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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 October 2024
This article proposes a hybrid legal framework combining jus ad bellum and jus in bello to govern the attribution of State responsibility for reparations at the end of a war of aggression. To this end, the article considers former international mass claims processes and proposes a complementary approach that, on the one hand, acknowledges the role of the aggressor State in waging the war, and on the other, takes a cautionary approach to prevent a disproportionate burden of compensation being imposed on the aggressor State as a form of collective punishment. The consequences of respective violations of the prohibition of the use of force and the law of war are blurred in a war of aggression, resulting in complexities around liability for aggressor States. In response, this article concludes with a nuanced proposal to calculate compensation based on (1) the aggressor party's capacity to comply with jus in bello; (2) the extent of damage caused by the war of aggression, factoring in jus ad bellum considerations if a party is found to be intentionally maximizing destruction; and (3) the incorporation of tort law principles for equitable attribution of responsibility.
The author is grateful to Bruno Demeyere, Jillian Rafferty and the peer reviewers at the Review for their kind encouragement and feedback in refining the article.
The advice, opinions and statements contained in this article are those of the author/s and do not necessarily reflect the views of the ICRC. The ICRC does not necessarily represent or endorse the accuracy or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement or other information provided in this article.
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16 UNSC Res. 687, 3 April 1991.
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18 UNGA Res. L.6/2022, 7 November 2022.
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31 See UN Charter, above note 2, Art. 2(4).
32 See Regulations concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land, The Hague, 18 October 1907, Art. 22; Protocol Additional (I) to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts, 1125 UNTS 3, 8 June 1977 (entered into force 7 December 1978) (AP I), Art. 35.
33 V. Heiskanen and N. Leroux, above note 25, p. 55.
34 HRC, General Comment No. 36, “Article 6: The Right to Life”, UN Doc. CCPR/C/GC/36, 30 October 2018, para. 70.
35 See e.g. Shane Darcy, “Accident and Design: Recognising Victims of Aggression in International Law”, International and Comparative Law Quarterly, Vol. 70, No. 103, 2021.
36 ICJ, Ahmadou Sadio Diallo (Republic of Guinea v. Democratic Republic of the Congo), Merits, Judgment, ICJ Reports 2010, p. 639, para. 66.
37 For a favourable reading, see European Court of Human Rights, Georgia v Russia (II), Appl. No. 38263/08, Judgment, 21 January 2021, Concurring Opinion of Judge Keller, paras 28, 30.
38 Art. 1 common to the Geneva Conventions of 1949.
39 AP I, Preamble.
40 Eliav Lieblich, “The Humanization of Jus ad Bellum: Prospects and Perils”, European Journal of International Law, Vol. 32, No. 579, 2021.
41 Christopher Greenwood, “The Relationship between Jus ad Bellum and Jus in Bello”, Review of International Studies, Vol. 9, No. 4, 1983, pp. 232–233.
42 S. A. J. Boelaert-Suominen, “Iraqi War Reparations and the Laws of War: A Discussion of the Current Work of the United Nations Compensation Commission with Specific Reference to Environmental Damage During Warfare”, Zeitschrift für öffentliches Recht, Vol. 50, 1996, pp. 298, 302.
43 Hersch Lauterpacht, “The Limit of the Operation of the Law of War”, British Yearbook of International Law, Vol. 30, 1953, pp. 206, 212.
44 Dapo Akande and Miles Jackson, “The Right to Life and the Jus Ad Bellum: Belligerent Equality and the Duty to Prosecute Acts of Aggression”, International and Comparative Law Quarterly, Vol. 71, No. 2, 2022.
45 Ibid.
46 EECC, Final Award, above note 25, paras 333–349.
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48 D. Akande and M. Jackson, above note 44.
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51 UNSC Res. 661, 6 August 1990. See also UNSC Res. 660, 2 August 1990.
52 See UNSC Res. 670, 25 September 1990, Preamble; UNSC Res. 674, 29 October 1990, para. 1.
53 UNSC Res. 692, 20 May 1991.
54 E. V. Koppe, above note 50, p. 519.
55 UNSC Res. 687, 3 April 1991, para. 16.
56 UNSC, Res. 687, 3 April 1991, paras 16, 18; UNSC Res. 692, 20 May 1991, para. 3; Report of the Secretary-General Pursuant to Paragraph 19 of Security Council Resolution 687 (1991), UN Doc. S/22559, 2 May 1991, Part 1.
57 UNCC Governing Council Decision No. 10, above note 25, Art. 5(1).
58 See Hans van Houtte, Hans Das and Bart Delmartino, “The United Nations Compensation Commission”, in P. de Grieff (ed.), above note 23, pp. 335–338.
59 Michael E. Schneider, “The Role of Iraq in the UNCC Process with Special Emphasis on the Environmental Claims”, in Timothy J. Feighery, Christopher S. Gibson and Trevor M. Rajah (eds), War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2015, p. 137.
60 L. Brillmayer, C. Giorgetti and L. Charlton, above note 20, p. 105.
61 V. Heiskanen and N. Leroux, above note 25, p. 58.
62 UNCC Governing Council Decision No. 10, above note 25.
63 UNCC, Report and Recommendations of the Panel of Commissioners concerning the Third Instalment of Environmental (F4) Claims, UN Doc. S/AC.26/2003/31, 2003, para. 34. See also UNCC, Report and Recommendations Made by the Panel of Commissioners concerning the First Instalment of Individual Claims for Damages up to US $100,000 (Category C Claims), UN Doc. S/AC.26/1994/3, 1994 (Category C Claims Report), paras 9–10.
64 UNCC Governing Council Decision No. 1, UN Doc. S/AC.26/1991/1, 2 August 1991, para. 18. See also UNCC Governing Council Decision No. 7, UN Doc. S/AC/26/1991/7/Rev.1, 17 March 1992, paras 6, 21, 34; John R. Crook, “The United Nations Compensation Commission – A New Structure to Enforce State Responsibility”, American Journal of International Law, Vol. 87, No. 1, 2017.
65 See Hague Convention (IV) respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land, The Hague, 18 October 1907, Art. 3; AP I, Art. 91.
66 V. Heiskanen and N. Leroux, above note 25, p. 62.
67 UNCC, Report and Recommendations Made by the Panel of Commissioners Appointed to Review the Well Blowout Control Claim, UN Doc. S/AC.26/1996/Annex, 18 December 1996, para. 86. See also UNCC, Report and Recommendations of the Panel of Commissioners concerning the Third Instalment of Environmental (F4) Claims, UN Doc. S/AC.26/2003/31, 2003, para. 176.
68 E. V. Koppe, above note 50, p. 519.
69 D. Shelton, above note 12, para. 3.
70 “Law does not arise from injustice.”
71 H. Lauterpacht, above note 43, p. 212.
72 G. Fitzmaurice, “The Juridical Clauses of the Peace Treaties (Volume 73)”, in Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law, Brill, Leiden, 1948, pp. 235–236.
73 UNSC Res. 687, 8 April 1991, para. 19.
74 UNSC Res. 692, 20 May 1991.
75 Report of the Secretary-General, above note 56, para. 20.
76 See e.g. Iran–United States Claims Tribunal, SEDCO, Inc. v. National Iranian Oil Co. and the Islamic Republic of Iran, 10 Iran-U.S.C.T.R. 180, 1986 (declaring the customary international law principle of compensation as “compensation is equivalent to the full value of the property taken”); Permanent Court of International Justice, Factory at Chorzów, Merits, 1928 PCIJ (Ser. A) No. 17, 1928, p. 47 (compensation is intended “to wipe out all the consequences of the illegal act and re-establish the situation which would, in all probability, have existed if that act had not been committed”).
77 Arif H. Ali and Marguerite C. Walter, “Principles of Valuation Taken from the UNCC Perspective”, in T. J. Feighery, C. S. Gibson and T. M. Rajah (eds), above note 25.
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79 See e.g. EECC, Final Award, above note 25, para. 38 (acknowledging the EECC's reliance on the UNCC model for “damages suffered by large, but uncertain, numbers of victims and where there is limited supporting evidence”).
80 See Algiers Agreement, above note 17, Art. 5.
81 L. Brillmayer, C. Giorgetti and L. Charlton, above note 20, p. 110.
82 EECC, Rules of Procedure, October 2001, Art. 23, Chap. 2.
83 E. V. Koppe, above note 50, p. 533.
84 See EECC, Partial Award: Jus ad Bellum, Ethiopia's Claims 1–8, PCA Case No. 2001-02, 19 December 2005, p. 7; dictum under B.
85 EECC, Decision 7, above note 25; EECC, Final Award, above note 25.
86 EECC, Decision 7, above note 25, para. 7.
87 Ibid., para. 15.
88 Ibid., para. 18; see also paras 9, 17–18.
89 Ibid., para. 5.
90 EECC, Final Award, above note 25, para. 309.
91 Ibid., para. 312.
92 Ibid.
93 Ibid.
94 Ibid., para. 349.
95 Ibid., para. 316.
96 Larry May, After War Ends: A Philosophical Perspective, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2012, p. 51.
97 E. de Vattel, above note 8, Book IV, Chapter 1, para. 51.
98 Hersch Lauterpacht, Private Law Sources and Analogies of International Law, 1927, pp. 134–148.
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103 Ibid. See also ICJ, Barcelona Traction, Light and Power Company, Limited (Belgium v. Spain), Second Phase, ICJ Reports 1971 (where the ICJ refrained from discussing the matter of causality); ICJ, Corfu Channel (Albania v. United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland), Assessment of the Amount of Compensation Due from the People's Republic of Albania to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Dissenting Opinion by Judge Ečer, ICJ Reports 1949 (observing that “the juridical value of the Judgment would have been increased by a few short observations on causality as a juridical element for determining the amount of compensation”).
104 EECC, Decision 7, above note 25, para. 13.
105 UNCC Governing Council Decision No. 1, above note 64, para. 18.
106 Category C Claims Report, above note 63, para. 22.
107 Shelton, Dinah, “Righting Wrongs: Reparations in the Articles of State Responsibility”, American Journal of International Law, Vol. 96, No. 833, 2002CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
108 ARSIWA, above note 9, Art. 41.
109 Ibid., Art. 41 commentary, para. 14.
110 Ibid., Art. 31 commentary, para. 12; UNGA Res. 56/83, 12 December 2001s.
111 Tony Weir, “Complex Liabilities”, in André Tunc (ed.), International Encyclopedia of Comparative Law, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, 1986, p. 43.
112 ARSIWA, above note 9, Art. 39 commentary, para. 1.
113 Ibid., Art. 39 commentary, para. 4.
114 Ibid., Art. 31 commentary, para. 14.
115 Ibid., Art. 36 commentary, para. 4.
116 Ibid., Art. 36 commentary, para. 7.
117 R. A. Falk, above note 23.
118 Ibid., p. 487.
119 See Marco Sassòli, International Humanitarian Law: Rules, Controversies, and Solutions to Problems Arising in Warfare, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, 2019, p. 587.
120 ARSIWA, above note 9, Art. 30.