Introduction In the wake of Israel’s air and ground offensive following the 7th October Attacks, Houthi Movement, backed by Iran, has begun targeting shipping lanes in the Red Sea, explicitly to cripple Israeli economy, leading to disruptions of global shipping routes. The fallout of the Houthi campaign was swift and far-reaching, as it has forced major companies to reroute traffic away from the Red Sea..  This article examines the legal ramifications of this crisis by scrutinizing their targeting of civilian vessels under International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and its implications for inte ..read more

Introduction Anti-regime and Pro-democracy protests erupted in March 2011 in the Southwestern city of Derra in Syria and soon catalyzed the entire nation demanding the “fall of the regime”. What followed was the systemic reprisal of dissent by the Assad government and the killing of hundreds of demonstrators and the imprisonment of many more. On September 23, 2014, in the aftermath of the regime using chemical weapons against the opposition, the US and its Arab allies launched an air campaign against ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Levant), and the US deployed around 2000 troops in the region ..read more

Introduction You take my water, burn my olive trees, destroy my house, take my job, steal my land, imprison my father, kill my mother, bombard my country, starve us all, humiliate us all, but I am to blame: I shot a rocket back. Noam Chomsky On October 7, 2023, the Palestine-based group Hamas launched an armed attack on Israeli cities, killing nearly 1,200 citizens. Immediately after Hamas’ attack, Israel declared that it was at war, and it would take “mighty vengeance” upon Hamas. It retaliated by launching a prolonged offensive on Gaza by air and ground, killing nearly 20,000 Palestinians ..read more

Background  The ongoing Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 2023, between the Israeli military and Palestinian militant groups, such as the Hamas is proving to be a bloody battle, the fiercest since the Yom Kippur War. According to experts, in the past three weeks, more than 1,400 people in Israel and 7,000 people in Palestine including women and children have lost their lives in the fighting between the two groups. In fact, Palestine has witnessed more deaths in the past 15 days than it has in the past 15 years due to the conflict. The Conflict exposes a variety of challenges and unanswered qu ..read more

Introduction  In a recent article, Karim Khan, the lead prosecutor of the International Criminal Court affirmed his commitment towards investigating and prosecuting cybercrimes under the Rome Statute (“Statute“). The notion of prosecuting cybercrimes as violations under both international humanitarian law (“IHL“) and the Rome Statute has sparked considerable debate, with some scholars arguing for a new treaty to codify such offenses. However, the necessity for a new treaty to codify such offences seems redundant as it is evident that cyber warfare can already be prosecuted under the Rome ..read more

Introduction In the previous part of this post, a factor-based analysis was presented that showed the insufficiency of IHL in regulating cyberattacks in international armed conflicts. It showed how the general understanding of ‘armed conflict’ and ‘sovereign territory’ under the existing IHL fails to cover the particularities of cyberspace. The main argument advanced in Part I is that the factors required as a precondition for the IHL to be applicable in any international armed conflict cannot have the same meaning as under conventional international armed conflict. Therefore, the suggestions ..read more

Introduction With the advancement of technology, relatively more complex methods of warfare are developing and spreading around the world. Cyber warfare and artificial intelligence are being blatantly used in international conflicts without any regulation. Cyberattacks saw an increase of 440 per cent between 2009 and 2018. While the use of cyber weapons purportedly started with the deployment of Stuxnet (2007) in Iran’s nuclear facilities, recent instances of the Russia-Ukraine war have brought the matter of cybersecurity to the fore of international law and secur ..read more

Introduction The Russia-Ukraine international armed conflict marked its first anniversary on February 24, 2023. Since the past year, the conflict has seen the emergence of many deadly weapons which has contributed to tens of thousands of deaths. One such weapon which was reportedly used for the first time in the conflict on 13th September 2022 was the Shaheed-136 drone system, also known as ‘Kamikaze’ drones. As both countries continue to make advances; there have been reports that Russia has stepped up the usage of these drone systems with great frequency, further terrorizing Ukrainian cities ..read more

INTRODUCTION The onus of catering to security needs and providing for military support has historically been on the State. However, with the advent of globalisation, the borders have become increasingly porous and fragile. As a result, the role of the State and International Organisations in resolving any armed conflict or post-armed conflict has started shifting from a State/Organisational centric approach to a privately controlled one. The latter includes what we now call as ‘Private Military and Security Companies’ (hereinafter referred to as “PMSCs”), that is, when military and security re ..read more

Introduction The societal and cultural aspects of modern treaty-based regulations must be well-adjusted. For the ideal execution of laws, the needs of the ultimate stakeholders, namely Indigenous communities, must be considered. To improve compliance and legitimacy, the state-centric approach to conventions should be transformed into a community-centric approach. This would shift the focus of implementation even further and eliminate the ingrained constraints that exist due to the lack of mandate from Indigenous cultures. In this regard, the article has drawn on ancient legal regulations of ea ..read more