Journal of International Criminal Justice, Vol. 4(1) 2006 (peer reviewed).
This article was awarded the La Pira Prize in 2006 for best article by a scholar under the age of 35 years. The paper concludes that there is a striking resemblance between allegations made of detention practices at Guantánamo and many of the scenarios that gave rise to individual criminal responsibility for unlawful confinement as a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions in other contexts. As such, I gently emphasize the need to rethink the legal basis for detention at Guantánamo and point to the troubling risks of individual criminal responsibility for purporting to develop international humanitarian law through unilateral changes in policy rather than formal international law-making processes.