SEMINAR ON CASE STUDY OF INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW
國際人道法案例專題討論



Class Schedule: Friday 10:20am-12:10pm（社法5）
Office Hour: Monday 1pm-3pm or by appointment


Instructor: Wen-Chen Chang (張文貞)
台大法律學院 徐州路21號 研究大樓420室
Tel: 2351-9641 ext. 509
Email: wenchenchang@ntu.edu.tw

教學助理：陳彥君（台大法研所）
Email: r95a21030@ntu.edu.tw
陸詩薇（台大法研所）
Email: r94a21014@ntu.edu.tw

Fall, 2007
I. Course Description
International humanitarian law has been recently revitalized as the result of intensified ethnical conflicts and global terrors in the end of the twentieth century. The development reached its peak as the Rome Statute of International Criminal Court went into force on July 1, 2000. A re-emerging discourse notwithstanding, international humanitarian law was a product of the two World Wars in the first half of the last century. As a matter of fact, it helped shape international human rights law and global human rights mechanisms after World War II. Not until in the 1990s when serious war crimes appeared in several transitional regimes such as former Yugoslavia or Rwanda did international humanitarian law reemerge in the field of public international law and international human rights law.
This course is designed to provide a background understanding of the development of international humanitarian law and to analyze basic and important documents and cases in the field. In a way, international humanitarian law is a set of legal concepts shared by international law, the law of war, criminal law, human rights, and perhaps even constitutional law. It should draw attentions from a wide spectrum of students. One of the purposes aimed by this seminar is to serve as a preparatory mechanism for students who are interested in participating in the Inter-University Competition for International Humanitarian Law Moots held by Red Cross for East and Southeast Asia. Thus, students in this seminar are expected to be highly motivated, capable in using English, and ready to work with the instructor to shape the agenda of the course with the approaching of inter-university competition. This course is divided into two parts: class discussion and moot exercise. Students will be graded according to their involvement in both sections.

*required readings
#suggested readings (but required for on-called group of the week)

II. Class Schedule
Week One: 9/21
Introduction

Week Two: 9/28
1. The Development of Modern International Humanitarian Law (IHL)
1.1. Efforts at Punishment:
1.1.1. The Nuremburg Trail
1.
2. *STEINER & ALSTON, INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS IN CONTEXT: LAW, POLITICS, MORALS (2ND, 2000) (HEREINAFTER HR) [PP 112-126]
3. #STEPHAN LANSMAN, CRIMES OF THE HOLOCAUST: THE LAW CONFRONTS HARD CASES (2005) [CHAPTER 1: NUREMBERG, PP1-55]

Week Three: 10/5
4. 1.1.2. THE EICHMANN TRIAL
5.
6. *HR, PP1138-1142
7. #STEPHAN LANSMAN, CRIMES OF THE HOLOCAUST: THE LAW CONFRONTS HARD CASES (2005) [CHAPTER 2: EICHMANN, PP56-109]

Week Four: 10/12
1.2. Efforts at Prevention: the Development of four Geneva Conventions and two Protocols
1.2.1. The role of ICRC and the development of Geneva Conventions

*HILAIRE MCCOUBREY, INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW: MODERN DEVELOPMENTS IN THE LIMITATION OF WARFARE (2nd, 1998) (hereinafter IHL) [pp1-39]
#Francois Bugnion, The International Committee of the Red Cross and the Development of International Humanitarian Law, 5 Chi. J. Int’l L. 191 (2004).

Week Five: 10/19 No Class


Week Six: 10/26
1.2.2. The Protection of the Sick and Injured on Land and at Sea

*Convention (I) for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field. Geneva, 12 August 1949.
*Convention (II) for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea. Geneva, 12 August 1949.
[Not in the course material; Students must find and read conventions themselves.]
#IHL, pp79-131

1.2.3. The Protection of Prisoners of War

*Convention (III) relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War. Geneva, 12 August 1949.
[Not in the course material; Students must find and read conventions themselves.]
#IHL, pp133-175

Week Seven: 11/2
1.2.4. The Protection of Civilians

*Convention (IV) relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War. Geneva, 12 August 1949.
[Not in the course material; Students must find and read conventions themselves.]
#IHL, pp177-209

1.2.5. The Regulation of Methods and Means of Warfare

*Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Protocol I), 8 June 1977.
[Not in the course material; Students must find and read conventions themselves.]
#IHL, pp.211-252

Week Eight: 11/9
1.2.6. The Application of IHL to Non-international Armed Conflicts [Common Article 3]

*Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of Non-International Armed Conflicts (Protocol II), 8 June 1977.
#IHL, pp.253-277

Week Nine: 11/16
1.2.7. Superior Responsibility in International War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity

#Ilias Bantekas, Principle of Direct & Superior Responsibility in International Humanitarian Law (2002)[pp.67-124][Chapters 3 & 4]

Week Ten: 11/23
2. Recent Developments of Special Tribunals and International Criminal Court: From Wars to Massive Tragedies
2.1. International Criminal Tribunals for the Formal Yugoslavia

*HR, pp.1143-1174 [focusing on Prosecutor v. Tadic]
#Statute of The International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, 1993
#Rules of Procedure and Evidence of the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, 1995
[Prior class, students must learn by themselves what happed in former Yugoslavia]

Week Eleven: 11/30
2.2. International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

*HR, pp.1174-1192 [focusing on Prosecutor v.Akayesu]
#The Statue of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, 1994
[Prior class, students must learn by themselves what happed in Rwanda]

Week Twelve: 12/7

2.3. The International Criminal Court

*HR, pp.1192-1198
#Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, 1998, entering into force in 2002
#Elements of Crime (under the mandate of Article 9 of the Rome Statute)

3. Alternative Model: Truth and Reconciliation Commission

*HR, pp. 1216-1247

Week Thirteen: 12/14
4. Moot Court Exercise
4.1. Moot Court Exercise 1:
4.1.1. Preparation I

Week Fourteen: 12/21
4.1.2. Exercise I


Week Fifteen: 12/28
4.2. Moot Court Exercise 2: “February 28, 1947 Incident”: War Crimes or Reconciliation?
4.2.1. Preparation II


Week Sixteen: 1/4
Continued Preparation II


Week Seventeen: 1/11
4.2.2. Exercise II





III. Further Readings:
8. STEINER & ALSTON, INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS IN CONTEXT: LAW, POLITICS, MORALS (2ND, 2000)
9. CHRISTINE VAN DEN WYNGAERT ED., INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL LAW: A COLLECTION OF INTERNATIONAL AND EUROPEAN INSTRUMENTS (3RD, 2005)
10. JORDON J. PAUST ET AL, EDS, INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL LAW: CASES AND MATERIALS (2000)
11. ICRC, BASIC RULES OF THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS AND THEIR ADDITIONAL ARTICLES (GENEVA, 1983)
12. GEERT-JAN ALEXANDER KNOOPS, AN INTRODUCTION TO THE LAW OF INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNALS: A COMPARATIVE STUDY (NEW YORK: TRANSNATIONAL PUBLISHERS, 2003)
13. GUENAEL MATTRAUX, INTERNATIONAL CRIMES AND THE AD HOC TRIBUNALS (OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2005)
14. ICRC, THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS OF AUGUST 12, 1949 (GENEVA, 1949).
15. ICRC, PROTOCOLS ADDITIONAL TO THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS OF AUGUST 12, 1949 (GENEVA, 1977).
16. DAVID P. FORSYTHE, THE HUMANITARIANS: THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF THE RED CROSS (CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2005).
17. HENCKAERTS & DOSWALD-BECK, CUSTOMARY INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW (VOL. I, II, III) (CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, ICRC, 2005).
18. KLIP & SLUITER, ANNOTATED LEADING CASES OF INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNALS (VOL. 1-8) (HART PUBLISHING, 1999)
19. YORAM KINSTEIN, THE CONDUCT OF HOSTILITIES UNDER THE LAW OF INTERNATIONAL ARMED CONFLICT (CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2004)
20. YUSUF AKSAR, IMPLEMENTING INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW: FROM THE AD HOC TRIBUNALS TO A PERMANENT INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT (ROUTLEDGE, 2004)
21. DIETER FLECK, THE HANDBOOK OF HUMANITARIAN LAW IN ARMED CONFLICTS (OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1995)
22. UNESCO, INTERNATIONAL DIMENSIONS OF HUMANITARIAN LAW (1988).

More sources to be found at Human Rights Resources Center at the Graduate Branch of Law Library at College of Law!