2nd Annual Nordic IHL/LOAC Symposium: IHL/LOAC Implications of Emerging Threats and Technologies for Nordic Preparedness
The 2026 Nordic IHL/LOAC Symposium is co-hosted by the University of Copenhagen’s Centre for Military Studies, the Danish Red Cross, the Danish Ministry of Defence, and the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Through the lens of International Humanitarian Law/Law of Armed Conflict and related areas of international law (IHL/LOAC+), it will explore how developments in modern warfare – in terms of geography, actors, targets, and technology – have affected and will affect Nordic preparedness on the home front and in the European theatre.
The Symposium will take place over 1.5 days and will include four panels of Nordic-based experts from State authorities, academia, and civil society, as well as global IHL/LOAC experts. A fifth panel will engage young academics and professionals from or based in the Nordics.
Time and Place
- Thursday 28 May and Friday 29 May
- Venue: CSS, 35.01.05 (entrance from Gammeltoftsgade 15, 1355 Copenhagen K)
- The symposium will be in-person only
08:30-09:00: Registration and coffee
09:00-09:30: Opening address by high-level speaker (tbc)
09:30-10:30: Opening keynote by Dr. Teija Tiilikainen – a big picture view from the inside
10:30-10:45: Coffee Break
10:45-12:15: Panel 1 - Closer to Home: Reorienting Nordic Operational Law for a New Threat Environment
12:15-13:15: Lunch
13:15-14:45: Panel 2 - Early career panel
14.45-15:00: Coffee Break
15:00-16:30: Panel 3 - Code and Combat: Technological Disruption and IHL/LOAC in the Nordic Context
16:30-17:00: Reception
08:30-08:45: Registration and coffee
08:45-09:45: Opening Keynote by Lt. Col. (ret.) Chris Jenks – an IHL/LOAC view from the outside
09:45-10:00: Coffee break
10:00-11:30: Panel 1 - Code and Combat: Technological Disruption and IHL/LOAC in the Nordic Context II
11:30-11:45: Coffee break
11:45-13:15: Panel 2 - Law and Resilience: Integrating IHL/LOAC into Whole-of-Society Preparedness
13:15-14:00: Lunch and goodbye
Keynote Speakers
A Big Picture View from the Inside: Dr. Teija Tiilikainen, a former Secretary of State at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, is currently the Director of the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats and Vice-Chair of the Board of the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. She previously served as the Director of the Finnish Institute of International Affairs and as the Director of the Network of European Studies at the University of Helsinki, where she was also Vice-Chair of the Executive Board. She has been a member of the Panel of Eminent Persons on European Security as a Common Project, which was led by Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger.
An IHL/LOAC View from the Outside: Lt. Col. (ret.) Chris Jenks is currently the Senior Law of War Adviser to the US Army and a Research Professor of Law at the SMU-Dedman School of Law in Dallas, Texas. He served 20 years in the US Army, first as an infantry officer and later as a JAG at the Pentagon and in Mosul during the Iraq War. He ended his military career as Chief of the International Law Branch of the US Army JAG Corps. Since leaving the military, he has served as Special Counsel to the Department of Defense, as Senior Policy Adviser to the Office of Global Criminal Justice, and as an autonomy and artificial intelligence research fellow at the Center for Naval Analysis.
Registration
Please register here no later than Friday, 22 May 2026.
Contact person for this event: Kevin Heller, kevinheller@ifs.ku.dk
Background
At the 34th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent (2024), Nordic States and their respective Red Cross National Societies adopted a joint pledge towards Organizing and hosting a Rotating Nordic IHL/LOAC Symposium on an annual basis. The Symposium series is aimed at strengthening collaboration, facilitating expertise and knowledge transfer, and enhancing the dissemination of IHL/LOAC principles among different stakeholders within the participating states and across the Nordic and potentially neighbouring regions by harnessing the collective convening power and resources of Nordic states in a sustainable manner. The 1st Symposium was held in Stockholm, Sweden in 2025.
Co-hosts
