South Ossetia: Mine victim produces sweetness and light
Avtandil lost a leg to one of the universal consequences of armed conflict – landmines. But he continues to run his farm, with ICRC support. As I set out for Monaster, named after the nearby …
Skip to main content
Search results
International humanitarian law: Madagascar supports Montreux Document
A round table to present the Montreux Document to the Malagasy authorities was held on 18 June 2015 in the capital Antananarivo. This initiative was taken by the National International Humanitarian …
Memories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki urge us to eliminate nuclear weapons
By Tadateru Konoe, President, International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and Peter Maurer, President, International Committee of the Red Cross Consider a shocking reality: …
Helping mothers improve child nutrition in Somalia
Somalia has been ravaged by decades of armed conflict which has disrupted livelihoods and thrown the social fabric into disarray. Seasonal occurrences of drought and floods deepen the crisis by …
Doctor answers questions from Facebook on diseases caused by atomic bombs
Meet Dr Masao Tomonaga, Honorary Director of the Japanese Red Cross Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Hospital. Dr Tomonaga has cared for leukaemia patients, including atomic bomb survivors, and focused on how …
Yemen: The conflict continues ... the cost rises
The conflict in Yemen is causing immense suffering. Thousands of people have been killed, hundreds of thousands more have been forced to flee their homes. There have been attacks on medical …
Azerbaijan: Biological samples to help clarify fate of missing persons
Almost 4,600 people are still unaccounted for, more than two decades after the signing of a ceasefire agreement in the Nagorny Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia. The ICRC is working …
Subscribe to the law and policy newsletter
Subscribe Click here to see the past issues. Click here for Law and policy news, e-learning, videos, interviews and more. …
Azerbaijan: Trees protect front-line communities against bullets
Almost two decades after the signing of the 1994 cease-fire agreement regarding the Nagorny Karabakh conflict, the humanitarian situation remains difficult for communities on both sides of the …
Syrian family escape one war only to fall victim to the legacy of another
After fleeing Syria Jamil and his family thought they were safe in Lebanon until an unexploded bomb from the 2006 conflict with Israel shattered their lives Article published in The Guardian on 11 …
Didn’t find what you were looking for?
Try one of the following resources:
ICRC library
Created in 1863, the ICRC library, alongside the ICRC archives, provides an indispensable documentary reference on the organization itself and international humanitarian law.
IHL treaties
International humanitarian law is based on a number of treaties, in particular the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols, and a series of other instruments.
Customary IHL
Customary international humanitarian law consists of rules that come from "a general practice accepted as law" and that exist independent of treaty law.