international justice

Raqqa Eddy Van Wessel In the media

Does international humanitarian law legitimise wars?

03/26/2020 Rony Brauman

On March 8, 2020, the FIFDH Geneva organised a debate between Rony Brauman, Annyssa Bellal - Strategic Adviser on International Humanitarian Law - and Amani Ballour, a paediatrician who spent five years in an underground hospital in Syria and the protagonist of the film The Cave, to answer the question "Does international humanitarian law legitimise wars ?"

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13 avril 1994. Réfugiés rwandais à la frontière entre le Burundi et le Rwanda Xavier Lassalle/MSF Opinion

Genocide from an historical, legal and political standpoint

04/05/2018 Jean-Hervé Bradol

The publication of the journalist Judi Rever’s book, In Praise of Blood, on the crimes committed by the Rwandan Patriotic Front’s armed rebellion has rekindled discussion over the existence of a “double genocide”, one committed against the Tutsis under the orders of Rwanda’s interim government which took power in April 1994 following the assassination of President Habyarimana, and the other against the Hutus by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) which seized power in July 1994. There is little or no controversy about the reality of the genocide of the Tutsis in the world of Rwandan studies, but the claim that the Hutus were in turn victims of genocide sparks reactions as violent as they are confused. The cause of this confusion can be found in the different definitions of a term used in at least three fields: history, law and politics.

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Des réfugiés hutus rwandais attendent dans le camp de transit de Mukungwa. John Parkin Interview

Living through the horrors of genocide: humanitarian workers in Rwanda

01/10/2018 Marc Le Pape Jean-Hervé Bradol

How much is known about the daily experiences of humanitarian workers in extreme situations such as major conflict or disaster? In their new book, “Humanitarian Aid, Genocide and Mass Killings: Médecins sans frontières, the Rwandan experience, 1982-97”, Marc Le Pape and Jean-Hervé Bradol set out to answer some of these questions. The book is also informed by Bradol’s experience of working for Médecins Sans Frontières in Rwanda during the genocide. 

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A young girl walks in the streets of Bama Benoit Finck Analysis

War and humanitarian aid

07/25/2016 Rony Brauman

Rony Brauman focuses on the humanitarian environment and practices in war, in order to try to understand and analyze its political and ethical stakes. Starting with the creation of the Red Cross at the end of the XIXth century, he then focused on the contemporary postcolonial period, switching between various scales and reporting on contradictory points of view and issues.

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Un hôpital Médecins Sans Frontières au Soudan Jacob Kuehn Analysis

Humanitarian Aid and the International Criminal Court. Grounds for Divorce

10/01/2009 Fabrice Weissman

This essay points out the fragility of the arguments most often used by humanitarian organizations to justify their support for an international criminal court. Questioning NGOs' infatuation with punitive justice, Fabrice Weissman argues that humanitarian organizations should advocate for politics of aid and mediation rather than for a global moral order based on judicial punishment and just war.

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Opinion

Genocide, a word with many meanings

09/01/2004 Rony Brauman

Rony Brauman analyses the de-politicization and criminalisation process of the conflict in Darfur, resulting from an exclusively ethnic reading of this crisis and by the inappropriate use of the concept of "genocide".

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Couverture du livre A l’ombre des guerres justes MSF-Crash Book

In the Shadow of Just Wars

09/01/2003 Fabrice Weissman

During the planning stages of military intervention in Iraq, humanitarian organizations were offered U.S. government funds to join the Coalition and operate uneder the umbrella of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

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