Italy is a party to all the major international conventions on the law of armed conflict and international criminal law. These include the four 1949 Geneva Conventions and the 1977 and 2005 Additional Protocols, as well as numerous other international treaties that set limits on the use of certain weapon systems.

As regards international criminal law, Italy has acceded to the Rome Statute, which established the International Criminal Court (ICC).

By Law of 10 November 2021, n. 202 (Ratification and implementation of the amendments to the Statute establishing the International Criminal Court, ratified pursuant to Law of 12 July 1999, n. 232, adopted in Kampala on 10 and 11 June 2010), the Italian Parliament has authorised the ratification of the instrument amending the Rome Statute by introducing the definition of the crime of aggression (Art.8a), the forecast of conditions for the exercise by the ICC of the jurisdiction over this crime (art. 15a and 15b) and an extension of the types of cases which constitute war crimes (art. 8, para. 2, lett. e), xiii, xiv, and xv). The amendment entered into force for Italy on 26 January 2023, 12 months after the deposit of the instrument of ratification (Art. 121.5 of the Statute of the International Criminal Court).

Previously, following the adoption of the law 4 December 2017, n. 200, the President of the Republic on 13 April 2018 had ratified the amendment adopted in 2015 concerning the elimination of art. 124 of the Statute itself. This latter provision, better known as the "opting out clause", provides for a transitional period of seven years from the date on which the Statute entered into force for each State that it could declare that it does not accept: the jurisdiction of the Court with respect to war crimes committed by its own nationals or on its own territory. The amendment repealing Art. 124 has not yet entered into force, since it requires the accession of 7/8 of the States Parties.

Italy has not yet adopted certain amendments to Art. 8 (war crimes) introducing the use of weapons containing microbiological agents or toxins, use of weapons that injure with fragments invisible to X-rays, to the weapons that use blinding laser beams and the crime of deliberately using starvation as a means of warfare in internal armed conflicts, as well as international ones.

On 6 December 2017, the Assembly of States Parties elected the Italian judge Rosario Salvatore Aitala at the International Criminal Court, who began his duties the following year. Previously, from March 2009 to 2018, another Italian judge, Cuno Tarfusser, had served.