Human Security Centre Human Rights and International Security Research

As with previous conflicts in Gaza, this latest exchange of hostilities saw Palestinian militant groups use civilian buildings for military purposes, with subsequent Israeli attacks targeting these same civilian structures to eliminate a military threat. However, Israel employs a strategy known as “Roof Knocking”, designed to limit the number of civilian casualties caused by their airstrikes.

As the years pass and younger generations grow up in a de-facto partitioned Cyprus, it will increasingly become less-likely that Cyprus will be unified in the future. While parties to the Cyprus issue prepare for their meeting with UNSG Guterres this April, they should also prepare for the likely reality that the “frozen conflict”-zone of Cyprus will remain in a state of political limbo, akin to Western Sahara and the Palestinian Territories.

In the last months of 2020, Israel normalized its ties with four Arab countries. In the case of Morocco, the US issued a proclamation, recognizing Morocco’s sovereignty over Western Sahara, making it the first country in the world to do so. What consequences such recognition will have on what is essentially a conflict in limbo is unclear.

It may be that Ethiopia comes out of what is not just a regional conflict within its territory, but a nationwide struggle for national identity, as a stronger regional actor with the growing political and economic influence it has held so far.

While many assessments in the days after the coup in August foresaw instability in the region, no doubt due to the similarities seen in 2012, no increased instability, whether in Mali nor the greater Sahel region, has happened so far.

In a previous article from the Human Security Centre on the topic of neutral European states, the concept of neutrality was examined in relation to how Switzerland, Austria and Ireland have put neutrality into practice, including a history of neutrality in each of these countries, followed by an analysis of conventional ground-based military assets. This second article which looks into aerial and naval military assets, and examines how neutrality is practiced as a foreign policy by these three countries.

The law of neutrality was codified in 1907. Otherwise known as the Hague Convention, this document sets out the rights and responsibilities of neutral states. Since its writing, two World Wars and the Cold War have challenged neutral states to take steps and ensure their neutrality while giving them the chance to develop unique foreign policies.

The bushfires which rampaged across parts of southeastern Australia were finally extinguished at the end of February, after more than 240 days of blazing across New South Wales.

While this change in policy does not necessarily mean a change in practice, it must be remembered that landmines - no matter how advanced they are - prevent a peoples or a country from developing by denying them the ability to move on from an armed conflict.

Through Operation Bushfire Assist, Australia and its partners continue to develop interoperability, a crucial feat which will be called upon to face future challenges in the South Pacific region.