Petersburg Declaration

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The Petersburg Declaration , also known as the Petersburg Convention , of December 11, 1868 is an international treaty banning explosive projectiles weighing less than 400 grams. The initiative to conclude the convention came from the Russian Tsar Alexander II . For the first time in military and legal history, the Petersburg Declaration introduced a contractually defined restriction on the choice of means of waging war .

Legal and historical importance

The background to Alexander II's initiative was the development in 1863 of projectiles by Russian military engineers that explode on contact with a hard surface . Four years later, this technology, originally intended to combat the transport of ammunition, was modified in such a way that an explosion occurred when it hit softer structures. Since targeted or accidental use of these smaller explosive projectiles against people would lead to serious injuries, the Russian government proposed that the international community dispense with these ammunition. At the invitation of Russia, there was a congress in Saint Petersburg on December 11, 1868 with representatives from all European countries and North America, in which the "Declaration regarding the non-use of explosive projectiles in war" by Austria-Hungary , the Kingdom of Bavaria , Belgium , Denmark , the French Empire , the Kingdom of Greece , the Kingdom of Italy , the Netherlands , Persia , the Kingdom of Portugal , the Kingdom of Prussia and the North German Confederation , the Russian Empire , the personal union of Sweden and Norway , Switzerland , the Ottoman Empire , the United Kingdom Great Britain and Ireland and the Kingdom of Württemberg signed and adopted. The Grand Duchy of Baden and the Empire of Brazil became contracting parties the following year, and Estonia in 1991.

The principle first formulated in the St. Petersburg Declaration that there are restrictions on the choice of means of warfare and that the use of weapons that cause unnecessary suffering is prohibited, was later expanded and specified in further international treaties. The most important are the Hague Land Warfare Regulations and some other Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, the Geneva Protocol of 1925 "on the prohibition of the use of asphyxiating, poisonous or similar gases as well as bacteriological agents in war" and the additional protocols of 1977 the Geneva Conventions , the "Convention on the Prohibition or Restriction of the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons That Cause Excessive Suffering or May Act indiscriminately" of 1980 with its additional protocols, the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993 and the Ottawa Convention of 1997 against the use and the Manufacture of anti-personnel mines. The prohibition on the use of weapons and methods of warfare that cause unnecessary suffering has also been considered customary international law for decades .

literature

  • Dietrich Schindler , Jiří Toman (Eds.): The Laws of Armed Conflicts: A Collection of Conventions, Resolutions, and Other Documents. Third revised edition. Sijthoff & Noordhoff International Publishers, Alphen aan den Rijn 1988, ISBN 9-02-473306-5 , p. 102

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Database International Comitee of Red Cross (English) accessed on December 11, 2018