Geneva Conventions of 1949

On August 12, 1949, delegates at a diplomatic conference in Geneva signed four treaties, now known as the Geneva Conventions. They protect wounded and sick soldiers on land, wounded, sick and shipwrecked sailors, prisoners of war, and, for the first time in a treaty of this kind, civilians in wartime, including those in occupied territory. They bind states that fight each other, and they remain the core of the law of armed conflict.¹³

The rules grew from the 1864 Geneva Convention, shaped by Henry Dunant and the Red Cross, which first protected wounded soldiers. By 1949 the Second World War had shown how far existing law fell short: millions of civilians were killed, deported or forced to work, prisoners of war were starved or shot, and the Holocaust and brutal occupations had gone largely unrestrained by treaty. The International Committee of the Red Cross prepared draft texts, and the Nuremberg trials had confirmed that individuals could be punished for war crimes.¹³

The new treaties required that prisoners be treated humanely and fed, and that civilians not be deported, taken hostage or collectively punished. Common Article 3 set minimum standards for civil wars, the first treaty rule for internal conflicts. States must search for and prosecute people accused of 'grave breaches' of the rules. Two Additional Protocols in 1977 extended protections to modern conflicts. Today 196 states are party to the conventions, including every UN member, making them nearly universal, though compliance in practice is often poor.¹²³