Libya: Western countries selective
Sam Makinda
Since Western countries launched air strikes against Libya two weeks ago with a view to protecting civilians, a number of questions have been raised regarding the likely duration of the air attacks, the exit strategy for the participating countries, the meaning of success for such a mission, the nature of the Libyan opposition and whether the overthrow of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi is one of the objectives.
All these questions are legitimate and answers to them are likely to determine the level of support, which the countries participating in the implementation of the UN Security Council resolution 1973 on the no-fly zone will continue to receive.
The international conference convened in London on Tuesday this week, which was attended by more than 30 countries, as well as the African Union and the Arab League, was expected to provide credible answers to some of these questions, but it failed to do so.
Earlier in the week, US President Barack Obama spoke on the Libyan conflict at the National Defence University in Washington, DC, but his address was primarily designed to answer his American critics and fell short of providing answers to these fundamental questions.
President Obama argued that had the US and other coalition partners not acted at the time they did, many Libyans in Benghazi and adjacent towns would have been attacked and brutalised by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's forces.
While the United Nations and the Western European countries involved in enforcing the no-fly zone have defended their actions on the basis of the 2005 World Summit resolution on the responsibility to protect, Obama argued that he was driven by American values and the national interest.
More than 10 years ago, this would not have been surprising because many humanitarian interventions were underpinned by self-regarding, rather than other-regarding, factors.
Indeed, most countries committed resources and acted faster when there was a coincidence between their realpolitik concerns and humanitarian problems.
However, following the unanimous adoption of the resolution on the responsibility to protect in 2005, it would be expected that a leading power like the US would be guided by international norms rather than national interests.
Would this explain why there has been no appetite for intervention in Côte d'Ivoire, where Laurent Gbagbo has refused to step down four months after the Independent Electoral Commission declared on 2nd December 2010 that the opposition leader, Alassane Ouattara, had won the second round of the presidential elections?
The essence of President Obama's address this week is that unless humanitarian problems are framed in terms of American values and national interest, the US is unlikely to intervene.
A former UN Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar said in 1991 that "the principle of protection of human rights cannot be invoked in a particular situation and disregarded in a similar one. To apply it selectively is to debase it".
This was emphasised by another former UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, in 1999 when he said: "If the new commitment to intervention in the face of extreme suffering is to retain the support of the world's people, it must be fairly and consistently applied, irrespective of region or nation".
It is imperative that the countries participating in the Libyan conflict take global norms seriously.
Prof Makinda teaches at Murdoch
No comments:
Post a Comment