Regulating the use of Armed Drones in International Humanitarian Law

Nations worldwide are quickly adapting to newer technologies aimed at modern warfare. The armed Unmanned Aerial Vehicle or ‘drone’ is one of them. The scope of modern-day usage of drones has extended from its traditional roles of intelligence gathering, surveillance and reconnaissance1 to target monitoring and carrying out precision strikes. Some of the most recent examples of state militaries leveraging their armed drone capacities include the drone strikes in the Israeli- Palestinian conflict, the Armenia- Azerbaijan War 2, the ongoing Russia-Ukraine War 3 etc. With the growing use of any modern technology in warfare comes the urgency of formulating laws to regulate its use such that it is ethical and in line with International Laws. The regulation of armed drones can be a challenge to policymakers because of the fundamental ethical questions it poses in both wartime and peacetime: Firstly, who can or cannot be targeted in a drone attack during times of conflict? What is a conflict? If drones are unmanned, who is liable for any war crimes committed by means of the drone? And are our existing frameworks capable of addressing future developments in the field of modern drone warfare? This paper attempts to answer these questions while throwing light on additional recommendations that could be implemented to create a robust legal framework capable of tackling the humanitarian implications of technological warfare.