Humanitarian Intervention-The Responsibility to Protect Development - Essay Example

?Humanitarian Intervention-The Responsibility to Protect Development Collage: Introduction Humanitarian intervention incorporates the use of armed military forces by a State against another state with the aim of protecting the life and liberty of citizens under humanitarian crisis who are unwilling or unable to free or protect themselves. Although the idea appears to be lawful, it is in contrast with the Charter to humanitarian intervention that prohibits the use of force in restoring peace. Article 2 chapter 4 presents the legal dimension that governs against the use of force. It states that, “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.” Hence, NATO breached the international law when it used force without the consent of the UN Security Council and this places the organization outside legality. Humanitarian intervention takes into consideration the atrocities that occur within states that shook the conscience of humankind; hence the need of effective intervention that will help to save defenceless people in the country from starvation, carnage, among other human conditions (Ban 2009, 8). Humanitarian intervention can be defined as the use of coercive military force in the internal affairs of a sovereign state with the aim of addressing massive human rights violation so as to prevent widespread human suffering within a state by other state(s) (Weiss 2006, 3). There are various forms of humanitarian intervention including protection of humanitarian aid operations, use of military forces to deliver humanitarian aid such as food, water, medicine and shelter, protecting victims of violence and fighting violence perpetrators in states under threat. The humanitarian intervention is attributed to the role played by the UN Security Council in promoting international peace and security through authorization of military force to respond to severe atrocities. This role is seen in interventions during the atrocities in Somalia, Rwanda, Kosovo and East Timor. The humanitarian intervention plays effective roles in conflict resolution in peacekeeping through collective interventions by the UN as well as regional bodies sanctioned by the UN Security Council. The humanitarian interventions has always been treated as suspects since they are viewed to be used as mere vehicles for national aggrandizement, institutions of political and economic systems that are detested by indigenous population and imposition of puppets in power. These issues raised by humanitarian intervention makes it impractical for balancing sovereign rights and global values. Given the US has been shadowing its operations in invading other countries under the umbrella of humanitarian intervention and UN charter article 2 chapters 7 that calls for enforcement of measures that aid in international peace and security. Most of the humanitarian intervention involves attempt of stemming out the tides of threats to international peace and security (Pattinson 2010, 113). This is due the fact that peace in the world today is being destroyed by unending wars and conflicts that tend to block the world peace process thus leading to material loss, loss of life and mental sadness. Humanitarian disasters results to torture of human conscience and these calls for the whole of the international community to be responsible in times of massive humanitarian crisis. Interventions that took place in Somalia in 1993 were characterized by failure of the doctrine and this led to facing out of intervention thus leading to non-interventionism. Non-interventionism approach was employed in Rwanda and this led to disastrous consequences in 1994 brought about by genocide. In effect, interventionism was employed in Kosovo and East Timor in 1999. The Kosovo war is a good case for understanding the legality of the humanitarian intervention in respect to the international law. NATO’s military were deployed in Kosovo to aid in solving the conflict, an action that was illegal under the international law (Thakur 2006, 127). Overlooking the presence of the UN Security Council, NATO retained its right of resorting to military action by declaring it as an act of precedent towards emerging new understanding of the international law; however, this does not justify the reasons for gross violation of humanitarian law. Although the NATO’s action of overlooking UN mandate raised more concern, the New Strategic Concept Alliance together with the follow-up documents gives room for NATO to undertake military action again without the consent of the UN Security Council. The NATO’s action is due to the opposition that may be presented by non-democratic countries such as Russia and China in pursuing legitimate military action whenever there is dire need of military action. The limitation of the NATO operation by some members of the UN Security Council led to formulation of new initiatives by the European Union to be conducted within the UN and G-8 context in enforcing peace operations. Deployment of military in conflicting regions by NATO is based on moral motivation since it has no legal basis to do so given that the legal arguments presented has no fundamental facts. In essence, the Kosovo humanitarian intervention raised more questions on the enforcement of unauthorised military action in situations with extreme humanitarian necessity (Belloni 2002, 40). In view of this, the natural law theory and human rights protection are in the forefront in justifying humanitarian intervention although it is inconsistent with the UN charter as well as it lacks proper regulations. The humanitarian intervention in Kosovo led to massive humanitarian catastrophe since by saving the lives of tens of thousands of people, bombing of Yugoslavia by NATO military led to the death of thousands of civilians both in Serbs and Kosovan Albanians in 1999. The NATO bombing which lasted for 78 days resulted to withdrawal of Serb forces from Kosovo which was later followed by intensive ethnic cleansing of Serbs and other minorities in Kosovo. The outcome of the fight led to Kosovo being an independent state in 2008 and was immediately recognised by France, US, Germany, UK among other 24 members of NATO out of 28 though some countries like Serbia and Russia has not. The non-intervention and non-interference in domestic affairs of sovereign states is blamed for the dark days that led to Rwanda genocide massacre. NATO failed to act without authorization from the UN Security Council since it was blamed for the outcome of the Somalia humanitarian intervention and the result was catastrophic (Thakur and Schnabel 2000, 5). Suitable efforts should be developed in dealing with the rise of problems and contradictions associated with external intervention when gross human rights violations have been perpetrated so as to enhance global human rights, diplomatic principles and long-established international relations. Wheeler points out that the rights of human can legitimate the instrument of violence; however, its application has been contested and even denied by intervening states thus leading to their slow adoption (Wheeler 2001, 157). To curb modern humanitarian crisis, solidarist approach to international politics will be paramount as it permits and calls for external intervention in instances of supreme humanitarian emergencies (Wheeler 2001, 132). The humanitarian intervention is thus a violation of the rules that safeguards the independent choices of certain political communities that result to coercive abuse of the weak by the strong parties. The intervention is intended to strengthen the legitimacy of the states society while deepening its commitment to justice. The move of protecting and enforcing human rights has become a new trend in the global politics today and this is being embraced worldwide as part of the national interest conceptions by states. Hence, the compatibility between national interest’s protection and promotion of international order has led to global enforcement of human rights at national level (Wheeler, 2001, 309). A legitimate and humanitarian intervention is characterized by supreme humanitarian emergency. The degree of human rights violations should shock the moral conscience of humanity where all the possible remedies for peace intervention has been employed and that the force to be employed in restoring peace should be proportionate to the harm that is to be prevented or stopped so as to lead positive humanitarian outcome. During the Kosovo tragedy, NATO is considered to be more concerned with boosting its credibility more than being concerned with humanitarian issues as it contributed to the humanitarian catastrophe. Although other non-violent strategies could have been used in protecting the rights of humans in Kosovo for instance, the option of employing military force is subject to investigation on the credibility of NATO’s approaches and aims (Booth 2001, 160). The failure of other states in the UN Security Council to support the fight against massive violation of human rights since the system calls for other states to break the law in the move of doing well. The mechanism employed by NATO in employing weapons of massive destruction such as depleted uranium tipped armour-piercing shells and missiles, cluster bombs instead of ground troops reveals the mistakes and accidents. Furthermore, the post war situations led to more unresolved problems that do not qualify as humanitarian status. The non-intervened Rwandan genocide has experienced a stable post-war environment that saw respect and value of humanity that led to peaceful coexistence between the two conflicting communities. On the other hand, multicultural values and practices were not defended in Kosovo since the Serbs were expelled from Kosovo after the war thus leading to reversed ethnic cleansing (Belloni 2002, 39). The flaws of NATO have made many organizations to view it as non-effective humanitarian intervention model particularly due to the post-conflict transition since the intervention has been short-term in nature. This call for efforts that are beyond the short term military action in order to advance shared responsibility and advanced participation for communities that recovers from war and this includes the Responsibility to protect development. Humanitarian intervention doctrine has been undergoing massive development in order to enhance its legitimacy and success in the global community. With the endorsement of the responsibility to protect (R2P) to enhance global consensus on this concept by the international community was a great achievement. The R2P is a political and moral tool that aid in preventing and reconstruction and this is more than just intervention (Evans, 2004, 35). As states intends to be responsible for its population, it tends to act responsibly mostly in line with the traditional national interests so as to maintain its prestige in the international community. The political and economical crisis plays an effective role in determining the role played by the UN in delivering humanitarian intervention. For a long time, humanitarian intervention has been more of a practice than a doctrine as it reflects aspects of moral image and political gain. Drawing a line of the legality of humanitarian intervention using unauthorised military action to resolve dispute and the operation of the international law is a big challenge. The concept of Responsibility to Protect which is recognized by the UN Assembly calls for measures to protect citizens against war crimes, ethnic cleansing, genocide and crimes against humanity. In essence, humanitarian intervention reflects on the ways in which one or more states intervenes in addressing the threat or actual large scale violation of fundamental human rights in protecting citizens within a state from being deprived off their fundamental human rights without authorization by the UN. The fact that it offers great respect to human rights; humanitarian intervention grants states great diplomacy and zero supervision during military action (Luck 2010, 357). States that are unable to protect its population on its own propels the international community to take effective responsibility in assisting the state in building its capacity to protect its population. To enhance success of the responsibility to Protect guidelines, countries should be willing and ready to accept this doctrine and promote its development (Evans 2008, 22). The R2P evolution of international norms about violence holds that international community enjoys special set of responsibility in protecting civilians from ethnic cleansing, war against humanity, genocide and war crimes if necessary by force in case the national government fail (Brown 2008, 5). The robust peacekeeping operations and effective international criminal justice mechanisms have integrated the R2P tool kit of conflict management strategies in fostering declined armed conflict, lesser wars and thus fewer civilian casualties than in the 1990’s. The recent humanitarian intervention in Libya that saw the UN authorizing NATO to employ military force while demanding the Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi to step down proved to be wrong mechanism in ending civil wars and violence as it led to massive casualties as it was in Somalia and Rwanda (Brendan and Trim 2011, 172). The Somalia crisis in the early 1990’s paved light to the developments towards international relief efforts as portrayed by the United Nations and military forces of powerful nations such as United States of America as well as the international non-governmental organizations. Following the outcome of the humanitarian intervention in Somalia, the efforts to intervene the Rwanda crisis received conflicting perceptions. As the military-humanitarian intervention efforts failed in Somalia, the validity and effectiveness of international intervention was questioned. The UN Charter empowers states to use or use force against another state when it has been authorised by the UN Security Council to maintain or restore international peace and security or for self-defence reasons. Since humanitarian crisis is not recognized as a legitimate reason for intervention, the Security Council has been experiencing opposition in making decisions pertaining to humanitarian intervention and this led the NATO to overlook the UN when intervening in humanitarian crisis. Adopting the R2P in protecting innocent civilians has become the biggest challenge since most countries have been pursuing their narrow national interest including territory grabbing, seize control of the precious natural resources or even gain geo-strategic advantage (Hamilton 2006, 292). To win the confidence of the civilians, leaders adopt this mechanism while purporting civilization, justice, democracy, to bring peace and for moral interventions. As the new world is characterized by democracy, rule of law and protection of human rights as their preferred priorities, everyone is therefore served with the role of assisting those at risk. However, this move at times may override the traditional legal rules including the non-intervention principle. In essence, inconsistency in decision making regarding the humanitarian emergencies that poses threat to international peace and security resulted to increased problems to the parties that favoured interventionist approach. The Kosovo humanitarian crisis was not endorsed by the UN Security Council in the use of force by the NATO against the Serbia. During the crisis in Somalia, the Security Council authorized humanitarian intervention in 1992 following the widespread of famine, general lawlessness, and absence of a government authority and increased inter-clan fighting. The humanitarian troops in Somalia which was under the US central command was intended to provide humanitarian relief activities in Somalia but the troops were withdrawn following increased cases of violence and disturbing footages of dead American soldiers being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. This led to more directives on other countries that intend to mediate the crisis to shy off. In 2005, the UN General Assembly adopted the international responsibility to protect that gave official endorsement of the idea by the security council should the country’s government fails to prevent acts of genocide or any other atrocities that take place within individual states during the World Summit (Annan 2005, 12). The biggest challenge during humanitarian intervention is defining the right time to intervene, the means of intervention and under whose authority. Calls for reforms on the international law against use of force have been voiced in order to counter unacceptable assault on sovereignty against gross and systematic violation of human rights that affects the precepts of humanity. Thus, the sovereignty of states should not be used as shields towards gross violation of human rights given that some sovereign states are unable to shield crimes against. The issues of humanitarian intervention has several unresolved loose ends in practice and principle since the UN Charter is quite silent on the forceful intervention of states against other states in the move of shielding the state’s own nationals. As we think through humanitarian issues afresh, efforts need to be employed to find new common ground that will not propels further genocide, ethnic cleansing or massacre (Evans 2008, 69). Developments towards new mechanism of responding to man-made human rights violation catastrophe by the international community are paramount in this new era. The policy should be accepted by all parties as the most preferred framework for action against humanitarian emergencies and be capable of mobilising support while motivating action in demanding situations. As the sovereign states enjoys the norm of non-intervention as presented by article 2.7 that empowers a state to exercise exclusive and total jurisdiction within its territorial borders and that other states should not intervene in a country’s internal affairs thus enhancing territorial integrity, national sovereignty and political independence among the United Nation members (Pattinson 2010, 23). The biggest challenge today is the rise in the intra-state conflicts that has seen the rise of civilians killed by the military rising from about one in ten in the beginning of the 20th century to around nine in ten by the beginning of the 21st century. This new development calls for new measures to combat the crisis and reconcile the foundational principles of member states sovereignty while maintaining peace and security based on the United Nation mission of promoting the interests and welfare of the people within member states. The concept of security has extended from the state to its people encompassing their physical safety, respect to their dignity, protection of their human worth and human rights, economic and social well being and their fundamental freedom. Today the sovereign states are called upon to internally respect the dignity and basic human rights of all within people within the state as well the sovereignty of other states. In rethinking about sovereignty in respect to its essence obliges the member states to voluntarily accept the UN Charter and this is aimed at strengthening the ever increasing impact of international human rights as well as the impact of international discourse of the concept of human security. The new standards of conduct within member states will go a long way in protecting and advancing international human rights norms which forms the greatest achievement since the post-war era. The culture of national and international accountability helps in dealing with sovereign impunity culture as the state conduct will be judged based on the international human rights norms and instruments (IDRC 2001, 51). The transition from humanitarian intervention to responsibility to protect helps to draw a line between the military activity and humanitarian relief organizations such as the Red Cross. Furthermore, R2P focuses on those who seek or need help through evaluation of issues geared at protecting communities from mass killing, starvation of children and rape of women. Pointing out that the primary responsibility to protect lies with the concerned state, those that fails to enhance these are considered as the primary perpetrators, thus making it the responsibility of the international community in enhancing protection through the necessary and possible methods. Lastly, R2P embraces the responsibility to react, responsibility to prevent and the responsibility to rebuild dimensions which was neglected in the traditional humanitarian intervention (Cooper and Kohler 2009, 67). The root cause of the problem is identified in respect to their various cases and impact and later addressed effectively as it helps in closing the gap between rhetorical support for prevention and tangible commitments. The responsibility to rebuild on the other hand is concerned with offering full assistance towards recovery efforts, reconciliation, reconstruction and addressing the causes of harm the intervention helped to avert after the occurrence of an event. The military intervention can be employed with genuine commitment in helping to build durable peace, sustainable development and promote good governance. Critics of humanitarian intervention and R2P argues that humanitarian intervention is usually characterized with hidden agenda of intervening parties thus portraying modern Western colonialism in the name of reconstruction as they prevent self determined leaders from adopting development approaches that will benefit the people within a country. Intervention has been viewed as being exploitative in nature as developed countries use humanitarian pretexts to pursue unacceptable geopolitical goals in order to avoid non-intervention norm and legal prohibition when using international force. They asserts that as the Kosovo intervention was to conducted to boost the credibility of NATO, the US hides under the umbrella of humanitarianism in propagating its own interests while promoting post cold war (MacQueen 2011, 53). Additionally, the intervention is considered to neglect the conflicts forgotten by the media or the ones that occur based on chronic distresses. For instance the military intervention in Serbia while neglecting the Rwanda genocide intervention shows that the US agenda is questionable. The humanitarian intervention is incompatible with the ban on the use of force that has been enshrined in the UN Charter given that the humanitarian intervention was not established under the customary law thus makes this institution not to exist. The international law bans the use of force in restoring peace and order and in order to change this law, the whole international community should be engaged in establishing the humanitarian intervention norm which has proved to be difficult (Stanulova, 2000, 9). Promotion of the humanitarian intervention by the West will negatively impact NATO’s relation with the rest of the international community as it leaves room for wider range of abuse and this undermines the international law that inhibits the use of force. The R2P has not be left out either, it is criticized that it overlooks the sovereignty of a country. Since the international community is only required to intervene in a state without consent when it allows mass atrocities by not holding its sovereign responsibility as a sovereign state, the parties that makes decision on countries that has lost their sovereignty on behalf of the international community is unknown and this makes R2P to infringe the national sovereignty. The biasness and selectiveness in application of R2P makes the military intervention ineffective and questionable. In conclusion, the humanitarian intervention in Somalia in 1993, inadequate response to the Rwandan genocide in 1994, the NATO’s intervention in Kosovo without the consent of the UN security council in 1999 and the more marginal situation in East Timor although it consented with the Australian-led intervention thus making the crisis intervention not to be severe. The Somalia, Rwanda and Kosovo crisis are the most debatable humanitarian emergencies as they played great role in raising the legal, moral, operational and political issues on the debates towards humanitarian intervention since none of these cases was handled confidently by the international community. In Somalia and Rwanda, the intervention was a bit late, poorly resourced, poorly executed, misconceived and hence less effective. On the other hand, the Security Council was divided during the Kosovo intervention was viewed as being successful although it was criticised as being characterised by increased carnage (Batir 2010, 11). These generated more international controversy including the role and responsibility of the United Nations, never enough resources to settle the principle issues once and for all, usually too late intervention to be useful and the nature and limits of sovereign state. The military intervention is usually considered to be last resort employed in the event of serious violation of international humanitarian law under certain principles including just cause, right authority, precautionary principles and operational principles. These are based on the seriousness of the threat. Proper purpose of intervention, last resort, proportional means and the balance of consequences of the intervention are the building stones for military intervention. 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