A while ago, on June 1, 2008 I attended an international conference under the title ‘Complimenting IHL: Exploring the need for additional norms to govern contemporary conflict situations’ organised by the Minerva Center for Human Rights of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the ICRC. The question at stake was whether the problems created by an archaic legislative framework of international humanitarian law called for further legislation (for the purpose of clarification) and if this indeed was the only means to achieve these objectives? In response to the opening keynote address of the conference delivered on 1 June, 2008 by…