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24 November 2016, 12:15-13:30

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Violence Against Healthcare and Humanitarian Workers

IHL Talks

Yemen, MSF hospital destroyed by bombing Yemen, MSF hospital destroyed by bombing

Violence against health care facilities and humanitarian workers remains a recurring and preoccupying issue in today’s world.

Paradoxically, this takes place within a well-accepted framework of protection of health care facilities and medical or humanitarian personnel under international humanitarian law (IHL), which rules and principles are not contested either by states or non-state armed groups.

This IHL Talk, organized with the support of the ICRC, aims at reflecting on the reasons why health care and humanitarian workers are being targeted despite their protection under IHL and what policy tools can be elaborated to implement and ensure better respect of the law by the different parties in armed conflicts.

Moderation

Imogen Foulkes, BBC Geneva Correspondent

Panelists

Babak Ali Naraghi, Head of Health Care in Danger Project, International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)

Robert Kolb, Professor of Public International Law, University of Geneva and Geneva Academy

Caroline Abu-Sada, Director of the Research Unit on Humanitarian Stakes and Practices (UREPH), MSF Switzerland

About IHL Talks

The IHL Talks are a new series of events, hosted by the Geneva Academy, on international humanitarian law and current humanitarian topics. Every two months at lunchtime, academic experts, practitioners, policy makers and journalists discuss burning humanitarian issues and their regulation under international law.

 Video

Violence Against Healthcare and Humanitarian Workers

Violence against health care facilities and humanitarian workers remains a recurring and preoccupying issue in today’s world.

Paradoxically, this takes place within a well-accepted framework of protection of health care facilities and medical or humanitarian personnel under international humanitarian law (IHL), which rules and principles are not contested either by states or non-state armed groups.

This IHL Talk, organized with the support of the ICRC, aimed at reflecting on the reasons why health care and humanitarian workers are being targeted despite their protection under IHL and what policy tools can be elaborated to implement and ensure better respect of the law by the different parties in armed conflicts.

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