This article provides an introduction to the phenomenon of globalization and its implications for humanitarian action. The process of globalization entails risks as well as chances and although it is difficult to measure with any degree of precision it is a factor in many contemporary conflicts. Humanitarian action has a fundamental international dimension and is thus affected by globalization in that it has an impact on the way that risks and potential dangers are managed.

The author reflects on contemporary security challenges and how they have changed the environment in which humanitarian work is carried out. Deliberate targeting is but one example of how humanitarian operations are challenged today. On the basis of this analysis the author provides an insight into the ICRC assessment of these developments and provides an outlook for the parameters for neutral, impartial and independent humanitarian action in the future.

The author analyses the nature and limits of the right to humanitarian assistance during national and international armed conflict. She views humanitarian assistance as a right directly derived from the right to life and draws attention to recent practice of the Security Council which has explicitly acknowledged serious and systematic infringements of this rights and linked it with threats to international peace. The article concludes by proposing a number of possible solutions for such infringements and shows how humanitarian aid that conforms to the relevant international principles is protected by international law.

The article deals with the numerous moral dilemmas humanitarian organizations are faced with when they - often unwillingly - become part of political and military strategies to reduce conflict and to build peace, notably in the aftermath of military interventions that have been justified on humanitarian grounds.

The post Cold War period has witnessed an increasing "militarization" of humanitarian action. Today armed forces are deployed on peace-keeping missions and mandated to carry out humanitarian operations. The distinction between humanitarian, political and military action is thus increasingly blurred. The article sets out to analyse the ICRC's views on this civil-military relationship in contemporary humanitarian environment.

The ICRC's position regarding public statements is often controversial and has sometimes given rise to fierce debate. In this article, the President of the ICRC points out the ICRC's absolute commitment to remaining in close proximity to the victims of armed conflict and to uphold every possibility for constructive dialogue with governmental authorities. Only under exceptional circumstances, when all other efforts have failed, does the ICRC consider going public and only if it considers this step to be in the interest of the people concerned. The author emphasizes the need for consistency and predictability in the ICRC's public statements and argues, that the very purpose of discretion is to achieve the largest possible access to victims on a world-wide basis.

Adopted by the Assembly of the International Committee of the Red Cross on 29 April 2004 - Public version

Biannual update on national legislation and case law, January – June 2004

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