Law of War and Human Rights

State power is the use of force to limit the use of force.

The law of war is one part of public international law:
it has two parts – jus ad bellum, which is the right to go to war
and jus in bello, which is the rights of armed conflict.

Jus in bello applies both to insurgents and official forces, though to enjoy the rights of jus in bello one must wear marking insignia, to indicate that one is in armed conflict.

One rule of jus in bello is that you must use only force which is necessary and proportioned to eliminate the threat.

Retorsions are lawful unfriendly acts. Sanctions are a kind of retorsion.<br />Reprisals are unlawful acts, which are however justified as self-help to remedy a greater unlawful act. The reprisal would be illegal were it not for the wrongful act which it seeks to remedy.
Two wrongs can make a right in international law!

Two treaties we have not yet mentioned:
Convention against Torture.
Genocide Convention

Law of war was first codified in the Hague conventions and then in the Geneva conventions.
The Hague conventions are considered customary international law since about 1950.

A more recent term for the law of armed conflict is international humanitarian law. There is some overlap between IHL and international human rights law, or at least they are often closely related.