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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-06-08 Daily Xml
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INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW

The Hon. S.G. WADE (15:47): Today, I would like to briefly highlight international humanitarian law. Following his experience of the Battle of Soferino in 1859, Henry Dunant led the establishment of the International Committee for the Relief of Military Wounded in 1863 and the adoption of the Geneva Convention for the amelioration of the condition of the wounded in armies in the field in 1864.

This was the birth of international humanitarian law: a set of international written and non-written rules and principles applicable in international or non-international armed conflicts. The conventions limit the means and method of warfare and protect those who do not or no longer take part in hostilities.

On 14 October 1958, Australia ratified the four Geneva Conventions of 1949. But ratifying the convention is only the start. As a state parliament I think we need to be mindful that key areas of implementation of the conventions are the responsibility of state governments; for example, the education system. Under the convention, the education system is required to disseminate international humanitarian law so that the principles thereof may become known to the entire population.

In health, we are committed to ensuring the correct use of the Red Cross emblem, which is the emblem of the neutrality of the movement. In planning, we commit ourselves to ensuring that military objectives are established at a distance from civilian infrastructure. As a parliament, we can play our part through motions which highlight international humanitarian law. I am mindful of previous motions on Burma and note that the House of Assembly has a motion in respect to Copts in Egypt.

I also highlight that as parliamentarians we have an opportunity to influence our international colleagues through parliamentary groups such as the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. The international humanitarian law program engages not only with those who are involved in the defence forces, but also people in peacekeeping forces, which of course in the past have included members of our own SA Police. Humanitarian workers often include South Australian teachers and workers. In fact, I am very proud that one of my former work experience trainees is working in the area of human rights monitoring in Asia. Only last Saturday he sent me the following update:

My team and I have spent the day investigating a recent outbreak of violence in some of the poorest villages I have ever been to. While all of the victims were political figures none of them were beaten for political motives but rather criminal motives.

I am concerned for his safety as he undertakes this important work.

In 2010, Laura Stark, a South Australian student of the University of South Australia, won second prize in a national essay competition which highlighted the risks to humanitarian workers. I quote from that essay:

An Operating Room is not entirely distinct from a War Zone. The pressure is high, civilian lives are at risk, and a doctor's duty is to do all that is within his or her power to bring the patient back to full health. But rarely in an O.R. does a surgeon face the possibility of an insurgent attack lead by armed Taliban forces. Rarely is he held at gunpoint and threatened with death simply for doing his job. This is the brutal reality facing doctors and other aid workers in Afghanistan. In August this year, a group of medics returning from an Afghan village where they had been treating civilians, were needlessly and violently mown down by a group of masked gunmen, determined to punish them for helping the innocent.

Responsibility for the attack was proudly claimed by the Taliban—a group who have defiantly and continuously flouted the rules of International Humanitarian Law (IHL). There was one survivor from this particular attack—an Afghan national whose life was spared when he knelt in front of his attackers and recited verses of the Koran. As the killers dragged him away from the bloody scene, he recalls the leader of the group saying entries radio: 'Mission Complete'...Targeted attacks on aid workers that cause death or serious injury, are classified as a 'grave breaches' of IHL by the First Additional Protocol of 1977. These grave breaches of the most serious of war crimes, and the Geneva Convention is clear on the fact that such crimes must be appropriately punished.

Last week I was privileged to host a group of students in a Red Cross visit to Parliament House as part of the Red Cross program highlighting international humanitarian law to students as part of their Even War Has Limits program. I was impressed by the interest and enthusiasm of both the Red Cross volunteers and the students. As part of this session, the group of students received a presentation from the South Australian IHL Collective—a group of tertiary students working with Red Cross to promote international humanitarian law.

I pay tribute to them for their work, for example, their display Emergency Relief in Armed Conflict: Medical Experience from the Field; their involvement in the City to Bay Fun Run; their Flash Mob in Rundle Mall to highlight the risk to humanitarian workers; and their screening of War Dance. In conclusion, I commend the Red Cross for all that it is doing both in Australia and overseas to promote international humanitarian law for the good of the whole human kind.

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