DOHA: Qatar Red Crescent (QRC) has made an open appeal yesterday to protect health care facilities in conflict zones and respect Geneva Accords, following an attack on their hospital in Syrian town of Tel Abyad.
“We are particularly concerned by the consequences of such attacks on the hospital’s patients and staff. At this moment, the hospital is overwhelmed with patients exceeding its operational capacities,” said a statement issues by QRC.
Under international humanitarian law, health-care facilities shall be protected and respected at all times to allow medical personnel to provide the necessary care to all patients safe from any further risk or attack.
The statement said that Qatar Red Crescent would like to remind that Article 3 of the Geneva Convention 1949 applies to non-international conflicts and therefore also applies to all parties of the conflict in Syria. It guarantees that any person ‘placed ‘hors de combat’ by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely’ and that ‘the wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.’
Customary international law also ensures special protection to hospitals and medical facilities and personnel prohibiting to target, attack or use such facilities to commit ‘acts harmful to the enemy”. International humanitarian law also prohibits misuse of the emblems of the Red Cross Red Crescent which can result in abandoning respect and protection of health-care personnel and facilities altogether.
Such violations can only affect the medical assistance provided to patients in desperate need for care. “Therefore, we would like to remind all parties to the conflict their responsibility under international humanitarian law to protect all health-care facilities, to keep combats far from the vicinity of any medical facility and to respect the Red Cross Red Crescent principles of neutrality and impartiality while protecting the emblem,” the statement added. The Peninsula
