Author Archives: Jean-Michel Turcotte

About Jean-Michel Turcotte

Jean-Michel Turcotte is a SSHRC postdoctoral fellow at the Leibniz Institute of European History in Mainz. His first book, Comment traiter les «soldats d'Hitler»? (Ottawa, 2022), examines the treatment of German prisoners of war detained in Canada, the United States, and Great Britain during World War II. The book is interested in inter-allied relationships regarding the detention of German soldiers and offers an international perspective on the subject of wartime captivity. In Mainz, he is working on a book project exploring the history of the Geneva Conventions in military and legal perspectives from 1864 to 1949.

The Major Humanitarian Dilemma of Neutrality: The International Committee of the Red Cross and Prisoners of War in Korea, 1950–1953

January 18, 2023 by
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Abstract: This article examines how the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) addressed the complex issue of the 150,000 North Korean and Chinese prisoners of war (POW) detained by the US-led United Nations Command (UNC) during the Korean War (1950–1953). Based on the 1949 Geneva Convention, the treatment of POWs raised serious concerns regarding one of ongoing challenge for the ICRC: neutrality. As suggested in this article, delegates faced a major dilemma in providing humanitarian aid and protection to prisoners while preserving their neutrality. Continue reading → Continue reading →