The Law of Nations
  • Home
  • About
  • Public International Law
  • Private International Law
  • Arbitration
  • Podcasts
  • Contact Us
Human Rights, Public International Law 0

The international legal framework regulating armed drones

As the Parliamentary inquiry into the issue calls for evidence, Professor Dapo Akande draws together recent analyses of the legal issues involved

By Dapo Akande · On March 28, 2017


Editors’ note: The use of armed drones is one of the pressing international legal issues currently facing the UK; we are pleased to post the following note by Dapo Akande, which originally appeared on EJIL:Talk!

On 16 March, I had the pleasure and honour of delivering the International and Comparative Law Quarterly’s Annual Lecture for 2017 together with Lawrence Hill-Cawthorne. Our lecture was based on an article – “International Legal Framework Regulating Armed Drones” – that we co-authored with Professor Christof Heyns and Dr Thompson Chengeta which was published in Volume 65 (2016) of the ICLQ. The article arose out of a project to support Christof’s work in his capacity as United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions. We began the collaboration in the summer of 2013 in the lead up to Christof preparing a report for the 68th session of UN General Assembly on “Armed Drones and the Right to Life”. The project commenced with an expert workshop organized by the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict and the Oxford Martin Programme on Human Rights for Future Generations and has concluded with this article which is an expanded version of the UN GA report.

As the abstract of the article sets out:

This article provides a holistic examination of the international legal frameworks which regulate targeted killings by drones. The article argues that for a particular drone strike to be lawful, it must satisfy the legal requirements under all applicable international legal regimes, namely: the law regulating the use of force (ius ad bellum); international humanitarian law and international human rights law. It is argued that the legality of a drone strike under the ius ad bellum does not preclude the wrongfulness of that strike under international humanitarian law or international human rights law, and that since those latter obligations are owed to individuals, one State cannot consent to their violation by another State. The article considers the important legal challenges that the use of armed drones poses under each of the three legal frameworks mentioned above. It considers the law relating to the use of force by States against non-State groups abroad. This part examines the principles of self-defence and consent, in so far as they may be relied upon to justify targeted killings abroad. The article then turns to some of the key controversies in the application of international humanitarian law to drone strikes. It examines the threshold for non-international armed conflicts, the possibility of a global non-international armed conflict and the question of who may be targeted in a non-international armed conflict. The final substantive section of the article considers the nature and application of the right to life in armed conflict, as well as the extraterritorial application of that right particularly in territory not controlled by the State conducting the strike.

The ICLQ and Cambridge University Press have kindly made the article free to access here from now until the end of April. Take a look to see what you think. As indicated by the abstract, the piece is wide-ranging and seeks to cover a lot of ground though much more can be said about each of the individual areas that we address.

In other drones related news, I have recently been appointed as a legal advisor to an Inquiry by the UK Parliament’s All Party Parliamentary Group on Drones (APPG) into the emerging technologies of drones and the ways in which the UK works with allies with regard to use of armed drones. Under its terms of reference, the inquiry will make recommendations to ensure appropriate levels of transparency and accountability with regard to the use of armed drones. The APPG on Drones inquiry aims to build on the 2016 report of Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights on “The Government’s policy on the use of drones for targeted killing”. The APPG inquiry panel invites written submissions on all aspects of its terms of reference. The deadline for written submissions is next Friday 31 March 2017. Submissions may be made here.

Dapo Akande

Dapo Akande

Dapo Akande is Professor of Public International Law in the University of Oxford. He is also Yamani Fellow at St. Peter's College, and Co-Director of the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict (ELAC) & the Oxford Martin Programme on Human Rights for Future Generations. He has held visiting professorships at Yale Law School (where he was also Robinna Foundation International Fellow), the University of Miami School of Law and the Catolica Global Law School, Lisbon. He was the 2015 Sir Ninian Stephen Visiting Scholar at the University of Melbourne Law School’s Asia-Pacific Centre for Military Law. Before taking up his position in Oxford in 2004, he was Lecturer in Law at the University of Nottingham School of Law (1998-2000) and at the University of Durham (2000-2004). In 2017 he is acting as legal adviser to the UK Parliament’s All Party Parliamentary Group on Drone’s Inquiry into the ways in which the UK works with partners on the use of drones.




You Might Also Like

  • Human Rights

    The Matrix Law Pod Episode 12: The Magnitsky Method – Hitting Human Rights Abusers Where it Hurts

  • Human Rights

    The Matrix Law Pod Episode 11: Building Back Better

  • Human Rights

    The Matrix Law Pod Episode 10: Past, Present, Future – Transitional Justice for Turbulent Times

No Comments

Leave a reply Cancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Mailing List

Sign up to our Mailing List

Categories

  • Arbitration
  • Book Review
  • Brexit
  • Business and Human Rights
  • Comparative Law
  • Constitutional Law
  • Criminal Law
  • Environmental Law
  • From the editors
  • Human Rights
  • International Trade
  • News Round-up
  • Podcasts
  • Private International Law
  • Public International Law
  • Uncategorized

Archives

  • November 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016

From Twitter

  • New post: why depriving Shamima Begum of her UK citizenship violates international law. https://t.co/I51X5qT8um… https://t.co/FF0p3hqE8Q

© Matrix Chambers. All rights reserved. | Accessibility | Terms and Conditions | Privacy Policy