Along What Lines Can Humanitarian Interventions Be Critiqued - Coursework Example

Humanitarian Interventions With the increasing levels of globalization, economies across the world have become integrated. As a result, a problem in one country has an effect on other economies. However, there has been a need to ensure that there is global stability. This aspect could not be achieved if some countries are experiencing cases of human rights violation (MacQueen 2011). Over the years, the number of terrorist groups has increased tremendously. This has mainly resulting from radicalization of the young generation by various leaders who have their special interests. However, these groups are ending using the weapons they possess against innocent citizens. This is having a major impact on the global peace and stability. Therefore, humanitarian intervention is important in this case in order to ensure that these cases are eliminated. The intervention involves the use of military to weaken these groups and help the locals with various supplies such as food and shelter. Humanitarian intervention is any measure taken by an external state or organization in an attempt to salvage the local population from the heinous acts directed to them by the local authority or militia groups (Welsh 2004). In the modern society, differences in leadership ideologies have a major impact on the security of the country. Some countries such as Iran, Russia, and North Korea have been accused of funding local groups with the aim of weakening the authority of a certain country. Such groups are able to get access to weapons of mass destruction. Therefore, they use these weapons against people who do not share the same beliefs or political ideologies. This may lead to deaths, injuries or displacement. In this case, these people require medical, food, and shelter assistance. Humanitarian intervention plays a significant role in restoring human dignity and ensuring that cases of human rights violations are minimized. After the World War II, the United Nations body was formed with the aim of ensuring that it deters any possible cases of human violations (Welsh 2004). However, since its inception, these cases have been rampant. The latest cases have been experienced in Syria. This is after the government and rebels fight to get control of various regions in the country. However, the citizens have been caught in between, an aspect that has increased the need to have a holistic approach in order to help those affected. The war has destroyed various installations that were providing essential services such as water, electricity, health and education services. Therefore, the global community has an obligation of ensuring that the innocent citizens are protected from inhumane treatment by the warring groups. This is through giving essential aid in order to avoid deaths that may emanate from malnourishment, lack o clean water, and other diseases that might result from poor living conditions. United Nations has been intervening through its UNHCR body. This is a body mandated in ensuring that the refugees who have been displaced by war or any other natural calamities are taken care. This is through sending to sending personnel to help them restore their normal lives when residing in the refugees’ camps. Syria widening civil war and growing toll on the civilians is igniting a debate on the role of international community in mounting humanitarian intervention through external forces. However, Libya experience in Libya has overshadowed such efforts. In 2011, the United Nations Security Council invoked the responsibility to protect doctrine and instead adopted the Resolution 1773. This is through endorsing a no-flying zone and giving the necessary authority to ensure that all the necessary measures are taken to protect the civilians from the attack from Muammar al-Qaddafi’s authority. Airstrikes by Western Nations were able to oust Qaddafi from power. However, the humanitarian decision was highly criticised by some security council such as Russia. Poor strategy led to the spilling over of the upheavals to other countries. This has put pressure on the existing mechanisms. This is an indication that humanitarian intervention needs to be regulated in order to avoid the interference of the global partners with the existing administration, an aspect that can lead a country to a state of anarchy. According to United Nations Charter, there is nothing that is contained in the Charter that can authorize this international body to intervene in matters that are within the jurisdiction of the country. However, this statement has not been respected (Murphy 2006). In several cases, United Nation has been said to interfere with the political and administrative structures of the countries. This has aggravated the situation. In many cases, the humanitarian intervention leaves the citizens even more exposed and divided than before. Nevertheless, the principle does not rule out the application of force, or any other act of aggression to the state in case of any form of breach of peace. Furthermore, the Genocide Convention of 1948 overrides the non-intervention principle. This is to ensure that the Srebrenica Massacre in Bosnia and Rwanda genocide does not reoccur and the international community can intervene on time in order to avoid such deaths. However, the United Nation has been accused for being on the sidelines when people are being massacred. For instance, two years ago, thousands of people were killed in South Sudan but United Nations remained silence despite having the capacity to intervene and prevent bloodshed. Therefore, humanitarian intervention needs to be redefined to include quick intervention to avoid conflict escalation rather than help people when they have been affected by the conflict. The humanitarian intervention need to be reframed and changed from the right to intervene to responsibility to protect. Initially, the focus was on just conflicts and its repercussions on the civilians. However, some actions by the powerful state need to be checked in order to avoid any case of human intervention which might emanate from natural disasters. For instance, the world is currently crumbling with the increasing levels of global warming. However, the international bodies are just watching as the situation escalates. The powerful countries are not taking the necessary measures to prevent the release of green house gases to the atmosphere. However, these countries are willing to offer assistance to countries that are affected by drought, floods, or any other disasters that emanates from global warming. Therefore, humanitarian intervention need to be critiqued in terms of how it prevented the violation of human rights rather than how the interventions helped the victims of the violence. This can be achieved by highlighting various issues across the world that is likely to cause a humanitarian crisis. According to Just War Theory, war is not always the worst option. There are some atrocities which are very significant and can only be prevented through war (Pattison 2010). This theory expounds that some times, the government which has a responsible of protecting the citizens may rise against its own people. Therefore, in this case, people are mainly left helpless. This necessitates the need for neighbouring countries to use all available means to ensure that people are protected against such regimes and the leaders are removed from power in order for democracy to prevail. However, the procedure to interevene in such situations is not effective. As a result, they have been misused by some external powers with some hidden interests. For instance, in Libya the countries that participated in ousting their leader were accused of siphoning fuel and other minerals. In addition, some have argued that some countries are funding the rebels in order to create a state of instability in order to enable these countries to continue enjoying these benefits. This has a major effect on the definition and the role of humanitarian intervention to a country. According to Just War Theory, states have a duty to defend their citizens and their justice (Holzgrefe & Keohane 2003). However, over the years, government has failed to take this responsibility and instead they have risen against their own citizens. This has been one strategy that has been used by political leaders to marginalize some people in order to gain political advantage and retain power. Some have gone to an extent of killing those who hold a different opinion or ideology. However, when states fail, the global community has an objective of protecting global citizens against such aggression. Therefore, just to go to war is a concept that should be defined in terms of objectives that is intended to be achieved and its importance in restoring human dignity. In many cases, the humanitarian intervention has been used by some countries to achieve hidden interests such as ousting leaders who have not been following their guidelines in relation to global politics. This is an indication that there is need to redefine the humanitarian intervention and how to monitor the operations of the countries that is intervening. This is to ensure that this noble act is not manipulated for selfish gains. Just to go to war should be defined based on the circumstances that necessitate the need to participate in war (Potter, 2004). During war, civilians are likely to be caught in between, an aspect that might water down the intension of humanitarian intervention. For instance, in Yemen, United Nation states that more than 500 innocent civilians have been killed. Majority of these people are women and children who have been living near Houthis territory. However, the intension of the Saudi-led group which is attacking these rebels is to liberate the people from this group which has enslaved the local population. Although the intension of the Saudi-led group was noble, the consequences are going against the spirit of humanitarian intervention. Any form of intervention should take the interests of the civilians into consideration. Although Houthis have been accused of opening fire on civilians in order to attract the attention of the international community, any war that is intended to salvage the people from such authority should consider the civilians first. Major changes are happening on the global platform. Countries are coming together in order to avoid wars (Lawson 2003). Peace mechanisms are being put in place to ensure that war is the last result; however, with the integration of people in the world, neighbouring countries are feeling that they have an obligation to observe the operations of other country. This is to ensure that there is regional stability. Many countries feel that international bodies such as UN Security Council is slow to respond even when the situation is dire for the civilians. As a result, different regions are establishing regional forces to offer humanitarian assistance. For instance, in Africa, African countries have established a single force to intervene where necessary in order to protect the people from any aggression from the authority. This has weakened the position of United Nation in the global arena. In addition, it has rendered the laws that guided the humanitarian intervention unoperational. International bodies have the responsibility to protect global citizens. According to United Nations, prevention of genocides and mass atrocities requires apportioning responsibility to and ensuring that there is collaboration between states and international community (Chesterman 2001). Currently, sovereignty is no longer an excuse to block other states from foreign interference. Instead, it is a responsibility whereby the states are responsible and accountable for the welfare of their people. This is through ensuring that they do not use the power embedded on them by the people against them. The responsibility to protect has three main pillars. These are that the country has the primary responsibility to protect the people against genocide, wars crimes, and any other crime against the humanity (Welsh 2004). In addition, it must not use ethical cleansing or incite people against others in order to gain an advantage. Secondly, the international community has a responsibility to encourage the country to fulfil their responsibility. This is through constant monitoring and evaluation of the policies by the government which might violate the human rights. Thirdly, the international community has a responsibility of using any appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian, and any other means that might protect the civilians from these crimes. Therefore, if the country fails to protect the civilians, the international community has an obligation to take collective actions that will aim at protecting the population. This would be significant in ensuring that no mass casualties that might occur from the crimes. Therefore, humanitarian intervention can be critiqued in terms of what leads the international community to interfere with the sovereignty of the country and whether the necessary procedures were followed. Responsibility to protect aims at overturning the country’s laws in case the leaders have been unable to offer security and the necessary humanitarian assistance to its people (Badescu 2011). Through the guidance of UN Secretary General, the United Nation has repealed this policy in order to make it effective. This is through ensuring that it is pro-active. This is to enable the international community to react before the civilians can experience high levels of sufferings. It outlines the need to use negotiations as the first strategy to initiate change. However, in case peaceful mechanisms fails, the international community has powers to use any possible means to ensure that the leadership comes into a negotiating table. For instance, the European Union has enacted some restrictions to Russia after its continuous atrocities against people of Crimea. This is ensuring that it freezes any trade relationship with the country. Although this intervention has a major effect on the living conditions on the Russian civilians, it is likely to bring the Russian leaders to negotiating people, an aspect that will protect the people of Crimea. This is what has happened with Iran which has been compelled by the international community to sign a treaty against production of nuclear weapons which are of mass destruction. Critics state that responsibility to protect has not outlined the mechanism to determine the best time to intervene. Despite the existence of this policy, atrocities continue to be reported across the world. For instance, the world continues to watch as thousands of people in Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, and other countries continue to suffer. This is despite the United Nations Security Council having the power to intervene through NATO (Plappert 2010). Instead, the body is being drawn to the global politics, an aspect that is exposing the civilians to violence. This has seen the number of victims of these violent acts continue to increase tremendously. Critics believe that some nations are not covered in this policy. For instance, there has been arguments that United Nations does not interfere in cases where United States is leading the line. For instance, the UN watched as civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan were subjected to torture by the US soldiers. Although the humanitarian intervention was significant, the body allowed the US to violate human rights in an attempt to oust terrorist groups and Iraq leader. However, humanitarian intervention should apply to all countries irrespective of the country that is violating the human rights. However, with United States being one of the financiers of UN, the body tries not to intervene, an aspect that has led to intensive suffering when US attack a country. Therefore, there should be mechanism to protect international body from being manipulated from superpowers in order to serve global citizens without any form of discrimination. References Badescu, C. G. 2011. Humanitarian intervention and the responsibility to protect: Security and human rights. Milton Park, Abingdon: Routledge. Chesterman, S. 2001. Just war or just peace?: Humanitarian intervention and international law. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Holzgrefe, J. L., & Keohane, R. O. 2003. Humanitarian intervention: Ethical, legal, and political dilemmas. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lawson, S. 2003. International relations. Cambridge, UK: Polity. MacQueen, N. 2011. Humanitarian intervention and the United Nations. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Murphy, S. D. 2006. Humanitarian intervention: The United Nations in an evolving world order. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Pattison, J. 2010. Humanitarian intervention and the responsibility to protect: Who should intervene? Oxford: Oxford University Press. Plappert, S. 2010. Humanitarian Intervention: "Why do states intervene in some humanitarian crises and not others?". München: GRIN Verlag GmbH. Potter, N. N. 2004. Putting peace into practice: Evaluating policy on local and global levels. Amsterdam [Netherlands: Rodopi. Welsh, J. M. 2004. Humanitarian intervention and international relations. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More