Introduction

Environment has always been one of the main victims of war. The experiences of the 1990–91 Gulf War brought this fact into the public consciousness more than ever before. Plants and animals were destroyed and damaged, and air and water were polluted by the burning oil wells and oil slicks to such a degree that it seemed urgently necessary to examine the question of the extent to which belligerents are responsible under international law for damages caused by them to the environment.

State responsibility for environmental damage caused by war is commonly addressed in the traditional context of ius in bello and ius ad bellum. It is generally agreed that every violation of the laws of armed conflict that is attributable to a state entails the international responsibility of that state. Furthermore, a state incurs responsibility when it violates those rules of international law that prohibit recourse to force against another state, in particular Article 2(4) of the UN Charter. However, neither of these two bases of state responsibility is free from shortcomings, and even taken together they constitute only a rudimentary system of legal liability for environmental damage caused by war.

Without going into depth, it should be recalled that although there are several rules of the law of armed conflict that directly or indirectly protect the environment and whose violation will lead to international responsibility, these provisions include so many gaps that even the devastation of the 1990–91 Gulf War arguably was not covered by them all.