1st Nordic symposium on the Law of Armed Conflict
Scholars and legal practitioners are invited to the first Nordic symposium on the law of armed conflict, hosted by the Department of International and Operational Law of the Swedish Defence University and organised jointly with the Swedish Red Cross.
The symposium is the first of its kind implementing the pledge of Nordic states and Red Cross societies made at the 34th Red Cross conference in 2024. It aims to bring together academics, legal practitioners and other stakeholders from the military and humanitarian sectors and to strengthen collaboration, facilitate expertise and knowledge transfer, and enhance the dissemination of IHL/LOAC across the Nordic region.
Over 1.5 days, the symposium will host panels on three themes:
- Conduct of hostilities
- Protection
- Compliance
The current draft programme can be seen below.
Registration
Register your attendance at this link no later than April 29: https://survey.fhs.se/Survey/1790
Kindly note that to access our premises, the same valid form of ID used to register needs to be presented on the day.
Draft programme
May 8, 2025
08:00 Registration
08:45 Opening remarks from high level officials
09:15 Key note speaker: Mr John Swords, Legal Adviser and Director of the Office of Legal Affairs at NATO HQ Brussels
Conduct of hostilities I
Moderator: TBC
09:35 Mr. Laurent Gisel, Head of ICRC's Arms & Conduct of Hostilities Unit: Anti-personnel mines convention under pressure
09:5o Ms. Claire Bertouille, Université libre de Bruxelles: The Legality of Siege Warfare: An Analysis of the Prohibition of Starvation and the Principle of Proportionality Under International Humanitarian Law
10:05 Ms. Boudicca J. Hawke, PhD student, University of Essex: Exploring the legal basis for targeting in non-international armed conflicts
10:20 Q&A
10:50 Coffee break
11:20 Conduct of hostilities II, panel discussion
Moderator: Dr. Heather Harrison Dinniss, Swedish Defence University
Dr. William H. Boothby: AI and international humanitarian law
Dr. Elisenda Calvet and Ms. Andrea Farrés Jiménez, University of Barcelona: AI-driven warfare: A threat or guardian of the principle of humanity
Mr. Ulrik Graff & Dr. Daniel Møller Ølgaard, Royal Danish Defence College: Under pressure? IHL, the reasonable commander, and AI decision-support systems
12:05 Q&A
12:35 Lunch
Protection I
Moderator: TBC
13:50 Jelena Pejic: Security versus criminal detention in armed conflict
14:05 Professor Gloria Gaggioli, University of Geneva: Evacuation v deportation in IHL
14:20 Ms. Guilmette Blanc, Legal Advisor, ICRC: Prisoners of war and hors de combat
14:35 Mr. Juan Pablo Acosta-Penaloza: Public curiosity under IHL in information operations: Interplay with human rights law
14:50 Q&A
15:20 Coffee break
15:45 Protection II
Moderator: Mr. Jonathan Somer, Danish Red Cross
15:50 Dr. Riccardo Vecellio Segate, University of Groningen: The invisible disposability of ”military-age” male non-combatants meets the legally sanctioned women and-children rhetoric: Defining an epistemic obligation for feminist scholars in law to advocate for all non-combatants to be protected equally
16:05 Dr. Tilman Rodenhäuser, Legal Adviser, ICRC: From resilience to resistance: The risks and legal implications of involving civilians in “total defence”
16:20 Mr. Giacomo Cuscunà, PhD-student, Swedish Defence University: Compliance conundrum: International humanitarian law, total defence, and the protection of civilians in Ukraine. An exploratory overview
16:35 Dr. Asli Ozcelik Olcay, University of Glasgow: Re-thinking the protection of health care in armed conflict: Compounding harm and international (humanitarian) law
16:50 Q&A
17:20 End of day 1
May 9, 2025
08:50 Compliance I
Moderator: Peter Lundberg, Raoul Wallenberg Institute
09:00 Professor Steve Murdoch, Swedish Defence University: The conduct of war: Cases and consequences in the early modern European theatre
09:15 Dr. Sofia Nilsson, Swedish Defence University: Exploring socio-prsychological factors that may impact compliance with humanitarian values. laws and regulations from the perspective of moral distress and moral injury
09:30 Professor Marco Sassòli, University og Geneva: Compliance and organised armed groups
09:45 Mr. Henrique Garbino, PhD student, Swedish Defence University: Defining and measuring restraint: Gauging restraint behaviour through event-based data on emplaced munitions
10:00 Q&A
10:30 Coffee break
11:00 Compliance II, panel discussion
Moderator: Ms. Angelica Widström, the Swedish Red Cross
Professor Alette Smeulers, University of Groningen: Criminological perspective on war crimes
BrigGen (Prof) Dan Kuwali, Commandant, National Defence College Malawi: Operationalising compliance: Legal strategies for modern military operations
Dr. Noel Maurer Trew, Legal Adviser, the British Red Cross: This is who we are: The role of military ethics, culture and religion in disseminating international humanitarian law to the Armed Forces
Professor Jann Kleffner, Swedish Defence University: Lessons for LoAC compliance
12:00 Q&A
12:30-12:45 Final remarks