Syracuse University’s INSCT presents ‘New Battlefields, Old Laws’ conference Oct. 8 in Washington, D.C.

Syracuse University’s INSCT presents ‘New Battlefields, Old Laws’ conference Oct. 8 in Washington, D.C.October 01, 2007SU News ServicesSUnews@syr.edu

On Monday, October Oct. 8, 2007, Syracuse University’s Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism (INSCT) will present “New Battlefields, Old Laws: From the Hague Conventions to Asymmetric Warfare” at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C., beginning at 9 a.m. International experts from academia, government and the human rights community will gather to debate the challenges and limitations of International Humanitarian Law and lay the foundation for adaptations of the Hague and Geneva conventions. Topics for discussion will include whether to recognize non-state actors as lawful participants in armed conflict, how to fit non-state entity personnel into the rubric of combatants and civilians, and the role of private security contractors. The conference coincides with the 100th anniversary of the 1907 Hague Rules of War.

James Ross, legal and policy director for Human Rights Watch, will deliver the luncheon keynote address. Thomas E. Ricks, Washington Post senior Pentagon correspondent, and Robert Siegel, host of National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered,” will serve as moderators.

The “New Battlefields, Old Laws” conference will feature three roundtables. Roundtable I, “Laying the Foundation,” will run from 9–10:30 a.m. and feature panelists David M. Crane, SU professor of law and former Chief chief Prosecutor prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra Leone; Irwin Cotler, former Canadian Minister of Justice, current Member member of Parliamentparliament, and law professor at McGill University; and Michael Scharf, director of the Institute for Global Law and Security at Case

Western Reserve University’s School of Law. Robert Siegel will moderate. Panelists will review the evolving history of the laws of armed conflict and international humanitarian law, consider how the rules apply now, and examine why asymmetric conflicts present challenges in providing rules to limit this form of warfare.

Roundtable II, “Proposals for Reform,” will run from 10:45 a.m.-12:15 p.m. and feature panelists Renee de Nevers, assistant professor of public administration at SU’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and co-author of “Combating Terrorism” (CQ Press, October 2007); Greg Rose, associate professor at the University of Wollongong’s Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention in Australia; and Colonel Col. Daniel Reisner, former head of the International Law Department of the Israel Defense Forces. Robert Siegel will moderate. Panelists will present and then discuss interconnected proposals from the “New Battlefields, Old Laws” research project that suggest ways to limit and govern with rules asymmetric conflicts between states and non-state entities.

In the afternoon, Roundtable III, “Implementing the Reforms,” will take place from 2-4 p.m. and feature panelists Professor Boaz Ganor, director of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya, Israel; Mitchel Wallerstein, dean of the Maxwell School and former Deputy deputy Assistant assistant Secretarysecretary, U.S. Department of Defense (Counterproliferation); and Professor Ruth Wedgewood, director of the International Law and Organization Program at Johns Hopkins University. Thomas E. Ricks will moderate. The panelists will evaluate the prospects and implementation problems that might arise in putting the suggested reforms and other proposals for reform into place.

The Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism (http://insct.syr.edu) is an academic center at Syracuse University dedicated to interdisciplinary teaching, research and public service directed at the national and global problems of security and terrorism. INSCT is jointly sponsored by the SU College of Law and the Maxwell School. The “New Battlefields, Old Laws” conference is part of a multi-year research project, jointly sponsored by INSCT and the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) at the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya, Israel.

For more information, contact Laurie Tillet at (703) 898-2330 or ltillet@cox.net or Julie Bradsher at (703) 622-6349 or jlbradsher@aol.com.