Legal Mechanisms for Addressing Wartime Damage to Tropical Forests

Summary

The tactics of war have profound impacts on tropical forest ecosystems, and modern weapons technologies have greatly increased their destructive potential. Some legal protection is afforded by customary international law, and the international community responded to the Vietnam War by adopting, inter alia, the 1977 Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions and the 1976 Environmental Modification Convention, which prohibit “long-term” (or “long-lasting”), “widespread,” and “severe” environmental damage. Nevertheless, many regard these and other existing conventions as inadequate, especially as applied to internal conflicts. More recently, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature-World Conservation Union (IUCN) put forth a Draft Convention on the Prohibition of Hostile Military Activities in Internationally Protected Areas. This paper analyzes the IUCN Draft Convention-particularly issues of prior designation of protected areas, waiver of protection, and monitoring and enforcement-and compares it to other relevant area-based treaties, such as the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property and the 1972 World Heritage Convention. The paper also highlights other recent legal developments that may help prevent, remediate, or punish wartime damage to tropical forests, such as the nascent International Criminal Court; liability mechanisms for providing compensation for wartime damage; environmental guidelines for military, peacekeeping and humanitarian operations; import bans and trade embargoes; and a proposed no-fault remediation fund.

Key Words:

• International environmental law
• international law of war
• warfare
• military activities
• protected areas
• tropical forests