Reimagining the Wheel: Detention and Release of Non-State Actors under the Geneva Conventions

Authors

Chris Jenks, Southern Methodist University, Dedman School of LawFollow

Abstract

After more than a decade of sustained armed conflict, the international community continues to struggle with the issues posed by non-State actors participating in hostilities. Issues range from the micro, of if and when individuals may be targeted and detained, to the macro if not meta level of which legal regime to apply. This chapter considers detention from a pragmatic approach and proposes that the 1949 Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols I and II, outmoded and seemingly inapplicable though they are in some respects, offer the most thorough, humane, realistic and readily available option for determining how to treat and when to release non-State actors detained during armed conflict.

Publication Title

Detention of Non-State Actors Engaged in Hostilities: The Future Law

Document Type

Book Chapter

Keywords

Detention, Armed Conflict, Prisoner of War, Geneva Conventions, Civilian, Additional Protocol

Recommended Citation

Chris Jenks, Reimagining the Wheel: Detention and Release of Non-State Actors under the Geneva Conventions in Detention of Non-State Actors Engaged in Hostilities (Gregory Rose and Bruce Oswald eds., Brill 2016)