This article examines the outcome of the International Law Commission’s (ILC) Study on the Protection of the Environment in relation to Armed Conflict as adopted on first reading. The twenty-eight... Show moreThis article examines the outcome of the International Law Commission’s (ILC) Study on the Protection of the Environment in relation to Armed Conflict as adopted on first reading. The twenty-eight draft principles, adopted by the ILC in July 2019, aim to enhance environmental protection before, during, and after armed conflict. This article evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of the draft principles and highlights principal innovations of the draft principles. Then this article concludes that the ILC study makes important substantive contributions to enhancing environmental protection, but it also misses opportunities to advance the law in this field. The principal strength of the study is that it brings in many different aspects relating to the environment and armed conflicts under one framework, including legal questions that were hitherto neglected. Its weaknesses relate most notably to the protection of the environment during armed conflict. This article argues that, even though there was limited space for the ILC to develop the applicable law in this field, it nevertheless could have been more ambitious. Show less
