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Foreign opinion

In this special interview for the Russian International Affairs Council Professor Michael Doyle analyses the practical dilemmas of humanitarian interventions in the examples of NATO’s military intervention in Libya and the international response to the Syrian civil war. He discusses the circumstances under which intervention is permissible; whether regional organizations have the right to authorize military intervention; and what should be done to improve the efficiency of UN peacekeeping to adequately respond to increasing challenges around the globe.

Foreign opinion

In this special interview for the Russian International Affairs Council Professor Michael Doyle analyses the practical dilemmas of humanitarian interventions in the examples of NATO’s military intervention in Libya and the international response to the Syrian civil war. He discusses the circumstances under which intervention is permissible; whether regional organizations have the right to authorize military intervention; and what should be done to improve the efficiency of UN peacekeeping to adequately respond to increasing challenges around the globe.

Interviewee: Michael Doyle, Harold Brown Professor of International Affairs, Law and Political Science at Columbia University, the chair of UN Democracy Fund, former Assistant Secretary-General and Special Adviser to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan

Interviewer: Maria Prosviryakova, Russian International Affairs Council

Photo: Michael Doyle, Harold Brown Professor
of International Affairs, Law and Political Science
at Columbia University

Even though there is general theoretical agreement over the concept of responsibility to protect, there is much dispute over the practical implementation of this norm. What are the main dilemmas of humanitarian interventions embraced in this norm?

There was indeed a very broad support for the responsibility to protect doctrine within the UN system. It was a unanimous resolution of the General Assembly in 2005. It established the dual commitment:

– States should protect their own populations

– If states fail to do so – the international community through the Security Council should step in to help protect population from war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and ethnic cleansing.

When the principle was reviewed in the summer of 2009, it had a very wide support across the General Assembly.

Libya was a difficult case for it. Some members were of the view that one could engage in an immaculate protection that is to protect the Libyan people without in any way interfering with the political conflict within Libya - between the government of Mr. Gaddafi and the rebels. So, the idea would be that the international interveners either through sanctions would persuade the two sides to come to an agreement and stop killing. If it failed, then military force would step in and on the battle field or town by town protect the civilians from being killed. But when the NATO intervention authorized by the Security Council contributed to the toppling of Gaddafi’s regime it was seen as beyond the authority granted (ultra viras as the lawyers say).

The other group led by the USA, France, the UK had a different view. First of all, there was an effort to come to a negotiated solution. It was led by the Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Libya, Abdel-Elah Al-Khatib. But there was nowhere close to a meeting of mind between the rebel of population and Gaddafi’s government. Therefore the negotiated solution didn’t exist. Secondly, one couldn’t save the Libyan people just by changing the equation by using force on the immediate battle field. In order to safely send in NATO war planes one had to destroy (make unthreatening) the Libyan air force as a whole. That meant going after all of their planes, the military bases (including bases in Tripoli), the communication sources, radars and so on - and it meant a full-scale attack. Thirdly, the vast majority of the Libyan people were in arms against what was seen as a very oppressive violent government. And it made no sense for the international community not to recognize the revolutionary situation in Libya. In order to produce a stable end-game to help the people come to power.

Those were the basic differences between the groups. Undoubtedly, it led to contention within the Security Council. It is one but not the most important factor that now makes it difficult to put together a concerted international approach vis-à-vis Syria.

So, the concept of the responsibility to protect was undermined by NATO's operation in Libya that exceeded the UN-authorized mandate. As one of the consequences we now see the deadlock in the UN Security Council over Syria. What are the prospects for the norm of responsibility to protect after Libya now?

As I mentioned before, that is disputed. Some felt that the nature of that intervention was necessarily broader than limited protection, in order to protect the interveners; and to reflect the situation on the ground as the regime of Muammar Gaddafi was so radically discredited by the slaughters that he inflicted. That there was no way that one couldn’t take into account that change in political circumstances.

In the aftermath of it a number of countries - Russia and China in the lead - have expressed concern or dissatisfaction about regime change related to the responsibility to protect. It is one of the numerous factors that are making the management of the Syrian crisis difficult.

Syria is radically different from Libya in so many dimensions. The Libyan people were overwhelmingly united in wishing to evict Gaddafi; the Syrian people on the other hand are deeply divided on religious and regional lines. Some people might speculate that a majority is in favor of regime change in Syria, but it is not anywhere close to the overwhelming majority in Libya.

Very important groups associated with the Alawites, the Christians and other Shia sects are apparently aligning behind Mr. Assad out of fear of what the Sunni majority might do if it won a civil war that was deeply sectarian, highly contentious and violent. So, it is a very different situation in Syria and that more than anything else makes almost everyone hesitate.

There are very few (if any) supporters in the international community for an international intervention into Syria. Most are hoping that the mediation effort - led by Kofi Annan before and by Mr. Brahimi now – will bring the Security Council together so that mediation can be achieved. Many outsiders believe that mediation will work best if it can combine carrots (incentives) as well as sticks. But right now there are no sticks to be employed, because the Security Council is not united in any form of sanctions.

When is it permissible to intervene?

It is legally permissible under the following circumstances:

  1. If you have been attacked you can respond it as a matter of self-defense, which may include an intervention.
  2. If some other states have been attacked you can come to their assistance.
  3. Both of these rights are set forth in Article 51 of the UN Charter.
  4. When the Security Council declares that it is the matter of international peace and security and intervention is necessary. The Security Council did so recently vis-à-vis Libya; and vis-à-vis Haiti, Georgia in 1992, Somalia, Bosnia in the past.
  5. If genocide is occurring. Though the genocide convention is a little bit ambiguous as to whether a pre-existing Security Council resolution is necessary or not.

So, the two main frameworks for interventions are the authorization of the UN Security Council and as a matter of pure self-defense.

Could humanitarian interventions authorized by regional organizations be legitimate?

If you read the African Union Charter, it states that there is a right for intervention attached to and agreed upon by the members of the African Union. If you look at the Declaration of Buenos Aires in the Organization of American States, you will see that it has an arrangement to take non-forcible measures should there be a non-constitutional collapse of a democratic regime.

Other regions have moved in this direction without clearly making these commitments. For example, NATO raised these issues for its own members without clarifying them. As well, there were some discussions within CIS. Those are the major regional moves, but the key thing the lawyer will respond that it is very clear under Article 103 of the UN Charter regional organizations are not authorize to use force other than in self-defense. The monopoly of authorizing of non-self-defensive uses of force is held by the Security Council.

There are two major challenges that UN peacekeeping operations face now. The first one is that peacekeeping operations seriously depend on troop contributions by UN Member States. Quite often it causes serious delays in deploying troops or the sudden withdrawal of troops when the risk on the ground increases. The second one is the management of peacekeeping operations. UN peacekeepers receive their orders from three sources: 1) they get the mandate from the Security Council; 2) they are managed by the UN Secretariat; and 3) they answer to their national governments. This has an impact on their effectiveness. What could be done to improve the effectiveness of UN peacekeeping operations?

I certainly agree with the premises of both parts of your question. At the present time peacekeeping operations are coalitions of the willing even though they are multilaterally organized. A very eminent peacekeeper, Sir Brian Urquhart, once described them as “sheriff’s posse”. What he had in mind was the Western movies where crime is committed. So, someone steals from the casino and then the sheriff hearing about the crime goes on to the front steps of the casino and calls for volunteers to show up and go after the criminals… Unfortunately, despite the fact that we are in very different circumstances, peacekeeping operations are still by and large put together the same way. It means that the battalions are often not trained to operate together, may not have the same set of doctrines, may not have compatible equipment, they certainly haven’t worked together before. All that reduces efficiency.

The other reduction of efficiency is multiple sources of orders: the Security Council on the one hand, the Secretariat on the other, and the contributing countries that own national militaries. All these three hands are giving orders to the troops in the field and it doesn’t produce the good management.

It could be done better in the following ways: for example, by establishing the permanent force that would be a 5000- 10 000 soldiers trained together, genuinely multilateral. It would be under the authority of the Secretary -General and would be available for emergencies where they might arise. Again, it is ideal theory, but we don’t have that commitment yet from UN Member States. They don’t want to give the UN Security Council or the Secretary- General so much potential influence.

Moreover, people are worried that the force soon become exhausted, it would be perhaps the first and only “game in town”. It would be used too much and everywhere, the troops would just be worn out. So, we have to think of lesser reforms. Among them would be an attempt - the UN is working on it now - to develop doctrine that can be widely shared - peacekeeping best practices, training manuals so that the soldiers that show up understand the job of peacekeeping even if they haven’t done it before.

Additionally, it is very important to make sure that non-commissioned officers, who would be leading these operations, speak French, English or Spanish or any other language depending upon the zone. It could be very valuable to train in advance specially designated peacekeeping units that would be available at shorter notice, so that they could be drawn in an emergency. All of these would be useful reforms to do. Some of them are now underway; much more needs to be done.

Thank you so much.

It is my pleasure.

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