- 2 days ago
Gavin Lee is pleased to welcome Philippe Bolopion. Executive Director of Human Rights Watch. He describes a seismic shift in the conduct of war, marked not merely by violations of international humanitarian law, but by an unprecedented openness in asserting, even embracing, such violations. What distinguishes this moment is not the erosion of norms alone, but the normalisation of dismissing international law and lacking empathy for civilians' suffering.
Across the globe, there is an emerging pattern of discourse that shows little regard for the laws of war and the protection of innocent life. This signals a deeper structural weakening of the rules-based international order, devised over decades, to mitigate harm to civilians. In this context, the role of legal frameworks becomes increasingly contested, as major powers challenge the rule of law, while smaller states hesitate to assert any collective pressure. The result is a widening gap between norms and operational realities. And so we all now lay witness to a global trend toward authoritarianism and the fragmentation of shared legal standards. Will international law remain a living instrument or simply be relegated to the annals of history as a symbolic relic?
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Across the globe, there is an emerging pattern of discourse that shows little regard for the laws of war and the protection of innocent life. This signals a deeper structural weakening of the rules-based international order, devised over decades, to mitigate harm to civilians. In this context, the role of legal frameworks becomes increasingly contested, as major powers challenge the rule of law, while smaller states hesitate to assert any collective pressure. The result is a widening gap between norms and operational realities. And so we all now lay witness to a global trend toward authoritarianism and the fragmentation of shared legal standards. Will international law remain a living instrument or simply be relegated to the annals of history as a symbolic relic?
Visit our website:
http://www.france24.com
Like us on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/France24_en
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00:00So let's go to New York. Let's bring in Philippe Bolopian, for decades a well-known human rights advocate and
00:05journalist.
00:05He is the executive director of Human Rights Watch. Welcome to the program, Philippe.
00:09Great to have you with us tonight. You've made clear in recent statements that you see all sides showing, quote,
00:16open disregard for international norms.
00:21Yeah, it's really, I would say, in the last month, a new phenomenon and a really dangerous rhetoric
00:27used by the leaders in the U.S., in Iran, in Israel as well,
00:33showing almost, you know, open disregard for international law, for the laws of war
00:38that are supposed to govern the conduct of the warring parties
00:42and are designed to limit the impact of war on civilians.
00:47And yet there is almost a sort of proud disregard from all parties to this conflict
00:53when it comes to international law.
00:55So that's quite new. You know, it's not new, of course, that people will violate the laws of war.
01:00That's happened many, many times, sadly, in the past.
01:03But in the past, you know, leaders were pretending it was not happening, you know,
01:08or that it happened by mistake.
01:10They were not making statements like, for example, President Trump recently
01:14that was conveying that they were actually planning on violating international law.
01:20When U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to obliterate power plants in Iran,
01:28that's a potential violation of international law.
01:31These are civilian objects that are indispensable for civilians to continue with daily life.
01:38And yet they become a sort of point of war in this type of speeches.
01:42And sadly, it's not just the U.S., but also Israel and Iran.
01:48We heard that justification on a smaller level, didn't we, a few days ago,
01:52with the Israeli IDF force saying that when they struck the South Paz facility,
01:56the energy facility of Iran, they did so because it was, quote, a dual-use facility.
02:02Yes, it was for civilians and it was for processing, but also not just processing energy.
02:09It could also be turned into ammonium, into explosives.
02:14So this was stopping the IRGC, the Revolutionary Guard.
02:17Is there a, where does the argument stand when it comes to dual-use justification?
02:22So, you know, that's when you enter into a more complex analysis that can't be done in theory,
02:29but has to be applied to a specific situation.
02:32There might be some limited cases where a facility that has a civilian use
02:38can be a legitimate military target.
02:41But there is a proportionality analysis that comes into play in this type of situations.
02:48Does the military objective you're pursuing with this military attack,
02:53is it justified and does it permit you to incur a cost for civilians?
03:01So it's a proportionality calculation that, you know, lawyers are trained to conduct.
03:09But the fact that a civilian facility may have a marginal military use
03:14is usually not enough to justify obliterating it.
03:18When you compare that to what you've just said,
03:20if the actions match the rhetoric in the days to come,
03:23the President Trump saying that we will, quote,
03:25obliterate Iran's power plants,
03:28as you see it, that's way beyond proportionality.
03:33Exactly.
03:33You know, this type of blanket statements not only convey complete disregard for international law,
03:40which is incredibly corrosive, right?
03:41The words of leaders matter.
03:44In a time of war, these words have weight and they have consequences.
03:49And sadly, you know, over the last few months,
03:55U.S. President Donald Trump has been very open with regard to his contempt
03:59for the international rules-based order, international law,
04:03the norms, the treaties, the institutions
04:05that have been built patiently over the last few decades
04:09to sort of improve the fate of civilians in conflict.
04:13So a blanket statement like this one is sort of bragging about potentially very serious violations
04:20of international law and of the laws of war.
04:23And they should be called out by leaders around the world, including U.S. allies.
04:28All the parties to the Geneva Conventions have really a responsibility,
04:33an obligation even, to call out violations of the convention.
04:37And when a country like the U.S. openly makes this type of statements,
04:43they're allies, but other countries around the world should call them out.
04:46The pit exit, the defense secretary, has a couple of weeks ago openly said that in Iran,
04:55his troops would give no quarters, which means that, you know,
05:00even if Iranian soldiers were to try to surrender, they would not be spared by U.S. forces.
05:06That's a sort of textbook example of a violation of the Geneva Conventions.
05:12It's coming from the highest levels of the U.S. government,
05:17and it's deeply corrosive and deeply worrying.
05:22If we look at the U.N. charter, this is where we have to go back to international law
05:26to look at a country's right to defend itself,
05:28the right of self-defense under Article 51,
05:30twofold to use force, one if you're as a nation under armed attack,
05:35twofold if there's an imminent armed attack,
05:39anticipatory self-defense is required.
05:42Or you get an agreement at Security Council,
05:44which we know hasn't been the case this time around.
05:46So my first question to you, we go back 24 hours,
05:48we listen to President Trump again, and he says,
05:50Iran was, quote, two to four weeks away from creating a nuclear weapon,
05:55to which he said it has remained and still remains a continuing threat
05:59to the lives of Americans and Israelis.
06:01Where do you sit on that reasoning?
06:05So, you know, our mandate at Human Rights Watch is a bit peculiar in that sense.
06:10We don't comment on the decision to go to war or the legality of that decision per se,
06:16because we see our role as being the sort of objective arbiter of how war is being conducted
06:24and not whether any given war is legitimate or not.
06:27I would say in this case, if you look to the well-respected experts in the field,
06:32you will have the answer that you are looking for.
06:36This is not, by any measure, a sort of close call or complex determination to make.
06:43But as a human rights organization, we stay away from that because we want to be really neutral
06:48when we are calling out the behavior of the parties.
06:51You know, when the U.S., for example, bonds a school in southern Iran,
06:59we want to be able to call out specifically this situation as a violation of the laws of war.
07:06So we don't really comment on the decision to go to war, only on how war is being conducted.
07:12I see where you're coming from.
07:12To rule out any perceived bias from right at the outset,
07:15you're looking objectively as you can, whatever party it is.
07:20And to that case, can I ask you about when it comes to Iran's attacks
07:24on energy facilities in the Gulf of innocent parties in this case,
07:29just that process in itself.
07:31And again, you go back to the proportionality,
07:33which you touched upon with the rhetoric of Trump when it came to the power plants
07:36and where you see that falling in terms of alleged possibility of war crimes.
07:43Well, of course, the very same rules apply to the Iranian regime.
07:48These civilian facilities are presumably not military targets.
07:53So when the Iranian army attacks energy facilities,
08:00but also residential buildings in the Gulf countries, airports,
08:05the shipping, you know, the shipping lanes,
08:08the civilian ships that are moving oil in the, you know,
08:13on the shores of their coast,
08:15they are committing serious violations of the laws of war.
08:19You know, these objects are not fair game in the Geneva Conventions.
08:24They are not military objects.
08:25And targeting them has profound consequences for the rest of the world.
08:29It brings the price of oil up, the price of food up,
08:34and it can really affect negatively a vulnerable population,
08:39literally all over the world, and in particular in this case in Asia.
08:42So whatever, you know, formidable the enemies of Iran are,
08:49it doesn't justify using these kind of tactics that have negative repercussions for civilians.
08:55So if we look at Human Rights Watch,
08:56if you look at your organisation to document abuses,
08:59to pressure governments and groups to stop them,
09:02to investigate, to report, to advocate,
09:05and then I ask you to the scale of this question now,
09:07how can you document alleged war crimes right now,
09:10crimes against humanity, breaches in such a vast region?
09:14You talked about some of the Gulf states.
09:15We're dealing with an expanded conflict,
09:18more than 10 countries either involved or directly affected by war.
09:21Tell me about the work you're trying to do in that remit right now.
09:26Look, it's very challenging.
09:28As you described it, the war is intensifying.
09:32It has spread out.
09:34It involves many parties and we have already documented very serious violations by a range of parties.
09:42We've mentioned some of the U.S., of Iran.
09:45The Israeli authorities have used white phosphorus to bomb some homes in Lebanon,
09:51which is an extremely dangerous and cruel weapon.
09:56And of course, several of these parties have a long track record of committing very, very serious crime.
10:02The Israeli authorities, for the last two and a half years,
10:05have been engaged in acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity in Gaza.
10:11We hear that the situation in the West Bank continues to be extremely concerning.
10:17The Iranian authorities in January killed thousands,
10:20mowed down thousands of peaceful protesters on the street
10:25and are still threatening to continue to do the same if anyone goes out to protest the policies of the
10:35Iranian regime.
10:37So it's a very, very challenging situation for human rights organizations to even keep up with.
10:43And don't forget, this is happening in a world that, as the U.N. Secretary General often says,
10:49that is on fire with conflicts in many other areas.
10:53We are working on Burkina Faso.
10:55We are working on Sudan.
10:56We are still working, of course, on Ukraine, on Myanmar.
10:59So what's happening in Iran today, the sort of disregard for international law,
11:05in fact, reflects a more global trend of a world that's becoming more authoritarian,
11:11where superpowers like the U.S., Russia and China are more and more challenging the rules-based world order
11:18and the entire infrastructure of norms and rules that have been created to protect civilians
11:25and to enforce the laws of war.
11:30So we are, you know, I would say definitely on the back foot as a human rights organization.
11:36At the same time, in times like this, is when we rise up to meet the moment.
11:40And if you look at the research our colleagues have produced in the last few weeks, it's extremely impressive.
11:48Your work matters. It clearly matters, Philippe, when we look at the documented work that you're doing,
11:54the evidence that you carried out, the consistency that you talk about with international law.
11:59But I would ask the question about the weight it's given, the impact that governments clearly play
12:03by either acknowledging it and therefore putting in sanctions and investigations or ignoring it.
12:09And we're in a situation right now where I would ask, what voice does Human Rights Watch have at the
12:13table?
12:13We heard Tom Fletcher, the head of the humanitarian segment, the UNHCR of the UN,
12:18and saying, no one is listening right now.
12:23Look, it's clear that in a situation like that, it's easy to sort of lose faith in the system.
12:31But if we do that, who will be left to defend these rules, these norms that the world has patiently
12:37created
12:37to help improve the faith of civilians?
12:40So there is still hope, even in a moment like this.
12:44In fact, we are really looking to countries around the world who are middle powers or smaller countries
12:50that still believe in human rights, still believe in the rule of law,
12:55to rise up and bend together to create a global coalition of democracies,
12:59of countries that want to protect the rules-based world order,
13:03to push back against countries like the US or China or Russia or these days Iran or Israel
13:09that are openly violating the rules of law.
13:15You may remember the speech, for example, of the Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney,
13:20in Davos calling for this type of coalition.
13:23Imagine if all of these countries, European, but South Africa, Brazil and South Korea and Japan
13:31and Australia and Canada all band together and demand that the US, Iran and Israel respect the laws of war
13:39and push for accountability at the International Criminal Court or in the UN for us.
13:45It can make a difference.
13:46But if nobody stands up in a moment like that, then yes, we'll see a slow degradation
13:50of the global environment in which we are.
13:54Really good to talk to you tonight, Philippe, and listen to the work you're doing as well.
13:57Philippe Bolloupillon, thank you, Executive Director of Human Rights.
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