Geneva Convention 



Geneva Convention are a set of four treaties which was formalised in 1949 and three additional protocols.

Don't be confused with Geneva Protocol (disambiguation) or Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees.   

The first two of which were formalised in 1997 and third in 2005 and these two codify widely accepted ethical and legal international standards for humanitarian treatment of those impacted by any ongoing war.
 
The Convention establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war.

The Geneva Conventions apply only at times of war and armed conflict to governments who have ratified its terms.

Geneva Conventions have been ratified by 196 states which includes all UN member states.


         Three protocols have been ratified by 174-169-79 states respectively.

First Geneva Convention:
1.Protocols wounded and sick soldiers on land during war.
2.Also the convention extends to medical and religious personnel, medical units and medical transport.

Second Geneva Convention:
1. Protects wounded , sick and shipwrecked military personnel at sea during war.
2.Also extends to hospital ships and medical transports by sea.

Third Geneva Convention:
1.This applies to prisoners of war , including a wide range of general protections such as humane treatment , maintenance and equality across prisoners etc.

Fourth Geneva Convention:
1.Protects civilians including those in the occupied territory.

Geneva convention has three additional protocols :


1.Protocol 1 (1977) Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts

2.Protocol II (1977) Protection of Victims of Non-International Armed Conflicts

3.Protocol 3-This was created as an additional emblem , the red Crystal , which has the same international status as Red Cross and Red Crescent emblems.

The Convention faces new challenges of  Artificial intelligence and autonomous weapon systems, such as military robots and cyber-weapons which  creating challenges in the creation, interpretation and application of the laws of armed conflict. 

The complexity of these new challenges,such as the speed in which they are developed, complicates the application of the Conventions, which have not been updated in a long time.

The ongoing  challenge is the very slow speed of the process of developing new treaties to deal with new forms of warfare, and determining agreed-upon interpretations to existing ones, meaning that by the time a decision can be made while armed conflict may have already evolved in a way that makes the changes obsolete.

Geneva Convention in March 2022 was in news as the Russian troop has been accused of violating Geneva Convention in ongoing war.