A war crime is a very specific type of offense involving violations of international humanitarian law that incur perpetrators in individual criminal liability. It is a serious matter, and one that can involve not just criminal prosecution but also political and diplomatic tensions, military failures, and strategic misdirection. But in the world of journalism, the term is sometimes used to describe a smorgasbord of actions, both actual and allegations: bombing a hospital; torturing a detainee; killing civilians. This confusion of semantics and implication can have real-world consequences, from popular condemnation to diplomatic and strategic re-direction to criminal prosecution.
The legal definition of a war crime is codified in various treaties and conventions including the 1949 Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocol I, and in international customary law. It prohibits grave breaches of the laws and customs of war. This definition has been expanded over time, with more behaviours being criminalized.
These crimes are prosecuted either by domestic courts (where the perpetrators are from) or through special international tribunals, such as the Nuremberg trials and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. In some cases, a prosecution for war crimes may be launched by non-state actors such as civil society and nongovernmental organisations.
Several nongovernmental organisations monitor armed conflict for evidence of war crimes, such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. They are sometimes helped by tracking tools like Marine Traffic, Flightradar24 and ADSB Exchange, which can help identify the emplacement of military units. This can be useful in establishing patterns of behaviour up the chain of command, e.g. if a unit seems to be engaging in more graphic violence than others.