Another Opportunity for Obama to Miss an Opportunity

When North Korea launched a "satellite" back in April, I wrote about how Obama missed a golden opportunity to shore up the UN's role in security issues as well as to put together a serious international effort to rein in North Korea.

Things have gotten worse.

Over the weekend, North Korea conducted what seems to be a successful test of a nuclear device that erases the failure of its previous attempt. Yesterday and today, North Korea has been launching several missiles -- both surface-to-air and surface-to-ship -- and is threatening to launch several more tomorrow. President Obama has vowed a swift and strong response to the test and launches, but it's not clear what good options exist at this point. Dan Blumenthal and Robert Kagan, in an op-ed in today's Washington Post outline the paucity of choices for the US:

the United States probably has little choice but to wait out Kim until the emergence of a leader who can make the strategic decision to abandon the nuclear weapons program. In the meantime, Washington should embark on a three-pronged approach. First, it should enhance its deterrent to protect itself, South Korea and Japan. That means, above all, bolstering American and allied missile defenses and deterrent capabilities. Unfortunately, it is precisely American missile defense capabilities that the Obama administration is now cutting -- despite the growing missile threat from North Korea and Iran. Second, it should strengthen multilateral efforts to stem North Korean proliferation, including more active efforts at interdiction and freezing bank accounts used to fund proliferation. Third, it should give up on the six-party talks. If it ever proves useful to talk to Pyongyang -- a big "if" -- let's do so directly.

Blumenthal and Kagan argue that neither China nor Russia has any serious interest in reining in North Korea, and thus efforts focused on mustering international will through the UN are useless.

While it's true that China does have an interest in a unpredictable and unfettered North Korea, that interest has its limits. China most certainly does not have an interest in a strengthened and proliferated Japan, which is a very serious possibility in the wake of the latest test. As Reuters reported over the weekend, Japan's ruling party is preparing to alter the constitution to allow for preemptive strikes under Japan's pacifistic doctrine. The LDP is also considering developing an indigenous early-warning satellite capability as Japan is currently dependent on US intelligence for warning of missile launches.

This would be a most unwelcome development for both China and Russia, which have long benefited from having a weakened and restrained Japan on their borders. And this is Obama's opening.

It's true that there aren't really any good options here. While it may have been feasible for the US to strike against the rocket launched two months ago, it is not possible for the US to use limited strikes against the nuclear program or the short-range missiles being launched now. The only option that exists while waiting out the passing of Kim Jong-Il is to get the UN to impose a complete and total sanctions regime on North Korea along the lines of that which was imposed on South Africa during the apartheid era. Doing so would require not just the acquiesence but the participation of both China and Russia, neither of which would participate for free.

But Obama has two things to offer: One is the prospect of the US operating through the multilateral channels of the UN, which Obama has clearly expressed a preference for doing when possible. Obama should make it clear to both Russia and China that North Korea is a test of their willingness to support the UN on issues of security, and that if they fail, the US will simply consider the UN to be obsolete on such issues in the future. If they want the UN to be a major player and to restrain the unilateralism of the US, then the UN has to be able to deal with such relatively easy cases as North Korea. Second, Obama should offer to use his good offices to prevent Japan from expanding its military doctrine and, down the road, from proliferating.

Both of these are issues about which Russia and China both care deeply; more deeply I believe than they care about keeping North Korea on the loose. If Obama plays his cards right, North Korea can be made to pay a meaningful and painful price for its wanton disregard of its obligations under international law.

But I doubt Obama will play his cards right. While Obama has shown a willingness to talk to any and all and to "reset" US relations, so far his talking has borne little if any fruit. Iran is just as intransigent, if not more so, than before, North Korea is, obviously, even more defiant, and Russia and China have responded to Obama's overtures with caution rather than warmth. So far, I've seen little evidence that Obama, his cabinet, or his policy aides have a strong coherent sense of policy to match their enthusiasm for talking.

What is China (and Russia) Doing?

I wrote a few days ago about how the UN's response to the North Korean launch of a missile/satellite would be vital in determining how the US deals with the UN and multilateralism more generally in the future. Specifically, I wrote that:

If China, Russia, and the other members of the UN truly wish to see the US restrain itself, follow international law, and respect the UN, the Security Council, and other international institutions, those institutions must demonstrate the ability to deal with security issues such as North Korea, a relatively easy case given the coincidence of interests between the major players (no one, especially not China, wants to see a nuclear DPRK).

Well, China and Russia don't seem to be listening to me. The UN Security Council met yesterday, but came to no agreement about what to do regarding North Korea's nuclear and missile programs. China and Russia both expressed skepticism about the need for increasing sanctions on North Korea and opposed a US-Japanese resolution to punish the DPRK. UN insiders are reporting that Russian and Chinese opposition is so strong that "the United States and Japan might have to accept a non-binding warning statement from the council instead of a legally binding resolution." Meanwhile, China has advanced weak resolution that prompted one US official to comment that "The Chinese have come up with a completely watered down text which is unacceptable to us. It's not even worth discussing."

While I am not in any way surprised at the UN's complete inability to deal with issues of international security, I must admit I do not understand the strategic thinking of Russia and China here. President Obama has expressed his interest in more multilateral solutions as compared to President Bush, and sought to use the UN to deal with North Korea. Furthermore, neither Russia nor China has an interest in seeing North Korea proliferate. China in particular needs to worry about this, especially as North Korean proliferation may in turn drive Japan to develop a nuclear capability, or at the very least increase its ability for power projection.

Given that neither Russia nor China cares all that much about North Korea, given that they could have taken this opportunity as a chance to demonstrate that their preferred multilateral forum -- the UN Security Council -- is the proper place to deal with such issues and does have the capability to do so, given that the potential responses to North Korean proliferation are not in their interest, why would China and Russia be so unwilling to impose increased sanctions on North Korea for its flagrant violation of international law? I must admit I do not understand the strategic thinking here. The outcome of this intransigence is likely to demonstrate to Obama what President Bush knew: the multilateralism is not an end unto itself and that the UN cannot be relied upon to deal with issues that threaten American national security. Combine that with the regional destabilizing that will accompany North Korean proliferation and the potential for Japanese proliferation in turn, and it seems that China and Russia have made a colossal blunder here.

Yet Another Test That the UN Will Fail

While many people have argued that the US should destroy the "satellite" that is about to be launched by North Korea, the Obama administration has backed away from any kind of aggressive position on the impending test. Rather, an anonymous US official at the G-20 summit stated today that the US will respond to any kind of launch by referring the matter to the UN. UN Security Council resolution 1718, passed in the wake of the North Korean nuclear "test" in October 2006, states that the North Korean nuclear program represents a "clear threat to international peace and security" and demands that North Korea not test any ballistic missiles and "suspend all activities related to its ballistic missile programme and in this context re-establish its pre-existing commitments to a moratorium on missile launching." Even if, as North Korea claims, the impending launch is a satellite and not a ballistic missile, the technologies are so similar as to render the distinction meaningless and violate the resolution.

But what will happen if and when the US refers the matter to the UNSC? Most likely, not much. The UN may indeed pass more sanctions (1718 imposed a wide sanction regime, including bans on arms sales and luxury items), but past sanctions have seemed to have little effect on North Korea's behavior. Anything more serious than sanctions is likely to draw a Chinese veto.

The international community, and China in particular, should be very wary about obstructing the work of the UNSC or failing to seriously punish North Korea for it violation. The decision by the Obama administration to act through the offices of the UN rather than taking matters into its own hands represents a complete 180 from the policies of the Bush administration that have been so widely and roundly criticized. But if the UN fails to take meaningful action, why would the US continue to refer issues of national security to an impotent body? China has already proved willing to punish North Korea for such flagrant violations of international law and norms; China did vote for resolution 1718. If China, Russia, and the other members of the UN truly wish to see the US restrain itself, follow international law, and respect the UN, the Security Council, and other international institutions, those institutions must demonstrate the ability to deal with security issues such as North Korea, a relatively easy case given the coincidence of interests between the major players (no one, especially not China, wants to see a nuclear DPRK).

However, short-term political points scoring usually outweighs long-term strategies. The UN will, most likely, fail to respond to the North Korean test in any kind of meaningful way, leaving President Obama with exactly the same problem President Bush faced when considering what to do about Iraq.

Obama, Human Rights, and America's Image

The election of Barack Obama as president of the United States has given hope to all those who believe the administration of George W. Bush has sullied the good name of America. Obama is going to close Guantanamo Bay, end the use of torture, sign the unsigned international treaties, rebuild America's partnerships and alliances, stop climate change, and end the war in Iraq. Just today, Obama promised to "reboot" America's image abroad. No one expresses this belief more clearly than does former President Jimmy Carter in an op-ed in today's Washington Post:

while Americans continue to espouse freedom and democracy, our government's abusive practices have undermined struggles for freedom in many parts of the world. As the gross abuses at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay were revealed, the United States lost its mantle as a champion of human rights, eliminating our national ability to speak credibly on the subject, let alone restrain or gain concessions from oppressors. Tragically, a global backlash against democracy and rights activists, who are now the targets of abuse, has followed.

...

With a new administration and a new vision coming to the White House, we have the opportunity to move boldly to restore the moral authority behind the worldwide human rights movement. But the first steps must be taken at home.

President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to shut down the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay and end torture, which can be accomplished by executive orders to close the prison and by enforcing existing prohibitions against torture by any U.S. representative, including FBI and CIA agents. The detention of people secretly or indefinitely and without due process must cease, and their cases should be transferred to our courts, which have proved their competence in trying those accused of terrorism. Further, a nonpartisan expert commission should be named to conduct a thorough review of U.S. practices related to unwarranted arrest, torture, secret detention, extraordinary rendition, abandonment of habeas corpus and related matters. Acknowledging to the world that the United States also has made mistakes will give credence to our becoming "a more perfect union" -- a message that would resonate worldwide. Together, these actions will help us restore our nation's principles and embolden others abroad who want higher moral standards for their own societies.

By putting its house in order, the United States would reclaim its moral authority and wield not only the political capital but also the credibility needed to engage in frank but respectful bilateral dialogues on the protection of human rights as central to world peace and prosperity.

To a degree, I agree with Carter. Bush most definitely has done damage to the moral reputation of the United States. However, I'm not so sure Obama will be able to do as much to fix that reputation as Carter and his ilk hope.

First, as Carter is well aware, the job of president is vastly different than the job of critic of the president. Being president means assuming responsibility for the security of the nation and the well-being of its citizens; sometimes those responsibilities demand actions that run counter to personal moral sentiments. Carter knows this first hand: He entered the White House on a "human rights first" platform, pledging to end US support of dictators simply because they weren't communist and promising to tie US foreign aid to human rights standards. He quickly learned that such a moral approach to foreign policy risked compromising strategic interests and strengthening the Soviet Union. Very quickly, Carter reversed this policy. Nonetheless, many analysts believe that the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was, to some degree, prompted by Soviet perceptions of American weakness.

Second, rebuilding America's moral reputation may, paradoxically, require sullying it. Carter and many other human rights activists lodge their hopes for global moral improvement with the United Nations. To some degree, this makes sense. The UN is the closest thing the world has to a world parliament in which all the countries of the world can express their collective opinion. The UN has produced some of the broadest statements on human rights, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Genocide Convention.

But that's where things get murky. While the UN may be able to produce broad statements about human rights, it is unable to do much to advance that noble cause. As Joseph Locante points out:

More than half of the 47 members of the Human Rights Council, the principal U.N. body charged with promoting human rights, fail to uphold basic democratic freedoms in their own countries. Using the canards of anti-colonialism and anti-Americanism, they block resolutions that might embarrass them on the world stage. Thus, some of the most egregious offenders of human rights--including China, Cuba, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Zimbabwe--typically evade censure. Last week, for example, the Human Rights Council approved a resolution praising the Kinshasa government of the Democratic Republic of Congo, whose military stands accused of mass rape and murder.

Meanwhile, U.N. preparations for a world conference against racism, a follow-up to a controversial 2001 event in Durban, carry the familiar stigmata of moral cynicism. The U.N. planning committee includes nations such as Libya, Iran, Pakistan, and Cuba. What exactly can Iran--which defends policies that criminalize and brutalize its gay community--teach the world about combating racism? Safely inoculated against self-examination, the U.N. committee has produced a draft declaration suggesting that the United States, Western Europe and other liberal democracies are discriminatory against Islam and fundamentally racist.

The problem is, as I have written about many times here, the UN fundamentally privileges sovereign equality over liberal values. Thus, the UN finds itself forced to place North Korea and Zimbabwe on the UN Commission for Sustainable Development but unable to condemn either country for their brutality towards their citizens.

Law represents an aggregation of individual interest backed by an enforcement power. Without either of these factors, law cannot exist. If it has no ability to be enforced, it is empty; if it does not represent collective interest, it is meaningless. International law often fails on both grounds. But most importantly, because its highest principle is sovereignty, it can't truly represent collective interest. Why should anything the UN be considered legitimate simply because it represents the expressed will of illiberal regimes?

Truly advancing the cause of human rights, then, will require that the US look outside and beyond the framework of the United Nations. Just as NATO chose to intervene in Kosovo without the legal authorization of the UN because it was the right thing to do, advancing the cause of human rights demands action in Sudan, Zimbabwe, and North Korea, just to name the worst. And when the procedural rules of the UN, committed to the preservation of sovereignty as they are, get in the way, those rules must be ignored in order adhere to the true law of liberalism. Such actions will be illegal, and unpopular with many states. But to deny, as Carter and his ilk often do, that such actions are what is required to really promote human rights is disingenous.

The US need not take such actions alone. Here, Carter is correct to point to the need for allies and reputation. What makes Kosovo a legitimate violation of international law was the broad spectrum of states, and the institutional process, that authorized the intervention when the UN would not. President Obama will have to reach out to the US's ideological kin. But he will also have to violate international law. Let us be clear that such violations are necessary, and may in fact harm the US's reputation. But such harms are the price of liberalism. International law must be recognized for what it is and what it is not. It is not the tool to uplift the downtrodden; it is not the tool to bring freedom to the world's oppressed. If and when President Obama takes action to advance human rights and freedom around the world, let us not blame him when those actions break the "law."

The EU's Powerless Power

It has long been accepted that while the EU may be one of the world's most powerful actor, its power was not measurable in traditional metrics, particularly not in hard power. The EU is no great military power, as the difficulties in Kosovo made abundantly evident. Instead the EU's power was economic (taken as a single entity, the EU's economy is around the same size as that of the US) and, more importantly, moral. The EU has been seen as one of the main purveyors of global soft power, stemming from the EU's global commitment to development, human rights, and the spread of international law and order. Traditionally, hard power has been the primary currency of international politics, but the EU has committed itself to a large degree to a new type of international politics. So, how has that new direction worked out for the EU?

Not so well, according to a new report from the European Council on Foreign Relations. The report, entitled "A Global Force for Human Rights: An Audit of European Power at the UN" makes a powerful, but not particularly surprising, conclusion. The report argues that the Europeans are losing their power and leverage at the UN: "this report shows that the EU
has also been the architect of its own misfortune. Europe has lost ground because of a reluctance to use its leverage, and a tendency to look inwards –with 1,000 coordination meetings in New York alone each year – rather than talk to others." The problem is that putting the European solutions into motion requires implementing a new, looser understanding of sovereignty. But:

If Europe can no longer win support at the UN for international action on human rights and justice, overriding national sovereignty in extreme cases, it will have been defeated over one of its deepest convictions about international politics as a whole. This is particularly true in cases involving the Responsibility to Protect against genocide and mass atrocities, when the humanitarian consequences of inaction are most severe.

The crisis facing the EU is apparent in the declining support among the UN’s members for European positions on human rights and the responsible exercise of sovereignty. That has been highlighted by 2008’s vitriolic Security Council debates, which have not only been about immediate crises but the principles of UN action. Russia justified its decision to veto action on Zimbabwe – despite an apparent promise to support it from President Medvedev at the G8 summit – as a defence of the UN Charter’s definition of sovereignty.

...

In the 1990s, the EU enjoyed up to 72% support on human rights issues in the UN General Assembly. In the last two Assembly sessions, the comparable percentages have been 48 and 55%. This decline is overshadowed by a leap in support for Chinese positions in the same votes from under 50% in the later 1990s to 74% in 2007-8. Russia has enjoyed a comparable leap in support. The trend away from the Europeans is markedly worse on the new Human Rights Council (HRC) where EU positions have been defeated in over half the votes.

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The EU has lost much support from African states since the 1990s, despite common policies in some specific cases like Darfur. While African leaders are increasingly sympathetic to some forms of humanitarian intervention, they feel alienated by the European approach to matters like immigration.
...

The EU is faring even worse in the 47-member Human Rights Council (HRC). This was formed in 2006 – with European support against US opposition – to replace the Commission on Human Rights (CHR), which was the object of widespread criticism. But the EU and its human rights allies actually enjoyed a small but workable majority in the CHR, which it has lost in the HRC, primarily due to a reallocation of seats by region that EU diplomats had failed to anticipate.

...

The EU’s frustrations continue on the Security Council. Despite an even division among the current membership between the EU’s friends and foes, the Russian and Chinese vetoes are a permanent impediment to progress on human rights issues....

The EU has thus been forced to water down resolutions on subjects such as peacekeeping in Darfur to get them through; in 2007, a resolution on Kosovo had to be abandoned altogether because of Russian opposition. The 2008 Security Council debates on Burma and Zimbabwe resulted in further high profile failures for the EU – the former was presented by some Europeans as a setback for the Responsibility to Protect, while the latter was celebrated by Russia’s ambassador as a victory for traditional sovereignty.

What is to be done? The report makes several suggestions:

Europe must erect a big tent at the UN, constructing broad, shifting coalitions capable of isolating the hard-line minority of states which resist all attempts to impose limits on national sovereignty. It needs an engagement strategy to win back the support of the African and Latin American countries that it has lost, and win over more moderate members of the Islamic bloc. This coalition-building policy should help put pressure on the Security Council to act in crises.

To this end, the EU needs to mobilise all the political and financial resources it can – as well as examining the sanctions it can impose – to persuade other countries to support an international rule of law based on human rights and justice.

But these recommendations not only have the solution all wrong, they fail to properly identify the problem. The problem isn't the EU's inability to put together a "big tent" coalition; it's the UN's commitment to sovereign equality and the EU's lack of hard power. Go back and look at the one of the first passages quoted above: "If Europe can no longer win support at the UN for international action on human rights and justice, overriding national sovereignty in extreme cases, it will have been defeated over one of its deepest convictions about international politics as a whole." When has the EU ever overridden national sovereignty for internatinal action on human rights and justice? In Rwanda? In Bosnia? In Kosovo? In Darfur? It's not the EU's fault, it's the UN. The UN is simply not the correct forum for advancing such an understanding of the responsibilities of sovereignty in "extreme cases."

In fact, the only time sovereignty has been overridden in such cases was a direct product of American hard power when, in Kosovo, NATO was both politically and militarily strong enough to bypass the UN and take matters into its own hands.

The report recommends the imposition of sanctions to force countries to "support an international rule of law based on human rights and justice." How well have sanctions worked in convincing North Korea, Iran, Syria, Sudan, or Zimbabwe to respect human rights and justice? Sanctions are an inherently flawed instrument that are not only ineffective but that typically harm the wrong audience -- the public rather than the political elites.

The EU has proven itself time and time again -- in the early days of the Kosovo crisis, in the inability of the EU-3 to make any meaningful progress with Iran, in its unwillingness to take even minimal actions in Darfur -- to be a powerless power. It may have oodles of soft power, and a commitment to justice, international law, and human rights. But those things are meaningless and useless without enforcement. Just as domestic law needs the backing of the power of the state to enforce a society's norms and values, so is hard power is necessary if states are to spread an international ideal other than sovereign equality. The failure to recognize this and to seriously consider the relationship between hard and soft power has been of the biggest failures of the US in recent years. Now, the EU is making the same mistake.

Dark Days for Darfur

Things are getting much, more worse for Darfur lately. Last week, a convoy of UN peacekeepers was ambushed by 200 gunmen on horseback and in SUVs. Seven peacekeepers were killed, and 22 wounded in the attack, which reinforces the argument that peacekeeping forces are inappropriate and ill-suited for a conflict which has not been resolved. Peacekeeping forces normally are introduced into conflict situations that have ended by agreement of all warring parties but who do not trust one another to keep the peace. Thus, a neutral third party interposes itself between the sides, guaranteeing that each side will adhere to its commitments. But Darfur is not a settled conflict. The central government in Khartoum is still conducting its raids, the janjaweed continue to raid refugee camps, and the Darfuri rebels are still fighting back, even having attacked peacekeepers in the past.

As if the situation isn't bad enough, it's like to get much worse in the near future. Today, the International Criminal Court announced that its prosecutor has requested an arrest warrant for Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir on three counts of genocide, five of crimes against humanity and two of murder. While it will be months before the ICC to rule on the application, but if the warrant is issued, President al-Bashir will "effectively turn al-Bashir into a prisoner in his own country. In the past, Interpol has issued so-called Red Notices for fugitives wanted by the court, meaning they should be arrested any time they attempt to cross an international border."

But even if the warrant isn't issued, the damage is already done. The UN, which backs the ICC, also maintains the current peacekeeping force in Darfur, and it seems unlikely that Sudan will allow the peacekeepers to remain if their political leaders face indictment and arrest. The removal of the peacekeeping force, as ineffectual as it has been, would likely herald the resumption of a massive cleansing campaign by the Sudanese government in an effort to "solve" the Darfur problem before international intervention occurs again (if it ever does). Furthermore, the BBC reported on Sunday that China was breaking the UN-imposed arms embargo on Sudan, "roviding military equipment and training pilots to fly Chinese jets." While this development is all that surprising, given the diversion of international pressure on China from Darfur to Tibet, it is a troubling one, as it signals, perhaps, the end of Chinese cooperation on Sudan.

Given the precarious nature of the international community's involvement in Darfur, the indictment of al-Bashir by the ICC was definitely ill-timed and most likely ill-advised. I've blogged several times before about the problems inherent in international justice and law, and this is no different. Given that al-Bashir is unlikely to ever stand trial, maintaining the peacekeeping presence was more important than making a point through law.

The international community needs to prepare itself for more attacks on the peacekeepers, if not their expulsion from Sudan. And if (and when) that happens, given China's backsliding, it is all but impossible for the UN to put together a stronger intervention. So, the burden and responsibility will likely fall on the United States and its NATO allies. Sudan must not be allowed to continue its murderous campaign against Darfur, and China must not be allowed to shield Sudan. President Bush and the heads of states and government of the western countries should immediately threaten to boycott the Olympics, not over Tibet (which is a lost cause) but over Chinese violations of the arms embargo and protection of Sudan. China must be leveraged away from Sudan.

However, while China may be willing to support increased sanctions on Sudan, it will not, nor will Russia, support an intervention without the permission of the Sudanese government. Thus, NATO needs to be ready, if it cares at all about saving the Darfuri people, to deploy a force to Sudan immediately. Anything less will likely condemn the people of Darfur to their doom.

A Chance for the UN to Show Its Quality

Things are looking pretty bleak in Zimbabwe. In the wake of the March elections in which opposition parties won more votes than the ruling ZANU-PF party, President Robert Mugabe has sunk to new, depraved lows in his efforts to hold on to power. Opposition parties have been arrested and charged with treason, rallies have been attacked, supporters have been killed, and there are accusations that the ZANU-PF has set up "torture camps" to systematically terrorize any who dare oppose it. This week, just days before the run-off election forced on the country by Mugabe, opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai has taken refuge in the Dutch Embassy and, on Sunday, withdrew from the race, claiming he would not subject his supporters to violence and even death when their votes would not matter. The UN has disparaged the election, which ZANU-PF has announced will take place this Friday regardless of Tsvangirai's withdrawal, international accusations of electoral fraud and intimidation, and the mounting violence, saying that they will lack legitimacy.

However, though, ultimately, it doesn't look like there's much hope. As the Washington Post editorialized yesterday, "Only concerted and aggressive intervention by the United Nations and Zimbabwe's neighbors can now prevent this crime, brazenly carried out in front of the world, from going forward" and that doesn't seem likely to happen. As the Post notes: "While the United States and Britain have repeatedly condemned Mr. Mugabe's terror and have tried to inspire action by the UN Security Council or the Southern African Development Community, they have been blocked by Mr. Mugabe's allies -- foremost among them Thabo Mbeki , South Africa's lame-duck president."

This blog has already called for the US and the Europeans to sanction South Africa if it refuses to play a responsible role in forcing Mugabe to accept the results of a free election. But that doesn't seem likely to happen either. The situation calls for stronger measures.

I hereby call upon the UN to expel, or suspend, Zimbabwe from the General Assembly and the community of nations. A state whose leader openly says that he would go to war before accepting defeat at the polls cannot be considered a legitimate state. Zimbabwe's legal international sovereignty should be immediately suspended, and Zimbabwe's membership in every international organization should end. Until Mugabe and the ZANU-PF end the campaign of organized electoral intimidation and publicly pledge to accept the results of the election, until the election can be monitored by independent third-party observers, and until the people of Zimbabwe are given the opportunity to have their voices counted, Zimbabwe does not deserve to be a member of the community of nations.

There is little chance that the UN will take such a principled stance, wedded as it is to sovereign equality. But this is a real opportunity for the UN to move beyond its stultifying addiction to treating every state equally. Until the UN is ready to make judgments about countries, to criticize them for openly subverting the will of their peoples, there is no hope for the people of Zimbabwe, let alone those in Darfur or anywhere else people are tormented by their authoritarian rulers.

Can't the UN Do ANYTHING Right?

I've spent a fair amount of time on this blog bashing the United Nations. From its insistence on championing sovereign equality to making Zimbabwe the chair of the Sustainable Development Commission to the absurdity that is the Human Rights Council, the UN provides no end of opportunities to ridicule it. But, I am willing to give credit when its due. In my classes, if not on this blog, I often discuss how one thing that the UN is good at is peacekeeping. The UN is really good at peacekeeping, in fact, and may be the only actor really capable of doing it. Peacekeeping, as opposed to peace building, peace making, or peace enforcement, happens when two warring parties are ready to end the conflict between them, but do not have sufficient mutual trust to lay down their arms. A neutral third party is needed to, almost literally, stand in between the warring parties, to ensure that the terms of the settlement are followed and to reassure each side that the other is adhering to the rules. The UN, as a non-state actor with a reputation for neutrality and impartiality, is very good at doing this, and is capable of drawing peacekeeping forces from smaller, non-aligned states. From the Sinai to the Golan, from Cambodia to Cyprus, UN peacekeepers can take pride in the fact that their efforts have helped end numerous conflicts around the world.

Which is what makes this piece in today's New York Times so distressing. Written by Matthias Basanisi, a former deputy chief investigator with the United Nations Office of Internal Oversight Services in Congo, the piece asserts that there is credible evidence of "gold smuggling and arms trafficking by [UN] peacekeepers in Congo." Basanisi was previously in charge of the investigation into these allegations, but claims that:

the investigation was taken away from my team after we resisted what we saw as attempts to influence the outcome. My fellow team members and I were appalled to see that the oversight office’s final report was little short of a whitewash.

The reports we submitted to the office’s senior management in 2006 included credible information from witnesses confirming illegal deals between Pakistani peacekeepers and warlords from the Front for National Integration, an ethnic militia group notorious for its cruelty even in such a brutal war. We found corroborative information that senior officers of the Pakistani contingent secretly returned seized weapons to two warlords in exchange for gold, and that the Pakistani peacekeepers tipped off two warlords about plans by the United Nations peacekeeping force and the Congolese Army to arrest them. And yet, much of the evidence we uncovered was excluded from the final report released last summer, including corroboration from the warlords themselves.

Basanisi claims that the impetus for the cover-up is an unwillingness to offend Pakistan and India, two countries that provide large numbers of troops for UN peacekeeping missions.

Beyond the criminality and sheer audacity of these actions (not to mention reports of rape, pedophilia, and prostitution), it is absolutely imperative that the UN not only address these allegations, but move swiftly to punish those responsibility. The success of the UN in peacekeeping rests on its reputation; only if peacekeepers are seen to be unbiased, neutral, and fair can their missions succeed. If actors worry that UN peacekeepers will give preferential treatment to whichever side can pay more and that the UN itself will do nothing in response, it will become less and less likely that warring parties will be willing to end their conflict and allow peacekeepers to deploy. This scandal is about much more than criminal actions; it threatens to undermine one of the vital tools for ending conflict that the international community has at its disposal.

Good Thing the UN Has Its Priorities Straight

UN Watch is reporting that while the UN Human Rights Council has responded positively to Cuba's request to investigate rising food prices, the Council isn't interested in looking into the refusal by the ruling junta of Myanmar to allow relief to the millions of people suffering in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis. When asked why the Council was h0lding a special session on food prices (an important, but long-term issue) but not on the situation in Myanmar, Rupert Colville of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights responded that "the Council had a very full programme, including the Universal Periodic Review, so it was a pretty packed schedule at the moment and it would be difficult to fit it in."

Seriously.

This would be shocking, if it wasn't so unsurprising. Bashing the UN is like shooting fish in a barrel. A country's government blocks and steals humanitarian relief aid, and the international body tasked with investigating human rights abuses can't be bothered to find time to even look in to it? The Human Rights Council should be abolished and not replaced unless the UN can get beyond its slavish devotion to sovereign equality and create an institution that works.

To Send Aid Or Not To Send Aid, That Is The Question

In the wake of the destruction left by Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar (Burma) -- the government is announcing 23, 335 deaths and 37, 019 people missing, while international humanitarian organizations are putting the death toll at more than 100,000 and more than 1 million displaced people -- the international community is faced with a difficult decision of how best to aid the suffering people. Initially, the ruling junta obstructed relief efforts, stopping aid shipments at the airport, seizing UN food packages, and holding off US naval ships coming to help. On Friday, the junta reversed course, announcing that it would "accept aid from any corner"and allowing emergency UN food shipments to enter the country, delivering food and temporary shelters (although a shipment from the World Food Programme that arrived on Friday was seized). On Saturday, the Myanmar government began handing out food packages emblazoned with the names of the junta members and taking credit for the relief. Despite the devastation wreaked by the cyclone, the junta was intending on proceeding with a previously-scheduled "referendum" on a constitution that would further entrench the power of the junta, and the provision of aid seems to be a propaganda exercise designed to cement support for the vote.

Meanwhile, as the government controls and exploits relief supplies for its own ends, relief experts are warning of impending catastrophe if help is not provided soon:

A total of 23 international agencies were providing aid to people in the devastated areas, said Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Byrs said another U.N. flight with 33 tons of plastic sheets, water and sanitation items and mosquito nets got clearance to take off from Brindisi, Italy later on Saturday.

But a large number of organizations still were awaiting government clearance for more aid shipments, staff and transport.

"It's a race against the clock," Byrs said. "If the humanitarian aid does not get into the country on a larger scale, there's the risk of a second catastrophe," she said, adding that people could die from hunger and diseases.

Health experts have warned there was a great risk of diarrhea and cholera spreading because of the lack of clean drinking water and sanitation.

Also:

"We think we need to be moving 375 tonnes of food a day down into the affected areas. We are doing less than 20 percent of that," World Food Program spokesman Marcus Prior said in the Thai capital.

At the United Nations in New York, Ban delivered his most critical comments so far of the Myanmar authorities' response.

"Today is the 11th day since ... Nargis hit Myanmar," Ban told reporters. "I want to register my deep concern -- and immense frustration -- at the unacceptably slow response to this grave humanitarian crisis.

"We are at a critical point," he said. "Unless more aid gets into the country very quickly, we face an outbreak of infectious diseases that could dwarf today's crisis."

Myanmar's reclusive military government was accepting aid from the outside world, including the United Nations, but refused to admit foreign experts waiting in Bangkok for visas from the Myanmar Embassy.

Whenever humanitarian emergencies occur in the most repressive countries of the world, as is the case here or during famines in North Korea, the international community is faced with an exceedingly difficult political and moral choice: Provide aid, knowing that much of it will be diverted for use by the government and hoping that some of it will trickle down to the people, or refuse to help, believing that helping the government remain in power is the worst option. Usually, the international community chooses to help.

In this case, the decision is complicated by the blatant manipulation of the aid in connection with the constitutional referendum. If the reports are accurate, the relief effort will end up further entrenching the junta in power, now with the cloak of democratic approval. That does not bode well for the future of the Burmese people.

So what else should be done? Assuming that doing nothing is off of the table, there are really only two options: Provide relief without going through the government through airdrops or invade the country to force the government to allow access to relief experts and the depoliticized distribution of food, medicine, and shelter. None of these is really an attractive option.

Many people have begun discussing the possibility of providing aid without going through the junta. Mark Faramaner, the director of Burma Campaign UK, argued that the UN should begin providing aid throughout the country without permission from the military leaders, but Douglas Alexander, the British Secretary for International Development, argues that doing so would be "incendiary":

"Our responsibility is to make sure that our sole focus is getting the aid to the people who desperately need it."

He said carrying out forced air-drops of supplies would be the wrong action to take.

"We believe that the best way forward would be for the junta to provide access, which the whole international community - including Ban Ki-moon [secretary general of the UN] - is requesting.

"That's why we've been making direct approaches, but we've also been speaking to other governments, including the government of China, urging them that there should be a united front to say that the access needs to be provided immediately."

Even those in favor of airdropping relief supplies acknowledge that doing so may not provide relief in anything approaching an efficient manner:

Former Liberal Democratic leader Sir Menzies Campbell said air drops were a "possibility" because of the scale of the disaster, but were not the most efficient way of distributing supplies.

"I don't think we have any legal right to impose it - we might have a moral obligation.

"But I don't believe we could give effect to that moral obligation for this reason - Burma is essentially a state run by the generals with an extremely powerful army.

"Any effort to impose humanitarian aid might well be the subject of resistance which would have the effect of damaging yet more of the people of that blighted country."

Former Conservative deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine said air drops should only be considered if they could be guaranteed to be effective.

"Who is going to be at the receiving end of the air drops? It could be the Burmese army. It could be the very people least affected by the tragedy that is going on."

Meanwhile, arguments for invading Myanmar have been raised as well. Writing in the Asia Times, Shawn Crispin argues that:

A unilateral - and potentially United Nations-approved - US military intervention in the name of humanitarianism could easily turn the tide against the impoverished country's unpopular military leaders, and simultaneously rehabilitate the legacy of lame-duck US President George W Bush's controversial pre-emptive military policies.

...

In the wake of the cyclone, the criminality of the junta's callous policies has taken on new human proportions in full view of the global community. Without a perceived strong UN-led response to the natural disaster, hard new questions will fast arise about the UN's own relevance and ability to manage global calamities.

This week, French Foreign Minister Bernard Koucher suggested that the UN invoke its so-called "responsibility to protect" civilians as legitimate grounds to force aid delivery, regardless of the military government's objections. On Friday, a UN spokesman called the junta's refusal to issue visas to aid workers "unprecedented" in the history of humanitarian work.

Because of the UN's own limited powers of projection, such a response would require US military management and assets. US officials appear to be building at least a rhetorical case for a humanitarian intervention. While offering relief and aid with one hand, top US officials have with the other publicly slapped at the Myanmar government's lame response to the disaster.

...

This time, it is almost sure-fire that Myanmar's desperate population would warmly welcome a US-led humanitarian intervention, considering that its own government is now withholding emergency supplies. Like his father then, Bush is now clearly focused on his presidential legacy, which to date will be judged harshly due to his government's controversial pre-emptive military policies, waged until now exclusively in the name of fighting global terror.

In an era when the US routinely launches pre-emptive military strikes, including its 2003 invasion of Iraq, the 2003 Predator drone assassination attack against an alleged al-Qaeda leader in Yemen, a similar drone attack in 2006 in northwestern Pakistan, and last week's attack against a reputed al-Qaeda ringleader in Somalia, it is not inconceivable that the US might yet intervene in military-run Myanmar, particularly if in the days ahead the social and political situation tilts towards anomie.

Whether or not a US military intervention in the name of humanitarianism would, as in Somalia, eventually morph into an armed attempt at regime change and nation-building would likely depend on the population's and Myanmar military's response to the first landing of US troops. Some political analysts speculate that Myanmar's woefully under-resourced and widely unpopular troops would defect en masse rather than confront US troops.

While Myanmar ally China would likely oppose a US military intervention, Beijing has so far notably goaded the junta to work with rather than against international organizations like the UN, and more to the point, it lacks the power projection capabilities to militarily challenge the US in a foreign theater. Most notably, the US would have at its disposal a globally respected and once democratically elected leader in Aung San Suu Kyi to lead a transitional government to full democracy.

But, in Time magazine, Romesh Ratnesar writes that:

A coercive humanitarian intervention would be complicated and costly. During the 2004 tsunami, some 24 U.S. ships and 16,000 troops were deployed in countries across the region; the mission cost the U.S. $5 million a day. Ultimately, the U.S. pledged nearly $900 million to tsunami relief. (By contrast, it has offered just $3.25 million to Burma.) But the risks would be greater this time: the Burmese government's xenophobia and insecurity make them prone to view U.S. troops — or worse, foreign relief workers — as hostile forces. (Remember Black Hawk Down?) Even if the U.S. and its allies made clear that their actions were strictly for humanitarian purposes, it's unlikely the junta would believe them. "You have to think it through — do you want to secure an area of the country by military force? What kinds of potential security risks would that create?" says [Jan Egeland, the former U.N. emergency relief coordinator]. "I can't imagine any humanitarian organization wanting to shoot their way in with food."

So, what to do? Despite the rafts of criticism I have leveled at the institution, this is a case where the UN can potentially be a critical asset. The problem here is, of course, one of sovereignty. Myanmar is a sovereign state that has the right to determine how it receives international aid. But the UN should invoke its "responsibility to protect" doctrine (the logic that enabled the UN to retroactively approve of NATO's intervention in Kosovo) and declare that sovereignty does not confer the right to deny one's people of basic supplies and relief. The UN should, as it did in 1990, put together a global coalition of humanitarian and military forces to deliver relief supplies to Myanmar. Most of the coercive force would, of course, come from the US, but the international community could, as it did during Operation Desert Shield/Storm, bear much of the financial burden (and provide much of the relief as well). While obtaining China's assent may be difficult (China is both a patron to Myanmar and exceedingly wary of authorizing international violations of state sovereignty), the recent negative publicity of the problems in Tibet may lead Beijing to seize this as an opportunity to burnish China's image leading up to the Olympics.

The US needs to look at the disaster in Myanmar through a strategic, as well as a moral, lens. Just as US relief in the 2004 Southeast Asian tsunami was a major boost to US soft power, taking an aggressive approach to helping the victims of Cyclone Nargis can have a similar effect. The US must realize that doing the right thing here is clearly in the US national interest as well. The US should pressure China and the UN Security Council to authorize a humanitarian mission with or without official sanction. Such a move could save tens or hundreds of thousands of lives, help the US image, and even force the UN to reconsider its slavish devotion to the concept of sovereign equality. All of these are excellent goals for US foreign policy.

The Legal Status of Kosovo's Independence

My former professor at Georgetown University, Anthony Arend, has posted an excellent analysis of the legal status of Kosovo's recent declaration of independence. Here are some of the highlights:

I The Legal Framework

When discussing the question of secession, two basic legal principles are in tension: the right of states to maintain their territorial integrity and the right of peoples to self-determination. First, one of the cornerstones of the international legal order is the right of states to their territorial integrity, a right implied through out the United Nations Charter. Article 2 (4), for example, prohibits the threat or use of force against the "territorial integrity or political independence" of states. Second, another right-- explicitly recognized in the Charter-- is the right of self-determination of peoples. Under Article 1 (2) of the Charter, one of the purposes of the United Nations is "to develop friendly relations among nations [read, states] based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples . . . ." (emphasis added).

...

When does a people have the right to pursue self-determination through secession?

This is the thorny question. The Charter doesn't address the question, so we have to look to subsequent practice. In 1970, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Declaration on Principles of Friendly Relations. This non-binding resolution had the following to say about the right to self-determination:

Every State has the duty to promote, through joint and separate action, realization of the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, in accordance with the provisions of the Charter, and to render assistance to the United Nations in carrying out the responsibilities entrusted to it by the Charter regarding the implementation of the principle, in order:

(a) To promote friendly relations and co-operation among States; and

(b) To bring a speedy end to colonialism, having due regard to the freely expressed will of the peoples concerned;

and bearing in mind that subjection of peoples to alien subjugation, domination and exploitation constitutes a violation of the principle, as well as a denial of fundamental human rights, and is contrary to the Charter.

Every State has the duty to promote through joint and separate action universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms in accordance with the Charter.

The establishment of a sovereign and independent State, the free association or integration with an independent State or the emergence into any other political status freely determined by a people constitute modes of implementing the right of self-determination by that people.

Every State has the duty to refrain from any forcible action which deprives peoples referred to above in the elaboration of the present principle of their right to self-determination and freedom and independence. In their actions against, and resistance to, such forcible action in pursuit of the exercise of their right to self-determination, such peoples are entitled to seek and to receive support in accordance with the purposes and principles of the Charter.

The territory of a colony or other Non-Self-Governing Territory has, under the Charter, a status separate and distinct from the territory of the State administering it; and such separate and distinct status under the Charter shall exist until the people of the colony or Non-Self-Governing Territory have exercised their right of self-determination in accordance with the Charter, and particularly its purposes and principles.

Nothing in the foregoing paragraphs shall be construed as authorizing or encouraging any action which would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity or political unity of sovereign and independent States conducting themselves in compliance with the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples as described above and thus possessed of a government representing the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction as to race, creed or colour.

Every State shall refrain from any action aimed at the partial or total disruption of the national unity and territorial integrity of any other State or country. (emphasis added)

In practice, this resolution (read together with others) meant that colonies had the right to pursue independence immediately. And this proposition seemed to be widely accepted by the international community. It also seems to mean that groups under direct foreign domination or subjugation-- like the people of Kuwait after the Iraqi invasion in 1990-- would have the right to pursue independence. But what about non-colonies or not subjected people-- like the component parts of Yugoslavia?

The Secession of Quebec took up this question. After declaring that the right to secede existed with respect to colonies and peoples there were under alien subjugation, the court noted:

A number of commentators have further asserted that the right to self-determination may ground a right to unilateral secession in a third circumstance. Although this third circumstance has been described in several ways, the underlying proposition is that, when a people is blocked from the meaningful exercise of its right to self-determination internally, it is entitled, as a last resort, to exercise it by secession. The Vienna Declaration requirement that governments represent "the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction of any kind" adds credence to the assertion that such a complete blockage may potentially give rise to a right of secession.

Clearly, such a circumstance parallels the other two recognized situations in that the ability of a people to exercise its right to self-determination internally is somehow being totally frustrated.

But, once again, the court did not have to determine if there is such a right to secession:

While it remains unclear whether this third proposition actually reflects an established international law standard, it is unnecessary for present purposes to make that determination. Even assuming that the third circumstance is sufficient to create a right to unilateral secession under international law, the current Quebec context cannot be said to approach such a threshold.

The court explained that the people of Quebec were able to fully participate in the political, economic, and cultural life of Canada and could not possibly be thought to have been denied their right to self-determination internally. So, even if the law allowed for secession in this third case, the people of Quebec could not exercise that right because they were in no way being blocked from internal self-determination-- the required condition for possible secession.

So what the court leaves us with is the conclusion that secession might be lawful in "category three" cases.

II Applying the Law to Kosovo

Are the persons living in Kosovo a "people"?

As noted earlier, there is no precise defintion of people under international law. Instead, it seems to mean a group that preceives itself to be a people based on certain common characteristics. This defintion would seem to cover the Kosovars. An overwhelmingly ethnic Albanian, Muslim group, they seem to me to perceive themselves to have a common bond.

But do they have the right to secede?

As seen above, the law is a bit murky. There is no straight-forward rule that would indicate that secession is permissible in cases like Kosovo. Preserving the territorial integrity of states remains an extremely important legal principle. But even if we accept that secession is permissible in certain "category three" cases, it would have to be demonstrated that the Kosovars were being denied the right to internal self-determination within the Serbian regime. Is this the case?

This is an interesting question. It seems clear that before NATO and the UN became active in Kosovo in 1999, the people there were facing the potential of ethnic cleansing and were being denied their rights to be full citizens of the Yugoslav state. Since that time, Kosovo has been under the protection of the international community, as determined pursuant to UN Security Council Resolution 1244 and subsequent resolutions. Under this arrangement, Kosovo was to enjoy "substantial autonomy and meaningful self-administration." At the same time, Resolution 1244 reaffirmed "the commitment of all Member States to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the other States of the region." What this suggests to me is that the way in which the UN envisoned Kosovo exercising its right of internal self-determination was as a substantially autonomous region that remained part of the state of Serbia. So can Kosovo now lawfully secede?


III Conclusions

1. In the absence of UN authority in Kosovo, a strong case for secession could be made.

If the UN had not become engaged in the Kosovo conflict, it would seem to me that a strong argument could be made that the people of Kosovo were being denied their right of internal self-determination and thus would have the right to secession. But note: even here the law is unclear as to whether a people in "category three" would ever have a right of secession.

2. Because the UN Security Council has been seized of the matter, a strong case against secession can be made.

Given that the UN Security Council has affirmed the territorial integrity of Serbia and continued to work for an autonomous, but not independent, Kosovo, a very strong argument can be made that in the absence of any further Security Council action, Kosovo secession would be illegal. Why? First, the Security Council has the authority to issue binding resolutions in this area. And even though Resolution 1244 does not explicitly prohibit secession or prohibit states from recognizing secession (like Security Council Resolutions 216 and 217 in the case of Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence in 1965), it nonetheless seems to set forth the framework for self-determination that does not include independence. Second, it seems that all the parties in the case were attempting to create an autonomous arrangement-- not complete integration in to the Serbian political structure-- so the logic of the Quebec case's understanding of internal self-determination would not quite seem on point. In the Kosovo case, internal self-determination would be achieved through autonomy within Serbia, not full participation in the overall political, economic, and cultural life of the Serbian state, as was the case of Quebec.

Good stuff.

Who's The Problem In Darfur?

Yesterday, hundreds of Darfur rebels poured out of the desert and assaulted a camp of peacekeeping troops from the African Union. When the attack was over, 10 peacekeepers were dead, dozens more were missing, possibly kidnapped, and lots of supplies, including heavy weapons, had been stolen. According to the New York Times:

Relief officials said that as those groups splintered, their new factions needed matériel, and that the attack on the peacekeepers might have been intended to seize quality weapons. “It’s indicative of the complete insecurity,” said Alun McDonald, a spokesman for the Oxfam aid organization in Sudan. “These groups are attacking anybody and everybody with total impunity.”

He added that armed groups were “increasingly targeting aid workers to steal their vehicles, radios and logistical stuff.” He said the attack on the peacekeepers “sounds quite similar to that, just on a much larger scale.”

Mr. McDonald's explanation is, however, unsatisfactory. Attacking the peacekeepers is very likely to result in the withdrawal of the AU force, and perhaps even a delay or cancellation of the UN-AU hybrid force that has been authorized to replace the existing AU force. Already Senegal, one of the largest contributors to the AU force, has announced that it is considering withdrawing its troops from the force. So, unless the rebels wanted the peacekeepers out of Darfur, attacking them doesn't make sense.

But it's altogether likely that the rebels do, in fact, want the peacekeepers out. The rebels are those Darfuri who have decided to take up arms against the Sudanese government in hopes of achieving greater political autonomy and protection, if not independence, for Darfur. The presence of peacekeepers, while perhaps sufficing to minimize or prevent the attacks against civilians that has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced millions more, will not serve to advance the larger political goal. If anything, the peacekeepers will serve to entrench the status quo by freezing the battlelines and political demands in place. They certainly will make it more difficult for the rebels to attain their larger political goals.

Of course, if the UN was capable of disregarding concerns for sovereign equality and actually taking sides in ethnic conflicts like this, the rebels might have a little more faith that their concerns would be addressed by the international community. But history has likely given them little confidence that the presence of UN peacekeepers will do anything but perpetuate the existing situation, and might, in a worst case, prevent the Darfuri from defending themselves against Sudanese predation.

This attack will likely go a long way to convincing states that sending soldiers to Darfur is not realyl in their national interest. And while that might benefit the rebels, it will do little to ease the suffering of the average Darfuri. Whatever forces end up on the ground in Darfur must be capable of defending themselves against government or rebel forces, and must not be unwilling to use force to enforce the peace.

Dallaire On Darfur

Romeo Dallaire, now a senator in the Canadian parliament, was the commander of the UN peacekeeping force on the ground at the onset of the Rwandan genocide. He has been haunted by his inability to do anything about the slaughter, and has written extensively about his failure, the failure of the UN, and of the international community.

Yesterday, Dallaire published an open letter to General Martin Agwai, the commander-designate of the UN force that will, someday, be deployed into Darfur. The letter is worth reading in its entirety:

An open letter from the former force commander of the ill-fated Unamir mission to Rwanda, to General Martin Agwai, the newly appointed force commander designate for the UN mission in Darfur.

Dear General Agwai

Congratulations on your recent appointment as Joint United Nations/African Union force commander for the hybrid UN/AU Mission in Darfur, formalised by resolution 1769 as Unamid. After over four years of massive killing and displacement in Darfur, a conflict that has not only destabilised Sudan but the entire Eastern Sahel region, Unamid under the leadership of Mr Adada, joint special representative for Darfur, and the force under your command will have the historic opportunity to end slaughter, bring peace, [and] allow humanitarian aid. In the longer term, Unamid has the potential to facilitate the return of Darfur's people to their homes, enhance Sudan's sovereignty and territorial integrity and stabilise the region.

This is a daunting mandate, and you enter into this mission facing long odds. The intentions of the regime in Khartoum toward an effective, impartial implementation of the Unamid mandate are deeply uncertain. The Sudanese government has blocked and whittled international efforts, through the AU and UN, to end the killing and facilitate a durable peace through fair and transparent internal negotiations. Even since the enactment of Resolution 1769, we have seen ample indications that the Sudanese government will at every turn seek to impose a minimalist reading of the Unamid mandate. The government has already signalled that it will try to restrict the non-African role in the mission as much as it can and prolong the internal divisions and growing chaos which undermine efforts to end the fighting and provide humanitarian aid to all in need.

The challenges you will face in dealing with the rebel movements will also be substantial. In the absence of a viable political settlement process, and exacerbated by the Abuja settlement which many saw as imposed and unbalanced, the groups have fragmented and many elements have degenerated into criminal activity and focus on fighting each other. The same holds true of many "Arab" elements, some of which previously fought alongside government troops. The recent efforts of special envoys Salim and Eliasson have given some hope that this deterioration can be reversed with support from rebel movement leaders and field commanders themselves. But as you know, not all leaders are cooperating and conflict has certainly not diminished on the ground since the recent Arusha meeting. The threat to sustaining humanitarian operations as well as to nurturing the AU/UN-sponsored political talks is obvious and severe.

Finally, assembling, sustaining and directing such a large force in this most remote and inhospitable area will tax you, as it will test the will and capacity of both sponsoring organisations. The Unamid hybrid is conceptually novel, with many practical and legal issues that will impact your work yet to be discovered, let alone resolved. Funding, command and control, reporting and provisioning are all areas where both the location and force size will be taxing, and where the novel character of Unamid will add a difficult layer of challenge for you and the SRSG.

In wishing you well, as a fellow force commander, in your important mission, I would like to take the opportunity to offer a few broad thoughts that I hope may assist you in your preparation and implementation of the mission in the field.

First: I urge you to insist both to New York and to Addis Ababa that they clarify, in the most practical terms and as fast as possible, the chain of command and reporting for the mission. Resolution 1769 is vague on command and control. It did not precisely resolve the well-known disagreement between Khartoum, which insists on essentially AU command, and many other member states, that demand UN command and control as the only guarantor of effectiveness.

For my part, I would press hard for New York to be the headquarters you look to for ongoing guidance and authority to implement the mandate. In practical terms, DPKO has the mechanisms to give you guidance and respond to your urgent requirements at any time, whereas the AU headquarters does not, and DPKO also has long and hard-won experience in supporting missions in the field. At the same time, you will want to ensure that Unamid and DPKO itself integrate the AU secretariat into that process, so that its views and interests are dynamically engaged in your support. Above all, you and SRSG Adada will need to demand from both the UN and AU that they reject undue Sudanese government interference in the implementation of Resolution 1769 regarding command and control, and indeed in your operations.

Second: To succeed in the task given you, it is evident that you must exercise, and insist on, the broadest reading of the mandate given in resolution 1769 (especially operative paragraph 15) concerning your chapter VII authority. We are already seeing efforts by the Sudanese government and its friends to argue that the chapter VII authority extends only to force protection situations and support for the execution of the Darfur peace agreement. But the plain text of the resolution and the intent of the security council clearly are that Unamid should play an active role not only in maintaining peace, but also in protecting the vulnerable civilian population.

The security council's intent flows from those aspects of the Darfur conflict which have set it apart as an international concern of special priority - notably, the massive, purposeful death and displacement at the hands of government forces and their janjaweed militia creation. Those attacks burdened the African Union Mission (Amis) and cast in stark relief its lack of mandate and practical inability to intervene against even the most egregious and predictable attacks on civilians. The Sudanese government has indicated that it does not want Unamid to exercise its chapter VII authority to protect civilians. That cannot be accepted. It would render Unamid a nullity regarding the most fundamental reason for its creation.

Third: All are agreed that Unamid will benefit from having "a predominantly African character," but you must insist that member states with sophisticated capacities provide quickly, and with no political obstruction from Khartoum, what you need to make your force mobile and capable of extending its reach throughout Darfur. So far, a number of African countries have made significant and encouraging commitments. It is beyond dispute, however, that African states themselves simply cannot provide nearly 20,000 qualified troops (nor enough police). Unamid needs attack helicopters, engineers, big cargo lorries, communications and other capabilities that African states also cannot provide.

So far, the UN member states that can provide such capabilities have been slow to do so. I therefore encourage you to reject assertions that the AU has already committed, or could provide, all the needed military forces. Equally, you should bring great pressure, working with the senior UN and AU leadership, to pressure more resource-rich member states to provide the specialised capacities you need. And if Khartoum seeks to discourage meaningful non-African contributions, I urge you to take active exception in the interest of succeeding in your difficult task.

Fourth: Press for progressive deployment of the force, as elements are recruited and prepared. Resolution 1769 sets ambitious target dates for establishing Unamid's operations headquarters, for taking command of the support packages and support for Amis, and for assumption of command authority from Amis. Ranged against those targets are the real challenges of rapid mobilisation and deployment of national troop contributions to Unamid.

The thrust of the resolution is correct in practical as well as policy terms, but the period from now until full Unamid deployment will be a testing one and in many ways the determining period for the mission's success or failure. Previous Amis commanders have made clear their assessment that getting more troops on the ground will shift the balance of authority toward the peacekeepers and away from the spoilers. With a progressive deployment, Unamid can foster a gradual shift in the balance of power in Darfur, which will enhance the longer-term prospects for its effectiveness. In this regard, you will want to maintain pressure on both the UN and AU headquarters to build your needed camp and other logistical facilities as fast as possible, and to monitor Sudanese government interaction with Unamid and the camp construction contractors to ensure that any delaying manoeuvres are quickly identified, reported to New York and Addis Ababa and made a priority for diplomatic intervention.

Fifth: Be vigorous and frank, both in your official reporting to New York and Addis Ababa, and in your public commentary, concerning your achievements and the challenges and obstacles you encounter. It is important that your official reporting, in describing progress on mandate implementation, should highlight obstacles you face that require action by the two headquarters, or by member states. You can anticipate being let down by everyone on whom you depend for support, be that troops, funding, logistics or political engagement. Only by shining a spotlight on those failures in every possible way can you mobilise the attention necessary to get the action you need. Bear in mind that whoever fails you will, in the end, be the most active in blaming you for whatever goes wrong.

Permit me to conclude, general, by wishing you every success in this most challenging and important assignment.

Sincerely,

Senator/Lt General Roméo Dallaire

An excellent letter. Unfortunately, if I was a betting man, I would wager that Dallaire's advice will not be followed, and that the situation in Darfur is far from improving.

The Source of Legitimacy in International Politics

As President Bush has learned as a result of the invasion of Iraq, legitimacy is exceedingly important in international politics. Soft power and interdependence have become such prominent features of the international landscape that acting in opposition to global norms and mores can be very costly.

However, while legitimacy may be important, its sources aren't clear. Most people look to the UN -- the closest thing that exists to a global parliament or legislative body -- for that legitimacy. But ultimately doing so makes no sense. Legitimacy must stem from a collective of shared values; that is, the actors from whom legitimacy is sought must agree on the basic values and rules to be followed that define the legitimacy. But the UN does not represent the kind of values that should define American (or global) legitimacy. The UN stands for sovereignty, nothing more. Every state is treated equally no matter how reprehensible the state, no matter how many of the UN's own rules it violates. Thus, we get states like Zimbabwe, North Korea, and Sudan not just participating, but leading committees and being treated as normal. However, despite this seeming democratic nature, the UN is fundamentally non-democratic, as the UN's institutional structure allows one of five states (the permanent members of the Security Council) to veto any action and block the will of the rest of the international community.

Seeking legitimacy from this institution makes no sense. Why is it acceptable to allow Russia or China to veto international action in Kosovo or Darfur? Why should the US seek approval from an organization that allows Sudan to serve, and chair, on the Human Rights Committee? That allows Zimbabwe to chair the Sustainable Development panel? That repeatedly condemns Israel but makes no mention of the genocides in Darfur, the brutalization in Zimbabwe, or the misery of North Korea? And the UN is, obviously, subjected to the politics of national self-interest which undermines its ability to define legitimacy. As Ivo Daalder and Robert Kagan note in their Washington Post op-ed from Monday:

the U.N. Security Council, no longer suffices [as a source of legitimacy], if it ever did. Under the United Nations Charter, states are prohibited from using force except in cases of self-defense or when explicitly authorized by the Security Council. But this presupposes that the members of the Security Council can agree on the threat and the appropriate response. From Rwanda to Kosovo to Darfur, however, and from Iraq to North Korea to Iran, the Security Council has not been able to agree and has failed to act decisively. Its permanent members are deeply divided by conflicting interests as well as by clashing beliefs about the nature of sovereignty and the right of the international community to intervene in the internal affairs of nations.

If the UN can't provide legitimacy, where should states look? According to Daalder and Kagan, "the answer is the world's democracies, the United States and its democratic partners in Europe and Asia." They continue:

As the war in Kosovo showed, democracies can agree and act effectively even when major non-democracies, such as Russia and China, do not. Because they share a common view of what constitutes a just order within states, they tend to agree on when the international community has an obligation to intervene. Shared principles provide the foundation for legitimacy.

A policy of seeking consensus among the world's great democratic nations can form the basis for a new domestic consensus on the use of force. It would not exclude efforts to win Security Council authorization. Nor would it preclude using force even when some of our democratic friends disagree. But the United States will be on stronger ground to launch and sustain interventions when it makes every effort to seek and win the approval of the democratic world.

Eventually, perhaps, these matters could be addressed and decided in a more formal arrangement, a Concert of Democracies, where the world's democracies could meet and cooperate in dealing with the many global challenges they confront. Until such a formal mechanism has been created, however, future presidents need to recognize that legitimacy matters, and that the most meaningful and potent form of legitimacy for a democracy such as the United States is the kind bestowed by fellow democrats around the world.

I have supported this idea many times in these pages. Back in May, I wrote about John McCain's idea of a league of democracies, arguing that:

that the democratic states of the world need to create, perhaps using the WTO and NATO as foundations, a meta-institution that can spread western values, enforce international laws and norms, maintain peace and security, and bolster the international economic order. The general vision is to connect the various economic and political institutions together, whereby membership in one is predicated on adherence to commitments in the others. Thus, violating the NPT or the genocide convention is met by punishment in the WTO. Such a strategy is based on the logic of engagement which has been working reasonably well in China, where the desire to participate in and receive the benefits of the international economic order (and the fear of the economic damage that would result from being excluded) creates incentives to maintain a status quo posture. Such a network, or meta-institution, could go a long way in dealing with the issues with which the UN is incapable of dealing.

I also claim that its not as important that the members of the group be democratic so long as they are committed to globalization, economic interdependence, and preservation of the status quo.

The UN is simply not capable of dealing with issues of global security, nor should it be seen as a source of legitimacy where such issues are concerned. The UN is invaluable when it comes to peace keeping, nation building, and social initiatives like disease prevention, education, and the like. But it is time to recognize the UN's limits. While the UN dithered getting a weak, watered down resolution in Darfur, more than 200,000 people died and millions more were displaced. If such an parallel institution existed, perhaps the Kosovo model, in which the democratic members of NATO authorized their own intervention contrary to international law, could have applied and countless lives saved.

Don't Count Your Peacekeepers Before They're Deployed

Sudan has finally agreed to allow a joint UN-AU peacekeeping force of nearly 20,000 soldiers into Darfur to monitor the situation and prevent any further genocide. Sort of.

While the announcement by Sudan is being hailed as a "breakthrough moment" by the African Union, it's not so clear that it's time to breath a sigh of relief for Darfur. Apparently, Sudan is insisting that the force be made up almost entirely of Africans, a demand that makes the deployment all but impossible. According to John Prendergast, a Sudan expert who helps lead Enough Project, “the gulf between the rhetoric of acceptance and the reality of deployment is huge,” and the continued haggling over force makeup “is putting a condition on the deployment which ensures its failure.” Similarly, US Ambassador to the UN Zalmay Khalilzad stated that "if [the acceptance] is conditional, as we hear, that there will be only African troops involved and no non-Africans, that is putting a condition on the acceptance, and that would be unacceptable.”

The UN will examine the plan today. Hopefully, if Sudan is still trying to stall and block the deployment by such insistences, the UN will finally decide to act and punish the genocidal regime. While this is welcome news, I'm certainly not holding my breath.

Maybe Zimbabwe WAS A Good Choice

I blogged on Monday about the pathetic move by the UN to elect Zimbabwe as chair of the Commission on Sustainable Development. Today, things get worse as Zimbabwe's government-run newspaper, The Herald, has announced that the annual inflation rate has risen to an astonishing 3,714%.

3,714%.

That represents a 1,500 point increase since March, and means that average prices have risen 36-fold in the last year.

If that's not sustainable development, I don't know what is.

Why The UN Sucks

I apologize for the not-so-academic language in the title of this post, but I'm just so flabbergasted by what the UN has done...as if there weren't already so many reasons to hate the UN.

Over the weekend, the UN Commission on Sustainable Development elected a new chair...Zimbabwe.

Yes, that Zimbabwe.

This is so ridiculous, monstrous, and pathetic on so many fronts it's hard to know where to start excoriating the UN for this truly idiotic decision.

Asking Zimbabwe to chair a commission on sustainable development is like asking Pol Pot to chair a panel on overpopulation. What aspect of Zimbabwe's development is sustainable or could serve as a model to other countries? The fact that the country doesn't have enough power for its capital city, or its farms? The 50% contraction of its economy since 2000? The 2,200% inflation? An unemployment rate believed to be around 80%? A life expectancy that has dropped from 55 to 35 in 27 years? The destruction of entire villages in the name of urban beautification? I guess those who believe that sustainable development means reversing economic development would be OK with the last one...and let's not forget the brutal political repression that has been going on.

This is the country that the UN has chosen to lead the world on the issue of sustainable development. I have written many times about the implications of the UN's preference for sovereign equality over values, law, norms, or basic human decency. How can this body be expected to advance human rights, prevent genocide, or serve as even a shadow of a world government if it can't punish one of the worst regimes operating today?

Madeline Albright and Archbishop Desmond Tutu had an op-ed in the Washington Post this past March arguing that:

The crisis in Zimbabwe raises familiar questions about the responsibilities of the international community. Some argue that the world has no business interfering with, or even commenting on, the internal affairs of a sovereign state. This principle is exceptionally convenient for dictators and for people who do not wish to be bothered about the well-being of others. It is a principle that paved the way for the rise of Hitler and Stalin and for the murders ordered by Idi Amin. It is a principle that, if consistently observed, would have shielded the apartheid government in South Africa from external criticism and from the economic sanctions and political pressure that forced it to change. It is a principle that would have prevented racist Rhodesia from becoming Zimbabwe and Robert Mugabe from ever coming to power.

However, they go on to assert that they "are not suggesting that the world should intervene to impose political change in Zimbabwe. We are suggesting that global and regional organizations and individual governments should make known their support for human rights and democratic practices in that country, as elsewhere." Which global organizations? The UN? As is evidenced by this, the UN cannot and will not act against its members until it's almost too late, not necessarily then, as Sudan and Rwanda readily demonstrate.

What regional organizations? The African Union? Not likely. The AU has been hesitant, to say the least, to take on Zimbabwe and its anti-colonial hero-president Mugabe.

So, if anything is going to happen, it will likely fall to the US, the EU, NATO, and/or other western organizations to do something. Of course, any such actions will violate the international law of sovereignty, they will violate the will of the international community as expressed by the UN, and they will no doubt resemble cultural imperialism. So be it. That is what it is going to take to end the suffering in Zimbabwe. In Darfur. In North Korea. And everywhere else that the UN has turned a blind eye.