The relevance of international humanitarian law in national case law on terrorism

War Crimes and the Conduct of Hostilities: Challenges to Adjudication and Investigation Edited by Fausto Pocar, Marco Pedrazzi and Micaela Frulli Edward Elgar, 2013, 416 pp, $155 hb ISBN 978 1 78195 591 8

“…The US Supreme Court decided to apply Common Article 3, as a matter of customary law, to acts related to the 'war on terror' in Iraq, but it refrained from legally qualifying the armed conflict between the US and Al Quaeda under IHL (pp 305-07). Among other national judicial decisions reviewed by Antonino Alì 35 a judgment of the Italian Court of Cassation sentenced a person accused of complicity with terrorist purposes, who had previously been acquitted on the ground that acts of guerrilla warfare perpetrated in armed conflict cannot be prosecuted unless violations of IHL have occurred (pp 300-03).…”