Click here for the basics regarding the protection of civilians and medical personel and resources under international law… the document is easy to read and understand: International Humanitarian Law, April 2011: Summary of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols
International Law – (draft version which needs to be completed with sources included)
International Humanitarian Law (IHL) is founded on the desire to alleviate the suffering caused by war. To this end, IHL – and the Fourth Geneva Convention in particular – specifically protects medical facilities and those persons engaged in the search for, and care of, the wounded and sick.
Article 18 of the Fourth Geneva Convention requires that medical facilities be respected and protected: in no circumstances may they be the object of an attack. Article 20 explicitly requires that “persons engaged in the search for, removal, and transporting of and caring for wounded and sick civilians … be respected and protected.”
IHL also places an obligation on all Parties to a conflict, to “facilitate the steps taken to search for the killed and wounded”. This is a pressing, positive obligation. As far as the military situation allows, medical and relief personnel must be allowed to carry out their work.
As non-combatants, IHL grants medical and relief personnel the same rights, protection, and immunity as civilians. They must be spared the effects of hostilities to the greatest extent possible, and they may not be directly targeted; doing so constitutes the crime of wilful killing and amounts to a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions.
As High Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions, all States are under a legal obligation to ensure respect for the Conventions in all circumstances. The individual States of the international community are thus under an obligation to hold accountable those who violate the fundamental principles of IHL.