The Geneva Conventions (2)

An International Red Cross Conference in Stockholm on August 23-30, 1948 was held to extend and systematize the three Geneva conventions’ principles.  Four conventions resulted from this conference: the Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field, Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea, Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, and Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War.

The specific convention covering prisoners of war was an improvement to that of 1929, requiring “humane treatment, adequate feeding, and delivery of relief supplies and forbidding pressure on prisoners to supply more than a minimum of information.” (Article 17, Section 1, Captivity, Part III)  It also forbade the taking of hostages, outrages upon personal dignity, particularly humiliating and degrading treatment, and discrimination in treatment on the basis of race, religion, nationality, or politics. (Article 3, General Provisions, Part I)  All four conventions were approved by more than 150 nations, including the Philippines, in Geneva on August 12, 1949.

Decades later, different kinds of wars ensued, more sporadic, sometimes protracted, and limited within the confines of a country.  These were the anti-colonial wars and insurrections.  Again the Geneva Conventions needed some updating.  Again the Red Cross came in, and after four years of negotiations, an international conference on June 8, 1977 approved four protocols to the 1949 conventions.  These protocols, or preliminary resolutions due for finalization as conventions or treaties, now included the protection of guerilla combatants with control over considerable measures of territory who either fight wars of “self-determination” or civil wars.  The coverage of the conventions was therefore extended to a different kind of armed force beyond the control of an existing government.

This time only about half of the countries that ratified the 1949 Geneva Convention signed these protocols.  Noteworthy of those that did not sign are the United States of America and the United Kingdom, now the leading allies in the war on terrorism.  The Philippines is not one of the signatories either.

It appears that as humankind creates more reasons for wars and newer, more efficient and more lethal weapons are produced, the Geneva Conventions catch up by updating themselves too, like new computer virus killers that are not far behind the latest of damaging viruses.

As for Dunant, the Red Cross founder who worked hard to make wars more humane because there was no stopping wars anyway, he lived the rest of his life quietly, impoverished as he had neglected his business affairs in favor of his humanitarian pursuits.  Fortunately honors and pensions were accorded him after a journalist found him in 1895.  His life’s works were capped by the first Nobel Peace Prize in 1901.

These days, civilian casualties are simply termed as “collateral damage,” terrorist acts are called “assymetrical combat,” and torture and abuse of prisoners are rife in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay and presumably in some other prisons in other countries.  Meanwhile, US White House lawyers nitpick legal loopholes to sidestep the Geneva Conventions despite the stand of US Secretary of State Collin Powell who wish America’s war policy to abide by them.

Still, Dunant’s Red Cross/Red Crescent is as strong and present as ever.  Exactly 94 years to the day after he died, his legacy as expressed in the Geneva Conventions is still a work in progress.

(2004)