscriminate, by nature, their use is hard
to reconcile with the spirit of humanitarian law, which is
based on the military ability to distinguish between civilian
and military objectives, and between civilians and members
of armed forces.
Bacteriological (or Biological) Weapons
Bacteriological weapons (commonly known as biological
weapons) are those that aim to spread disease that threatens
the health of human beings, animals, and plants. Customary
international humanitarian law prohibits the use of
biological weapons in both international and non-
international armed conflicts (Rule 73 of the customary IHL
study). Moreover, their use, production, and stockpiling are
prohibited by two main international texts:
 the Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use of
Asphyxiating, Poisonous, or Other Gases, and of
Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, adopted in Geneva
on 17 June 1925—this convention had 137 States Parties
as of June 2015;
 the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development,
Production, and Stockpiling of Bacteriological
(Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on Their
Destruction, better known as the Biological Weapons
Convention (BWC), opened for signature on 10 April 1972
—it had 172 States Parties as of June 2015. The fact that
this Convention is relatively recent, and its prohibitions
are very broad, has made it the point of reference in
terms of regulating biological weapons.
The main prohibitions are enumerated in Article 1: each
State Party undertakes “never in any circumstance to
develop, produce, stockpile, or otherwise acquire or retain
microbial or other biological agents, or toxins . . . , or
weapons, equipment or means of delivery designed to use
such agents or toxins.” The Convention offers no further
definition, which is problematic because the meaning of
“weapons, equipment or means of delivery” is now a subject
of controversy among States.
The Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) entered into
force in 1975; it was the first multilateral disarmament
treaty banning an entire category of weapons of mass
destruction. Nonetheless, the Convention has rapidly faced
criticism, notably because of the fact that it lacked clear
definitions of such weapons as well as a monitoring
mechanism. It was only at the Third Review Conference, in
1991, that the BWC States Parties decided to investigate
possible verification methods. However, this idea was
abandoned in 2001, when the United States rejected a draft
protocol to the Convention that would have required States
Parties to declare relevant facilities and submit to
inspections. In 2006, during the Sixth Review Conference,
States Parties adopted a consensus regarding the creation of
an Implementation Support Unit (ISU) to assist States
Parties with the implementation of the Convention. The ISU
is funded by the States Parties to the Convention and
performs several tasks, such as administrative support and
confidence-building measures and acts as a clearinghouse
for assistance with national implementation. Nonetheless,
the ISU has been given limited monitoring capabilities
because of its size (three full-time posts), funding (funded
for four years, 2007–2011), as well as mandate, as it cannot
carry out inspections or enforce compliance.
The Seventh Review Conference of the BWC was been held
in Geneva from 5 to 22 December 2011. It was the first
opportunity for States Parties to examine the
implementation of the Convention since 2006. According to
the new president of the Conference, Ambassador Paul van
den Ijssel of the Netherlands, it is clear that the Biological
Weapons Convention needs to be strengthened by
consensus. This Review Conference focused on several
issues, inter alia: (a) ways and means to enhance national
implementation; (b) ways to create an accountability
framework to monitor compliance; (c) means to set up
national, regional, and international measures to improve
bio safety and bio security; (d) ways to improve confidence
between States; and (e) ways to increase the ISU’s
capabilities.
Chemical Weapons
Chemical weapons—the clearest definition of which is
offered in the 1992 Convention listed later—cause death,
temporary incapacitation, or permanent harm to humans or
animals. Mainly, they include the munitions and devices that
release toxic chemicals. Various conventions prohibit their
use, production, and stockpiling:
 The Hague declarations prohibiting the launching of
projectiles, the aim of which is to spread asphyxiating or
poisonous gases, adopted 29 July 1899.
 The 1925 Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use of
Asphyxiating, Poisonous, or Other Gases, and of
Bacteriological Methods of Warfare (see above). This
Convention does not include any enforcement or
verification mechanisms. It prohibits the use of chemical
and biological weapons in times of international conflict
but does not prohibit their stockpiling or production.
Furthermore, it authorizes the use of these weapons in
reprisals against States that make use of such weapons
first, or against States that are not parties to the Protocol.
 The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development,
Production, Stockpiling, and Use of Chemical Weapons
and on Their Destruction adopted in Geneva on 3
September 1992—it entered into force on 29 April 1997
and had 190 States Parties as of June 2015. This
Convention created the Organization for the Prohibition
of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). Based in The Hague, this
monitoring body is made up of a secretariat and teams of
inspectors. It analyzes the reports that States Parties are
under the obligation to submit to it concerning their
activities relating to chemical agents; it carries out
routine or surprise inspections to production sites; and it
monitors the destruction operations of existing
stockpiles.

Customary humanitarian law also prohibits the use of

chemical weapons in international and non-international
armed conflicts (Rule 74 of the customary IHL study). Rule
75 specifically provides that “the use of riot-control agents as
a method of warfare is prohibited,” and Rule 76 states that
“the use of herbicides as a method of warfare is prohibited if
they: (a) are of a nature to be prohibited chemical weapons;
(b) are of a nature to be prohibited biological weapons; (c)
are aimed at vegetation that is not a military objective; (d)
would cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians,
damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which
may be expected to be excessive in relation to the concrete
and direct military advantage anticipated; or (e) would
cause widespread, long-term and severe damage to the
natural environment.”
Nuclear Weapons
There is no general prohibition on the use of nuclear
weapons. Today’s doctrine holds that nuclear weapons are
weapons of mass destruction and, as such, have
indiscriminate effects. From this perspective, and for both
reasons, they should be prohibited by the provisions of
Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions that forbid
indiscriminate or excessively injurious weapons (see Section
I of this entry). Eight States that possess nuclear weapons
have ratified Additional Protocol I with reservations of
interpretation.
On 8 July 1996, the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
rendered an advisory opinion on the legality of the threat or
use of nuclear weapons, on the United Nations General
Assembly’s request. The opinion, which is very ambiguous,
reaches four main conclusions: (1) the use of nuclear
weapons is neither formally prohibited nor formally
authorized; (2) the threat or use of nuclear weapons is
contrary to the fundamental rules of humanitarian law; (3)
the use of nuclear weapons in a conflict, during actions or
combats in which tactical weapons would be permitted, is
strictly forbidden; and (4) it was not possible to conclude
definitely whether the threat or use of nuclear weapons
would be lawful or unlawful in a case of self-defense, if a
State were to face an extreme circumstance that threatened
its very survival.
Officially, five nuclear powers exist: the five members of the
UN Security Council (China, France, the Russian Federation,
the United Kingdom, and the United States). However, in
1998, both India and Pakistan conducted several nuclear
tests. These two States, as well as Israel, are considered
“threshold” States, meaning they have the necessary
resources to produce nuclear weapons but are not officially
declared as possessing them.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), based in
Vienna, Austria, monitors the use of nuclear energy,
including weapons. There are two main international
conventions that aim to control nuclear weapons:
 The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons
(known as the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, or
NPT), which was adopted under the aegis of the UN in
1968. It entered into force on 5 March 1970 but was
suspended indefinitely in 1995. As of June 2015, it had
190 participating States, including the five Security
Council nuclear powers. Israel, India, and Pakistan have
not yet ratified it.
 The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT),
which was adopted in 1996 at the UN Conference on
Disarmament. It has not yet entered into force. It has to
be ratified by forty-four nuclear-capable States, including
the three threshold States, before it can enter into force.
As of June 2015, 183 States had signed it, and 164 had
ratified it (of which only twenty are among the nuclear-
capable States, and the threshold States have declared
that they will not ratify it). This treaty completes an
earlier treaty, the 1963 Moscow Treaty
Customary humanitarian law also limits the use of
landmines. Rule 81 of the customary IHL study provides that
“when landmines are used, particular care must be taken to
minimize their indiscriminate effects,” while Rule 83 states
that “at the end of active hostilities, a party to the conflict
which has used landmines must remove or otherwise render
them harmless to civilians, or facilitate their removal.”
Rules 81 and 83 are applicable in both international and
non-international armed conflicts. Rule 82 provides that “a
party to the conflict using landmines must record their
placement, as far as possible” and is customarily applicable
in international armed conflict and, arguably, in non-
international ones.

Autonomous Combat System: Drones and

Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAVS)
There is today a controversy regarding the legal status under
international humanitarian law of unmanned aerial vehicles
and drones. The debate is mainly focused on drone warfare.
Although there is no treaty or customary rule prohibiting
the use of autonomous attack technology, such practice
raises two main questions. The first one challenges the
autonomy of software in an attack decision. The second one
questions the possibility to articulate this autonomous
decision with the duty of distinction and precaution binding
on all targeting rules (API Arts. 36, 51). The qualitative legal
requirement to assess the risk for civilians and the balance
between this risk and the expected military advantage
cannot be left to autonomous technology and implies some
form of direct human involvement, even in a remote
manner. Another important element lies in the
extraterritorial dimension of such attack, which take place
far from the national territory of the country involved and is
aggravated by the confidentiality of the agencies often
operating such weapons, outside of official military
command.

Toward an Arms Trade Treaty

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research
Institute, based in Stockholm, Sweden, international arms
trade grew by 24 percent between 1994 and 1997. In 1998,
arms trade decreased slightly to $22 billion, from $25 billion
in 1997.
The arms market is dominated by five exporters: the United
States, the Russian Federation, France, the United Kingdom,
and Germany. The main purchasing regions are Asia (39
percent of arms imports) and the Middle East (31 percent).
Worldwide military and arms spending have decreased
continuously since 1987, except in these two regions. In
1998, the total value of the arms market was $745 billion.
According to a report published by UN experts in August
1999, internal conflicts (which represent 90 percent of
today’s conflicts) are fueled by small arms and light
weapons. Five hundred million such weapons are in
circulation around the world, and 40 percent of their trade
is illegal, often in violation of embargoes.
In 2003, following the success of the campaign treaty on the
ban of landmines, Amnesty International and Oxfam
International launched the “Control Arms” campaign, which
is a global civil society alliance campaigning for the drafting
of an international and legally binding agreement on arms
trade. In December 2006, the United Nations General
Assembly adopted Resolution 61/89, in which 153
governments recognized that arms control and
disarmament were essential for the maintenance of the
global peace and security. Therefore, they decided to start
working on the development of a global Arms Trade Treaty
that would regulate the import, export, and transfer of
conventional arms. In January 2009, the UN General
Assembly adopted Resolution 63/240, which launched a
time frame for the negotiation of the Arms Trade Treaty.
This included one preparatory meeting in 2010, two in 2011,
and one in July 2012 before the final negotiating conference
scheduled for March 2013. At the end of this Final UN
Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, States failed to reach
an agreement. The Treaty was therefore submitted to States
by votes at the General Assembly. The resolution containing
the text of the treaty was finally adopted on 2 April 2013 with
154 votes in favor, three against (Democratic People’s
Republic of Korea, Iran, and Syria), and twenty-three
abstentions. The treaty is opened to ratification since 3 June
2013 and will enter into force ninety days after its fiftieth
ratification.

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