How Challenges of Warfare Influences the Laws of Warfare

The first challenge to laws of warfare comes from the realm of human rights, from the right to life. Today the situation is different. Laws of human rights have trickled into laws of warfare, even though they never mean to apply to them. In the process of formulating human rights laws there was never any intention that they be applied to a state of war. Their starting point was the power that a regime brings to bear on its citizens. This was not a case of horizontal warring - such as a duel or contest - but rather a hierarchy, a vertical relationship in which the one possessing public power controlled the citizen. This essay will deal with the challenges to the laws of warfare posed by fighting in urban zones, the consequent changes to these laws, and the problems these changes have aroused and responses to them.