The first three contributions tackle legal conundrums affecting international operations at the level of NATO, European States and the United Kingdom.

Steven Hill and David Lemétayer, who are both lawyers at NATO’s Office of Legal Affairs, discuss a range of legal matters connected to multinational military operations from the Organization’s perspective. The authors emphasize that the Alliance abides by stringent norms in the planning and execution of operations, in particular with a view to shielding civilians from violence.

The second article, authored by Professor Wouter Vandenhole of the University of Antwerp, takes a closer look at the human rights obligations of European States in the context of peace operations. He discusses the duties and responsibility of States for human rights violations committed by troops they have contributed to peace operations. A crucial question that arises in this regard is whether the human rights obligations also apply extraterritorially. The author adopts a critical approach to the relevant case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

In the third piece, Jake Rylatt of the University of Cambridge offers a British viewpoint on analogous matters. His article focuses on the Serdar Mohammed case before the courts of England and Wales, which dealt with the attribution of conduct of British troops in the context of ISAF. In a similar vein, the author critically assesses the reasoning of the courts.

The immunity of State officials from prosecution for international crimes receives detailed treatment in an article by Pauline Lesaffre of the Université catholique de Louvain. She comes to the conclusion that under international law, State officials who are prosecuted before foreign courts still enjoy immunity. While this immunity is not opposable as such to the International Criminal Court (ICC), it does apply in respect of the system of co-operative duties stipulated in the Rome Statute: officials of States not party to the Rome Statute continue to enjoy costumary immunity from measures of execution by States Parties acting pursuant to a request from the Court.