webmaster
© Copyright DEHAI-Eritrea OnLine, 1993-2011
All rights reserved
From: wolda002@umn.edu
Date: Wed Mar 30 2011 - 14:00:53 EST
consortiumnews.com
Ignoring Peace Talks in Libya
By Marjorie Cohn
March 22, 2011
*Editor’s Note: The United Nations Security Council authorized “all
necessary means” to protect Libyan civilians from military attack – and the
United States and its allies have implemented the resolution with a
punishing bombing campaign against Libyan government targets.*
*But among the “necessary means” so far ignored are any serious attempts to
mediate a peaceful settlement between forces loyal to Col. Muammar Gaddafi
and the opposition, a failure that Marjorie Cohn explores in this guest
essay:*
Since Saturday night, the United States, France, and Britain have been
bombing Libya with cruise missiles, B-2 stealth bombers, F-16 and F-15
fighter jets, and Harrier attack jets. There is no reliable estimate of the
number of civilians killed.
The U.S. has taken the lead in the punishing bombing campaign to carry out
United Nations Security
Council Resolution 1973.
The resolution authorizes U.N. Member States “to take all necessary measures
. . . to protect civilians and civilian populated areas under threat of
attack in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, including Benghazi, while excluding a
foreign occupation force of any form on any part of Libyan territory.”
The military action taken exceeds the bounds of the “all necessary measures”
authorization.
“All necessary measures” should first have been peaceful measures to settle
the conflict. But peaceful means were not exhausted before Obama began
bombing Libya.
A high-level international team – consisting of representatives from the
Arab League, the Organization of African Unity, and the U.N. Secretary
General – should have been dispatched to Tripoli to attempt to negotiate a
real cease-fire, and set up a mechanism for elections and for protecting
civilians.
There is no doubt that Muammar Gaddafi has been brutally repressing Libyans
in order to maintain his power. But the purpose of the United Nations is to
maintain international peace and security. The burgeoning conflict in Libya
is a civil war, which arguably does not constitute a threat to international
peace and security.
The U.N. Charter commands that all Members settle their international
disputes by peaceful means, to maintain international peace, security, and
justice. Members must also refrain from the threat or use of force against
the territorial integrity or political independence of any state or in any
manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.
Only when a State acts in self-defense, in response to an armed attack by
one country against another, can it militarily attack another State under
the U.N. Charter. The need for self-defense must be overwhelming, leaving no
choice of means, and no moment for deliberation.
Libya has not attacked another country. The United States, France and
Britain are not acting in self-defense. Humanitarian concerns do not
constitute self-defense.
The U.N. Charter does not permit the use of military force for humanitarian
interventions. But the U.N. General Assembly embraced a norm of
“Responsibility to Protect” in the Outcome Document of the 2005 World
Summit. Paragraph 138 of that document says each individual State has the
responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic
cleansing, and crimes against humanity.
Paragraph 139 adds that the international community, through the United
Nations, also has “the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic,
humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapters VI and
VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes,
ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.”
Chapter VI of the Charter requires parties to a dispute likely to endanger
the maintenance of international peace and security to “first of all, seek a
solution by negotiation, enquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration,
judicial settlement, resort to regional agencies or arrangements, or other
peaceful means of their own choice.”
Chapter VIII governs “regional arrangements,” such as NATO, the Arab League,
and the Organization of African Unity. The chapter specifies that regional
arrangements “shall make every effort to achieve pacific settlement of local
disputes through such regional arrangements . . .”
It is only when peaceful means have been tried and proved inadequate that
the Security Council can authorize action under Chapter VII of the Charter.
That action includes boycotts, embargoes, severance of diplomatic relations,
and even blockades or operations by air, sea or land.
The “responsibility to protect” norm grew out of frustration with the
failure to take action to prevent the genocide in Rwanda, where a few
hundred troops could have saved myriad lives. But the norm was not
implemented to stop Israel from bombing Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009,
which resulted in a loss of 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians.
Nor is it being used to stop the killing of civilians by the United States
in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
There is also hypocrisy inherent in the U.S. bombing of Libya to enforce
international law. The Obama administration has thumbed its nose at its
international obligations by refusing to investigate officials of the Bush
administration for war crimes for its torture regime.
Both the Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions compel Member
States to bring people to justice who violate the commands of the
conventions.
The United States is ostensibly bombing Libya for humanitarian reasons. But
Obama refuses to condemn the repression and government killings of
protesters in Bahrain using U.S.-made tanks and weaponry because that is
where the U.S. Fifth Fleet is stationed.
And Yemen, a close U.S. ally, kills and wounds protesters while Obama
watches silently.
Regime change is not authorized by the resolution. Yet U.S. bombers targeted
the Qaddafi compound and Obama said at a news conference in Santiago that it
is “U.S. policy that Qaddafi needs to go.”
The resolution specifically forbids a “foreign occupation force.” But it is
unlikely that the United States, France and Britain will bomb Libya and
leave. Don’t be surprised to hear there are Western forces on the ground in
Libya to “train” or “assist” the rebels there.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates pegged it when he said that a “no-fly zone”
over Libya would be an “act of war.” Although the Arab League reportedly
favored a no-fly zone, Amr Moussa, Secretary General of the Arab League,
said that “what is happening in Libya differs from the aim of imposing a
no-fly zone.”
He added, “What we want is the protection of civilians and not the shelling
of more civilians.” He plans to call a new meeting of the league to
reconsider its support for a no-fly zone.
The military action in Libya sets a dangerous precedent of attacking
countries where the leadership does not favor the pro-U.S. or pro-European
Union countries. What will prevent the United States from stage-managing
some protests, magnifying them in the corporate media as mass actions, and
then bombing or attacking Venezuela, Cuba, Iran or North Korea?
During the Bush administration, Washington leveled baseless allegations to
justify an illegal invasion of Iraq.
Moreover, Obama took military action without consulting Congress, the only
body with the Constitutional power to declare war. It is not clear what our
mission is there or when it will end.
Congress – and indeed, the American people – should debate what we are doing
in Libya. We must not support a third expensive and illegal war. There is a
crying need for that money right here at home. And we should refuse to be
complicit in the killing of more civilians in a conflict in which we don’t
belong.
*Marjorie Cohn is a professor of law at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, past
president of the National Lawyers Guild, and deputy secretary general of the
International Association of Democratic Lawyers. Her latest book is The
United States and Torture: Interrogation, Incarceration, and Abuse (NYU
Press).** *
*To comment at Consortiumblog, click here<http://consortiumblog.blogspot.com/>.
(To make a blog comment about this or other stories, you can use your normal
e-mail address and password. Ignore the prompt for a Google account.) To
comment to us by e-mail, click
here<http://www.consortiumnews.com/contact.html>.
**To donate so we can continue reporting and publishing stories like the one
you just read, click
here<https://secure.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizations/consortiumnews/shop/custom.jsp?donate_page_KEY=2043>
.*
----[This List to be used for Eritrea Related News Only]----