Côte d’Ivoire
Practice Relating to Rule 129. The Act of Displacement
Côte d’Ivoire’s Teaching Manual (2007) provides in Book I (Basic instruction):
I. Grave violations
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They are enumerated by the Geneva Conventions and the Additional Protocols, as well as by the Ivorian Penal Code.
They are:
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- deportation or forced transfer of populations.
In Book III, Volume 2 (Instruction of second-year trainee officers), the Teaching Manual provides:
I.3. War crimes
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This is by far the breach which can take the most varied forms. It relates to the grave breaches of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, namely the following acts directed against the persons or objects protected by these acts:
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- unlawful deportation or transfer … of a civilian.
Côte d’Ivoire’s Penal Code (1981), as amended in 1998, punishes
any person who, in time of war or occupation, and in violation of … international conventions, makes an attack on the physical integrity of civilian populations or on their intellectual or moral rights … [by carrying out] their displacement or their forced dispersion, their deportation.
Côte d’Ivoire’s Penal Code (1981), as amended in 2015, states:
Article 139
Whoever commits a war crime is punished with life imprisonment.
War crimes are:
1 - grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, namely, any of the following acts against persons or property protected under the provisions of the relevant Geneva Convention:
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- unlawful deportation or transfer …
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2 - other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts:
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- … the deportation or transfer of all or parts of the population of the occupied territory within or outside this territory;
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4 - other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in armed conflicts not of an international character, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts:
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- ordering the displacement of the civilian population for reasons related to the conflict, unless the security of the civilians involved or imperative military reasons so demand;
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Article 139-1
The provisions of paragraphs 3 and 4 of the above article 139 do not apply to situations of internal disturbances and tensions, such as riots, isolated and sporadic acts of violence or other acts of a similar nature.
Article 139-2
Protected persons referred to in article 139 are in particular:
1 - civilian or military wounded, sick or shipwrecked;
2 - civilians in the power of the enemy;
3 - persons who do not take part directly or who no longer take part in hostilities;
4 - medical and religious personnel, whether civilian or military;
5 - persons deprived of their liberty for reasons related to the armed conflict, whether they are interned or detained.
Côte d’Ivoire’s Teaching Manual (2007) provides in Book III, Volume 1 (Instruction of first-year trainee officers):
IV.3.3. Total or partial evacuation of the civilian population
With respect to evacuations, additional limitations apply in occupied territory. The occupying power can decide to evacuate totally or partially a given zone if the security of the population or imperative military necessity so demand. This not only applies in situations of siege, but also in any situation which can arise in occupied territory. These evacuations should not demand displacements beyond the boundaries of the occupied territory, except if for material reasons such displacement is impossible to avoid. Persons evacuated in this manner must be transferred back to their homes as soon as the hostilities in the zone concerned cease.