Children protected under international humanitarian law

INTRODUCTION

History of Human Rights and IHL

CRC and its Approach to IHL

1. General Comments

2. Concluding Observations

3. State Reports

Assessing the Role of the CRC.

Introduction

Child protection has been an unspecialized part of International Humanitarian Law (hereinafter “IHL”) when IHL was first established through the Geneva Conventions in 1949.

However, as warfare grew to become more violent and machineries more sophisticated, armed conflict grew to

The Committee on the Rights of the Child (hereinafter “CRC”) has been the most active among the nine official UN human rights bodies to take an explicit interpretative approach on IHL, with the inclusion of humanitarian law in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (hereinafter “Children’s Convention”) and the Optional Protocol on Children in Armed Conflict (hereinafter “Child Soldier Protocol”). It is the only one to discuss humanitarian law directly through Article 38, which provides as follows:

States Parties undertake to respect and to ensure respect for rules of international humanitarian law applicable to them in armed conflicts which are relevant to the child. IN accordance with their obligations under international humanitarian law to protect the civilian population in armed conflicts, States Parties shall take all feasible measures to ensure protection and care of children who are affected by an armed conflict.

Generally, the CRC, along with other UN human rights bodies, shares a monitoring role by reviewing State party’s periodic reports on how each State advanced towards child rights protection as mandated by the Convention. However, the CRC has the greatest potential to become a powe...

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...and oppositions groups.

Situation of refugee children and internally displaced children face similar desperation for protection

While monitoring organizations, such as War Child Holland, one of the biggest child rights monitoring NGO in Syria, has made thoroughly grave observations utilizing its advanced Child Rights Situation Analysis. For the legal basis to report violations during its investigations, it used international instruments relevant to international humanitarian law and human rights law.

Indeed, children in armed conflict is a complicated situation where various legal tools covering different angles of protection come together to form a web of legal basis. Starting from the Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols I and II to the Convention

The history of human rights law approaching international humanitarian law has not been that long.