The Legal Status Of Warships In The Operation Of Evacuate Citizens

Nowadays,interests abroad of our country spread around the world following the footsteps of companies and individuals.At the same time,overseas risks were diversified increasingly.This embodied in that our country has carried out many evacuations in order to protect the overseas citizens’ life and safety in recent years.Also warship and other armed forces were used to the evacuation in Libya and Yemen.The word "Evacuation" has a long history,in general means that the government can evacuate their citizens or foreign citizens to safe havens or straight back to their territory by some ways when the life of citizens who lived in overseas being threatened.When the transports of evacuation are warship and military aircraft,we call it "Forcible Evacuation Operation".In evacuation task,warships can quickly reach the host country,undertake the task of evacuating large numbers of citizens,and protect the life of evacuees in extreme circumstances.It is important to clarify the legal status of warship which to prove the legitimacy of evacuation operation.First of all,warship has the right of immunity whether in foreign waters or foreign port.Second,warship’ freedom of navigation on the exclusive economic zone,territorial sea and inland waters are limited respectively.When warship involved in evacuation,these restrictions also exist.But as the country senting warship to participate in evacuation,the legal status of warship is gradually changing.In the peacetime,country admits that warship has special legal status by the provisions of domestic law and the bilateral or multilateral treaties.Then warship obtains the right to freedom of navigation gradually on the basis of performing its obligations.When hostilities are happening,on the one hand,warship has the freedom of navigation due to the neutral;On the other hand,warship has rights to protect itselves and to evacuate citizens which derived from the right of self-defense and also be limited by the law of armed conflict.At present,China’s successful evacuation practices are based on the friendly foreign consular relations rather than legal.It is related from the lack of laws and regulations about evacuation and the legal status of warship.This paper argues that we can change the legislation system and the contents to clarify the legal status of warship in evacuation.In the aspect of legislative system,our country should consider that adding "Operation of Evacuate Citizens","Forcible Evacuation Operation" and other professional terms to our law,and prepared the legislation of Non-war Military Operations or Non-combatantEvacuation.Thus,the legal status of warship will be managed by the high status law and separate regulations which have comprehensive and detailed rules.In the aspect of legislation contents,the legal status of warship in evacuation shall cover the setting out,landing on and evacuating the personnel to the safe havens or territory.Specifically,it shall include the legal bases,the rights and obligations of warship and mechanisms to form a complete set.In addition,we can refine the diplomatic or consular treaties to reach a term about the legal status of warship in evacuation.Then,it will further strengthen our international cooperation with other countries in the aspect of evacuation.