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The Study Group on the Conduct of Hostilities in the 21st Century (hereinafter the SG) was established in 2011 and conducted its first meeting in Sofia in 2012. It conducted a workshop in Leiden in November 2013. During this workshop, three general topics were explored. These were the relationship of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and International Human Rights Law in the conduct of military operations, technological challenges posed by new weapons systems and the function of the basic principles of IHL in the conduct of hostilities. An interim report on these topics was published and presented at the April 2014 Washington D.C. joint meeting of the ILA and the American Society of International Law. These topics were discussed further at a subsequent workshop held in Berlin at the Freie Universität in November of the same year. Attention was also devoted to the relationship of IHL with general international law and the place of IHL within the legal ‘pluriverse’ surrounding modern multinational military operations. The SG was unable to arrive at a consensus on a number of issues which arose, but the discussions were nevertheless extremely useful in highlighting some of the central questions related to the conduct of hostilities and focusing attention on the core area of the mandate; the legal challenges within IHL relating to the conduct of hostilities. It was decided in Berlin to refocus the work of the SG and the final report on those challenges and leave the broader questions of how IHL relates to other bodies of international law to further exploration in other forums.

The Study Group on the Conduct of Hostilities in the 21st Century (hereinafter the SG) was established in 2011 and conducted its first meeting in Sofia in 2012. It conducted a workshop in Leiden in November 2013. During this workshop, three general topics were explored. These were the relationship of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and International Human Rights Law in the conduct of military operations, technological challenges posed by new weapons systems and the function of the basic principles of IHL in the conduct of hostilities. An interim report on these topics was published and presented at the April 2014 Washington D.C. joint meeting of the ILA and the American Society of International Law. These topics were discussed further at a subsequent workshop held in Berlin at the Freie Universität in November of the same year. Attention was also devoted to the relationship of IHL with general international law and the place of IHL within the legal ‘pluriverse’ surrounding modern multinational military operations. The SG was unable to arrive at a consensus on a number of issues which arose, but the discussions were nevertheless extremely useful in highlighting some of the central questions related to the conduct of hostilities and focusing attention on the core area of the mandate; the legal challenges within IHL relating to the conduct of hostilities. It was decided in Berlin to refocus the work of the SG and the final report on those challenges and leave the broader questions of how IHL relates to other bodies of international law to further exploration in other forums.