El uso del hambre como arma de guerra: Una aproximación jurídica a las responsabilidades

Legal and Doctrinal Review of “El uso del hambre como arma de guerra: Una aproximación jurídica a las responsabilidades” (CODESEL Bulletin, Vol. 1, No. 5, October 2025):

Dr. Andrés Miguel Cosialls Ubach’s “El uso del hambre como arma de guerra: Una aproximación jurídica a las responsabilidades” represents a substantial contribution to the corpus of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) scholarship by reinterpreting the prohibition of starvation not as a peripheral humanitarian norm but as a core structural element of the law of armed conflict. The article achieves a rare equilibrium between doctrinal precision, historical contextualization, and operational foresight. Cosialls begins by confronting the widespread misconception that famine during conflict constitutes a collateral consequence of warfare. He refutes this by situating starvation as a deliberate and systematic weapon employed to break civilian resistance, destroy social fabric, and induce displacement, a practice that directly contravenes the foundational humanitarian principles articulated since the St. Petersburg Declaration of 1868. This opening effectively reframes starvation from a humanitarian concern into a legal and moral transgression, tracing a lineage that runs through The Hague Regulations and culminates in the 1977 Additional Protocols to the Geneva Conventions.

From this normative foundation, Cosialls constructs a doctrinal genealogy of Article 54 of Additional Protocol I, demonstrating that its categorical prohibition—“Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare is prohibited”—crystallizes a moral and legal evolution spanning over a century. His meticulous reading of authoritative commentators such as Kalshoven, Zegveld, Dinstein, and Pictet shows an acute sensitivity to both the letter and spirit of humanitarian law. Particularly compelling is his inclusion of Dinstein’s interpretation that the scope of protection under Article 54(2) extends to critical dual-use infrastructures like water-purification and power plants, thereby addressing contemporary debates on the targeting of essential services in hybrid warfare. By integrating perspectives from Shue and Wippman regarding the indirect humanitarian consequences of attacking dual-use facilities, Cosialls bridges traditional legal interpretation with modern operational dilemmas faced by military planners and humanitarian actors alike.

He further strengthens the doctrinal structure by connecting the conventional norm to its penal codification within the Rome Statute, specifically Article 8(2)(b)(xxv), which typifies starvation as a war crime. This transition from normative prescription to individual criminal accountability is treated with remarkable clarity. The discussion of mens rea—the intentional deprivation of objects indispensable to civilian survival—is handled with precision and nuance, highlighting that the crime is constituted not by outcome but by deliberate intent. Citing the Eritrea–Ethiopia Claims Commission decision and Akande and Gillard’s analysis, Cosialls underscores the customary character and universal applicability of the prohibition, even for non-signatory States. His analysis distinguishes between incidental deprivation and the deliberate orchestration of hunger, a distinction crucial for evidentiary assessments in international prosecutions.

The article’s treatment of contemporary conflicts—Yemen, Syria, and Ukraine—demonstrates the author’s ability to translate doctrine into empirical assessment. By referencing UN investigative bodies and independent legal reports such as The Hope Left Us (Global Rights Compliance, 2024), he introduces an evidentiary methodology that fuses legal reasoning with forensic and technological tools, including satellite imagery, electricity grid data, and mortality indices. This interdisciplinary integration reflects a forward-looking model of legal scholarship aligned with emerging practices in accountability mechanisms. It also provides an implicit critique of state impunity, revealing how modern siege warfare continues to operate under the guise of military necessity while systematically violating the foundational principles of distinction and proportionality.

A particularly strong aspect of the study lies in its detailed exploration of intent and evidentiary inference. Cosialls weaves together the jurisprudence of the ICTR and ICTY—Akayesu, Musema, and Blaškić—and the ICC’s Kenya authorization decision to articulate how international tribunals infer specific intent from patterns of conduct, systemic repetition, and official policy statements. His synthesis of Luciano’s analysis in International Criminal Law Review reinforces that the intention behind starvation can be deduced from the coherence between military policy, operational behavior, and the knowledge of foreseeable humanitarian consequences. This approach not only solidifies the legal threshold for proving deliberate starvation but also illustrates the progressive harmonization of IHL and international criminal law doctrines.

The discussion of Security Council Resolution 2417 (2018) provides a masterful link between IHL, human security, and international development policy. By framing the resolution as a normative bridge that integrates food security into the global security agenda, Cosialls exposes the emerging convergence of humanitarian and peacebuilding frameworks. He astutely observes that the resolution’s language—condemning the unlawful denial of humanitarian access and deprivation of survival goods—has translated into a foundation for individualized sanctions by the European Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom, effectively operationalizing IHL obligations within the global sanctions architecture. This articulation of law as both moral norm and enforcement instrument marks one of the article’s most significant theoretical achievements.

In its final analytical movement, the author reaffirms that IHL’s function is not merely prohibitive but prescriptive: it mandates positive obligations of precaution, distinction, and proportionality in the planning and conduct of hostilities. His reliance on Boothby and the UK Manual of the Law of Armed Conflict to argue that starvation-related operations must be evaluated through an anticipatory duty of diligence reflects an advanced understanding of how legal rules translate into tactical directives. The suggestion that operational planning must incorporate humanitarian risk assessment—especially regarding energy, water, and agricultural systems—introduces a practical dimension that elevates the article beyond doctrinal commentary into policy-relevant scholarship.

Cosialls concludes with a moral and legal synthesis that is both evocative and grounded: that the deliberate use of hunger destroys not only lives but also the legitimacy of those who wage war. By reframing Article 54 as a living norm whose vitality depends on its operationalization, he transforms a legal prohibition into a call for an “operational culture of humanity.” This conclusion, at once doctrinal and ethical, encapsulates the author’s conviction that the ultimate test of law in war lies in its capacity to restrain power.