In his guest slot on the New York Times columnist page (subscription req.), Robert Wright flips the conventional wisdom on the Security Council's rejection of a force authorization resolution for the American led invasion of Iraq in 2003.
A sacred duty of bodies that authorize things--the Security Council, Congress, zoning boards--is to sometimes not authorize things. (Imagine a world where everything was authorized!) People who want a thing authorized sometimes call the failure to authorize it "gridlock." People who don't want the thing authorized prefer to say "the system worked," and refer to people who complain about gridlock as "whiners." Who is right?History can judge who was "right" about the wisdom of invading Iraq in the spring of 2003. For now, I think it's instructive to look at how a core group of pro-Iraq war pundits and editorialists (whom we may call "whiners") tried to inflict damage on the public's opinion of the United Nations when the Security Council refused to authorize the war.
The post of UN Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide -- currently held by Juan E. Méndez of Argentina -- will be upgraded to a full-time position, Mr. Ban said in a message marking the anniversary of the start of the genocide. The UN Advisory Committee on Genocide Prevention will also be boosted, the Secretary-General said, adding that Africa has taken its own steps as well, such as the proposed Pact on Security, Stability and Development for the Great Lakes Region, which contains measures on genocide prevention and punishment.Ban said "Preventing genocide is a collective and individual responsibility...Everyone has a role to play: governments, the media, civil society organizations, religious groups, and each and every one of us." More
Following East Timor's independence from Indonesia in 1999, the Security Council authorized a peacekeeping operation in East Timor to stabilize the new country and rehabilitate its fractured government bureaucracies. Kofi Annan sent one of his most able diplomats, the late Sergio Vieira de Mello, to oversee East Timor reconstruction. The UN then began an ambitious set of capacity building efforts, including training Timorese to fill basic bureaucratic structures and training a judiciary. (This latter job was no easy task. As James Traub recounts in The Best Intentions, there was not a single lawyer in the county at the time.)
The United Nations also oversaw elections in East Timor. It now seems that the young country will reach another milestone as voters stood in long lines this week to cast ballots in a new presidential election. The results are still being tallied, and will not likely be known until Wednesday.
Crucially, the elections occurred without incident. This is an encouraging sign because ten months ago a brief spate of violence threatened to metastasize and reverse hard fought reconstruction gains. At the time, a speedy deployment of Australian military forces calmed the situation before it spiraled out of control. Today, it seems that the security situation is improved to the point that Australia has signaled that it may pull its remaining 1,000 troops from East Timor following a set of parliamentary elections later this year.
In [the] new report, the High Commissioner's Office describes attacks in December 2006 in eastern Jebel Marra, Darfur. At least 15 cases of sexual assault, including rape, had occurred, according to the report. At least two pregnant women were targeted in the violence. "Soldiers came in cars heading towards the hills. Three were in green military uniform and the fourth was in civilian clothes. All four of them were armed and all of them raped me," said one 13-year old victim, according to the report.More
After negotiations throughout the night in Brussels, the second installment of the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is ready for publication. The Financial Times offers a good summary of the panel's findings:
Spring is occurring earlier all around the world, and glaciers are melting. The polar ice caps are also melting, sea levels are gradually rising, and wildlife are migrating. Mr Pachauri [the Panel's Chair] said one of the most important aspects of the report was the "equity dimension" – that poor countries, which are least able to cope with climate change and which are least responsible for past emissions, are likely to be most affected by it.Read More.
The United Nations, the African Union (AU) and the Sudanese Government will participate in a technical-level meeting next week to finalize the measures for the UN "heavy support package" to the AU peacekeeping mission in Darfur.
Monday's meeting is not intended to re-negotiate the heavy support package, the second phase of the three-step process culminating in the eventual deployment of a hybrid UN-AU force, Mr. Ban told reporters at UN Headquarters in New York. "As the Government of Sudan has made certain reservations on my proposals, this meeting will be used to clarify and for an exchange of views on this heavy support package," he said following a briefing to the Security Council on his recent trip to the Middle East. "We hope that, through these consultative meetings, we will be able to deploy hybrid forces as soon as possible."More
At the Brookings Institution this morning, Steven Kull, editor of WorldPublicOpinion.org released the results of a new global public opinion survey on the responsibility to protect. The results are pretty striking. According to the data, there is an emerging international norm that approves United Nations intervention in the affairs of a member state if that country is failing to protect its own population from widespread human rights abuses.
Back in 2005, heads of state signed on to the principal of the responsibility to protect. This survey shows that the idea has now been endorsed by the public--in very large numbers.