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The Geneva Conventions

The four cornerstone treaties of IHL and their core protections for victims of armed conflict.

The Four Conventions

The four Geneva Conventions of 1949 form the core of IHL. Convention I protects wounded and sick soldiers on land. Convention II protects wounded, sick, and shipwrecked members of armed forces at sea. Convention III governs the treatment of prisoners of war. Convention IV protects civilians in time of war and under occupation. Together, they have been ratified by 196 states, making them universally binding.

The Conventions were adopted in the aftermath of World War II, where the treatment of prisoners and civilians had reached unprecedented levels of cruelty. They built on earlier Geneva Conventions (1864, 1906, 1929) but were far more comprehensive, particularly in extending protection to civilians, which the earlier conventions had largely ignored.