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APV Rogers, OBE Author, Law on the Battlefield, Fellow, Lauterpacht Research Centre for International Law, University of Cambridge
Eyal Benvenisti
Professor of International Law, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem
Visiting Professor, Columbia Law School
Michael Matheson
Senior Fellow
U.S. Institute of Peace
H. Wayne Elliott, S.J.D.
Lt. Col. (Ret.) U.S. Army Former Chief, International Law Division; Judge Advocate’s General School, U.S. Army
Robert Kogod Goldman
Professor, Washington College of Law
American University
Steven R. Ratner
Albert Sidney Burleson Professor in Law University of Texas Law School
David Turns, LL.M (London), Barrister
Lecturer in Law
The Liverpool Law School
Marc Cogen
Professor of International Law, Ghent University
Surya Narayan Sinha, Former UN Legal Adviser in Kosovo, Zagreb, and for UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, International Lawyer based in Chennai, India.

September 21, 2001


“Retaliation” and “revenge” have no legitimacy in international law. There is, however, the concept of “lawful reprisal,” which consists of acts which normally would be illegal, but are taken in response to prior illegal attacks. A reprisal can only be taken as a last resort in self-defense, and must be executed with the objective of ensuring future compliance with legal norms. Steven Ratner does not approve of the term reprisal, and instead stresses the importance of self-defense: “The violation of international humanitarian law by one side in an armed conflict does not justify its violation by the other.”


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