Summary

Massive violations of the right to adequate housing continue in unprecedented fashion during and after violent conflict. The attacking, bombing and shelling of civilian targets and the destruction of entire cities and villages – displacing millions into homelessness – have continued unabated despite the development of modern human rights and humanitarian law. While international law outlaws all forms of arbitrary destruction of housing, arbitrary displacement, forced evictions and other serious and large-scale violations of the right to adequate housing, there is an alarming continuity of gross violations of the right to adequate housing in times of conflict. Those severe human rights violations have been largely met with impunity. The report analyses the legal, political and practical challenges to preventing, ending and responding to systematic and deliberate mass destruction of homes during violent conflict. It calls for recognizing such severe violations of international law as “domicide” – a distinct crime under international criminal law – and concludes with a set of recommendations to prevent and eliminate that pervasive curse on humankind.