War and environmental law
[1] Weaponry, troop movements, land mines, creation and destruction of buildings, destruction of forests by defoliation or general military usage, poisoning of water sources, target-shooting of animals for practice, consumption of endangered species out of desperation etc., are just some of the examples of how both war and peacetime military activities (such as training, base construction, and transportation of weaponry) harm the environment.
Recent examples include the oil dump and fire by Iraq in Kuwait 1990/1991, depleted uranium use in Kosovo 1999, air fuel explosives use in Afghanistan since 2001.
States must strive to reach prompt agreement, in the relevant international organs, on the elimination and complete destruction of such weapons": Principle 26 of the 1972 Stockholm Declaration → Chapter 11 of the Brundtland Report: Peace, Security, Development, and the Environment.
UN General Assembly Resolution 47/37 (1992) provides:[3] "[D]estruction of the environment, not justified by military necessity and carried out wantonly, is clearly contrary to existing international law."
Iraq was liable under international law for the 'environmental damage and the depletion of natural resources' resulting from the unlawful invasion and occupation of Kuwait: United Nations Security Council Resolution 687 (1991).
"Destruction of the environment, not justified by military necessity and carried out wantonly, is clearly contrary to existing international law": UN General Assembly Resolution 47/37 (1992).
"Taken together, these provisions embody a general obligation to protect the natural environment against widespread, long-term and severe environmental damage; the prohibition of methods and means of warfare which are intended, or may be expected, to cause such damage; and the prohibition of attacks against the natural environment by way of reprisals": para 31, ICJ Advisory Opinion on Nuclear Weapons 1996; see also ICJ applications Yugoslavia v UK 1999, DR Congo v Rwanda 2002.
"Intentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause incidental loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects or widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment which would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage anticipated" is a war crime, being a "serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict, within the established framework of international law": art.
C. Launching an attack against a military objective which may be expected to cause incidental damage to the environment which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated is prohibited": ICRC Customary IHL Rule 43 (Application of General Principles on the Conduct of Hostilities to the Natural Environment).
ILC Draft Principles on protection of the environment in relation to armed conflicts: Special Rapporteur Marie G. Jacobsson considered from 2013 to 2015 obligations before, during, and after an armed conflict and proposed 5 draft jus in bello principles (proportionality, distinction, precaution, no reprisal, protected zones) among others.
Some environmental treaties have express provisions about military and conflicts; others need to rely on rebus sic stantibus (art.
"The Court does not consider that the treaties in question could have intended to deprive a State of the exercise of its right of self-defence under international law because of its obligations to protect the environment.
