The Year in Review highlights the issues of principal legal and political importance concerning international humanitarian law during the reporting period. In volume 7 (2004), it focuses on the prisoner abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and the mistreatment of other prisoners and detainees by the US and its allies in the context of the so-called ‘war on terror’, and explores the roots of that misbehaviour. The Year in Review covering 2004 also reports on IHL-related developments at the UN and other international organisations, in the area of arms control and implementation, inter alia.