Jus in Bello and the War on Terror: Are Extraordinary Renditions Grave Breaches of the Law of War?
3 Asia-Pacific Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law, 2007
Victoria University of Wellington Legal Research Paper No. 14/2019
42 Pages Posted: 27 Feb 2016 Last revised: 28 Apr 2019
Date Written: 2007
Abstract
In the global “war on terror”, the United States has espoused a very expansive view of international law as regards the right to use force. Its position relating to the application of principles governing the conduct of hostilities has been somewhat more constrained. This article argues that in those situations where the law of armed conflict applies to the “war on terror”, the process of extraordinary rendition, by which terrorist suspects are forcibly transferred between states and subjected to torture and inhuman treatment, violates the law of armed conflict in general and may constitute “grave breaches” of the Geneva Conventions, amounting to war crimes.
Keywords: terror, terrorist, united states, hostilities, war, law of war, conflict, law of conflict, armed conflict, extraordinary rendition, geneva conventions, geneva, conventions, war crimes
JEL Classification: K00, K1, K14, K19, K2, K29, K3, K30, K32, K33, K39, K4, K40, K41, K42, K49
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation