Vatican official says humanitarian law must be respected even in war

Published: 2003-12-10

GENEVA (CNS) -- In response to war and terrorism, people must pressure their governments to respect international humanitarian law, which is designed to protect human rights and lives, a Vatican official said. Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Vatican's representative to U.N. and humanitarian organizations based in Geneva, addressed the Dec. 2-6 international conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent movement. "In the effort to contain and overcome a wave of intolerable and unbearable violence, the temptation emerges to have recourse to methods of fighting not always respectful of the juridical rules adopted by the international community to ban war as a means to settle disputes," the archbishop said. In addition, he said, modern warfare often has included violations of the pledge to protect human dignity.

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