Legacy of the ad hoc international criminal tribunals in implementing international humanitarian law

Abstract

The aim of the Article is to show that both the ICTY and the ICTR played a very important role in the implementation of international humanitarian law and that they themselves should be regarded as a special mechanism of implementation. International criminal tribunals contributed to clarifying a significant number of international humanitarian law norms making this branch of international law more clear and coherent. The unity and coherence of the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda provides stability, certainty and predictability of humanitarian law and those values are important for every legal system.