Explosive weapons in populated areas
WATCH THE VIDEO: Increasingly, explosive weapons designed for warfare on open battlefields are being used in towns and cities. The effects on civilians are often devastating, even when these weapons are aimed at legitimate military targets.
The direct effects of explosive weapons on civilians in densely populated areas are obvious: deaths, injuries and damage.
The indirect effects are less obvious. Damage to water, electricity or sewerage systems affect services such as health and water distribution, leading to the spread of disease and further deaths.
In the face of such devastation, surviving civilians often have no choice but to leave, and their displacement is often long-lasting.
See also:
Events
- 32nd International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent: Side-Event on "The use of explosive weapons in populated areas and the need to better protect civilians"
- 16th Bruges Colloquium on International Humanitarian Law, 15 - 16 October 2015
Statements, reports and news releases
- Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, Statement by the ICRC, November 2015
- Use of explosive weapons in densely populated areas (chapter 7, part 2), International humanitarian law and the challenges of contemporary armed conflicts, October 2015
- Weapons: ICRC statement to the United Nations, 2015
- Urban services during protracted armed conflict, 5 October 2015
- ICRC statement to the Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on Conventional Weapons, 13 November 2014
- ICRC statement on weapons to the United Nations General Assembly, 14 October 2014
- ICRC alarmed over unacceptable use of explosive weapons in urban areas, News release, 13 October 2014
- Resolution 7 of the Council of Delegates of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement: Weapons and international humanitarian law, 18 November 2013
- ICRC statement on weapons to the United Nations General Assembly, 16 October 2013
- Open debate on the protection of civilians, statement to the United Nations Security Council, by Yves Daccord, director-general of the ICRC, 22 November 2010
- Sixty years of the Geneva Conventions, Address by Jakob Kellenberger, president of the ICRC, 12 August 2009
Articles
- Even war must have limits, article by Dominik Stillhart, director of operations for the ICRC, published on CNN website
- The use of explosive weapons in densely populated areas and the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks, proceedings of 37th Round Table on Current Issues of International Humanitarian Law (Sanremo, 4th-6th September
- Enhancing civilian protection from use of explosive weapons in populated areas: Building a policy and research agenda, by John Borrie and Maya Brehm, IRRC 809, 2011
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