Bern/ Information Office/ 08  December 2016/ The State of Qatar's candidate Dr. Abdullah Rashid Al Nuaimi, Chairman of the International Relief and Development at Qatar Red Crescent Society won the membership of the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission (IHFFC) for 2017- 2022.

  This came following the elections held today in Swiss capital, Bern, during the diplomatic conference "of the States Parties to the Protocol I of 1977 Additional to the 1949 Geneva Conventions on the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts." Permanent Mission of the State of Qatar to the United Nations Office and other international organizations in Geneva said in a statement that the States parties to the Diplomatic Conference elected fifteen members for a period of five years by secret ballot, according to equitable geographical distribution and with the necessary experience to decide on the acts which constitute grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, and the First Additional Protocol to these conventions .

In an effort to secure the guarantees accorded to the victims of armed conflict, Article 90 of the Protocol I Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949 (Protocol I) provides for the establishment of an International Fact-Finding Commission. The Commission was officially constituted in 1991 and is a permanent body whose primary purpose is to investigate allegations of grave breaches and other serious violations of international humanitarian law. As such, the Commission is an important means of ensuring that international humanitarian law is both applied and implemented during armed conflict.