On 20 February 1974, the Diplomatic Conference convened by the Swiss Government opened in Geneva. It was attended by the plenipotentiaries of 118 States parties to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and members of the United Nations, and by representatives of numerous international, intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations. The Conference examined the two draft Protocols Additional to the Geneva Conventions which the ICRC had prepared with the assistance of experts from countries all over the world, for the purpose of supplementing international humanitarian law in view of the development of conflicts. Since armed conflicts, unhappily, break out from time to time and the forms and techniques of warfare develop, it has become necessary to adapt the Geneva Conventions to present-day circumstances.