Tough wording stays . . . thanks to Canada
‘ Responsibility to protect’ preserved Aim of clause: No repeat of Rwanda
UNITED NATIONS—
A series of weekend phone calls by Prime Minister Paul Martin is being credited with saving a key plank in a United Nations document aimed at preventing the shame of another Rwanda.
In a reform document that fell far short of expectations, Canada is claiming a victory in keeping tough wording on what is known as the “ responsibility to protect” principle, which makes it easier for the world to act when the population in a country is threatened. The language in that provision appeared headed for the type of watered-down rhetoric that marked so much of the document, sources said, until African nations came on board, convinced such wording was in their best interest.
In the wake of the U. S. invasion of Iraq, any language that would make it easier for foreign troops to enter a country was initially resisted, sources said. Martin was one leader who shored up support at the 11th hour, with calls last weekend to Jamaican Prime Minister P.J. Patterson, Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf. There were also conversations at the officials’ level between Ottawa and Russia, Cuba and India.
Martin said yesterday he was very pleased with the Canadian idea on the responsibility to protect, “ which essentially says if Rwanda occurred today, the United Nations would act.
“ I’m delighted the responsibility to protect, a Canadian idea, now belongs to the world,” he said. “Leaders have accepted that we have a collective responsibility to act in the face, not only of genocide, but war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing.” Mark Malloch Brown, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan’s top aide, said the responsibility to protect needed a champion, and Martin was that champion.
Malloch Brown likened Ottawa’s efforts to its earlier work on the eradication of land mines.
“This could have very easily ended up left out of the document,” he said. “ This is a major step forward in international law and, as such, it met some resistance.” Martin had first outlined this principle in a speech here last winter and he said it would have allowed the world to act more quickly in Sudan’s Darfur region.
But, in fact, Canada had promoted such an idea dating back to 1999, Malloch Brown said. He also said because Canada was active in Darfur, it had credibility when it tried to sell the concept.
“ Fundamentally, what we have got ( in Darfur) is a huge tragedy and it is our responsibility to deal with it,” Martin said. “ But the responsibility to protect says we are not going to find ourselves in lengthy discussions about the legal definition of genocide.” He said nations would also be allowed to go into countries and take action in the case of war crimes. “The United Nations will not find itself turning away or averting its gaze,” he said.
Malloch Brown said the Canadian initiative did not amount to a “ blank cheque” for intervention, but the language now makes it much easier for the world to act more quickly in another genocide.
“ We learned a bitter lesson in Rwanda,” when some 800,000 were killed in 1994, said Allan Rock, Canada’s ambassador to the U. N. “ It is difficult to pull together the political will to take action, even in the face of terrible atrocities. Now that we have 171 world leaders who have embraced that principle it will be much easier to act.”
It will also, Rock said, be more difficult for those who would perpetrate such atrocities in the belief that the world would look away.