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Hostages

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Hostages 

persons illegally taken into custody by belligerents in order to avert the resistance of the population of an occupied territory. As a rule, hostages are taken from among persons who are not participating directly in military operations.

The Geneva Convention of Aug. 12, 1949, On the Protection of Civilians in Wartime, prohibits the taking of hostages, noting that this rule is included among the minimum provisions binding upon all belligerents. In its list of persons who may not be taken as hostages under any circumstances the Geneva convention includes—in addition to civilians—members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those who, as a result of illness, wounds, or detention, have ceased to participate in military operations.

The Geneva convention’s provisions concerning hostages must be applied also to the participants of national liberation movements.
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HE THAT hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.
The Essays by Bacon, Sir Francis View in context
It is not difficult to stand above the conventions when we leave no hostages among them; men can always be more unconventional than women, and a bachelor of independent means need encounter no difficulties at all.
Howards End by Forster, E. M. View in context
However, that we might be very secure, I told him he should go back again and choose out those five, and tell them, that they might see he did not want men, that he would take out those five to be his assistants, and that the governor would keep the other two, and the three that were sent prisoners to the castle (my cave), as hostages for the fidelity of those five; and that if they proved unfaithful in the execution, the five hostages should be hanged in chains alive on the shore.
Robinson Crusoe by Defoe, Daniel View in context
 
 
 
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