Commentary

THE UNITED NATIONS AND GENOCIDE

Samuel Totten

O ver the past several decades, the United Nations (UN) has

been blamed repeatedly for either not acting swiftly and/or effectively enough, or simply not acting at all, in the face of a potential or actual genocidal event. In light of the fact that the UN is mandated, under its own Convention on the Prevention and Pun i shmen t of Genoc ide (UNCG) and under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, to act to prevent or intervene in the case of potential or actual genocide, such criticism is understandable. And yet, it is rather ironic--not to mention, hypocritical--that various member stales disparage the inac- tion of the UN when, in many cases, it is those very states that are re- sponsible for deterring, if not out- right preventing, the UN from act- ing in a timely or adequate fashion. This is especially true of the mem- bers of the UN Security Council, who basically control what the United Nations does and does not do m the way of intervention and prevention of genocide.

It is also true that "...the United Nations is not a humanitarian, but a political, organization, and its hu- manitarian goals are at the play of political forces, pressure groups and blocs, in an arena where delegates pursue the divisive interests of the states they represent" (Kuper, 1981,

p. 175). This, of course, compli- cates why, how, when and where the United Nations acts, reacts, or neglects to act in regard to various genocidal situations.

Intervention and Prevention Over the past fifty plus years,

or since its establishment in 1948, the United Nations" success in pre- venting genocide has been dismal. Clear evidence of this is that dur- ing the latter half of the twentieth century, genocide was perpetrated time and again in various paris of the world, including, but not lim- ited to, Bangladesh, Burundi, East Timor, Indonesia, Iraq, Rwanda, Cambodia, Guatemala, the fo,mer Yugoslavia, and, most recently, Sudan.

During the period of the Cold War (1945-1989), the United Na- tions did virtually nothing to pre- vent genocide, and this was a di- rect result of the vise-like grip that the Soviet Union (USSR) and the United States (US) wielded within the global political arena. In case after case, the two superpower an- tagonists prevented the United Na- tions from taking action in those areas that they each deemed to be of strategic significance. Further- more, the USSR and USA seen> ingly looked away when their al- lies committed genocide, and each

was, more or less, prevented by the other from intervening in genocides outside their own sphere of influ- ence. As Ramsbo tham and Woodhouse (1999) note: "One of the main effects of the Cold War on the peacekeeping role of tile United Nations was that it was dill ficult to respond to or to mount an operation when menlbers of the Security Council were politically opposed and used their power of veto to further their political views. Another difficulty was that the 'su- perpowers' were both unwilling to allow the United Nations any lee- way to act in regional conflicts in which either had a political or mili- tary interest" (p. 45). As a result, genocide was committed almost with complete impunity during the Cold War period.

In the rare instances when inter- vention was undertaken to prevent genocide, it was generally canied out by actors other than tile United Nations. Two classic cases of the latter are India's intervention dur- ing the course of the Bangladesh genocide, and North Vietnam's less than altruistic and relatively late intervention during the course of the Khmer Rouge perpetrated geno- cide in Cambodia. Sadly, though, by the time military interventions were undertaken in Bangladesh and Cambodia, the genocides had al-

6 SOCIETY' �9 MAY/JUNF~ 2(X)5

ready engulfed the lives of tens of thousands and more in their mttr- derous maws.

In light of the political climate and impunity with which genocide wlts perpetrated in the post-World War II period (1945-1989). it is l i t t le w o n d e r that I ,eo Kuper (1981), in his pioneer ing work, Genocide: lls Political Use i , the 71ventieth Cf'lltlltV, took the United Nations to task by asserting thai "lGenocide] is a particularly threat- ening scourge (/1" our day and iige, fiicilitated by inlemational c(mcern for the protection of Ihc sovereign rights of the state, by international intervcnlion in the aill l ing of Cell- tending sections, and by the Uniled Na t ions de Jacto condona t ion . which serves as a screen lor geno- cide" (p. 18). Elsewhere, due to its hick of moral leadership imd inac- t ion Io stanch genocide, Kuper deemed the Untied Nations a "'dead letter,"

Following the end of the Cold War, there was a certain hope by many that genoc ide could and would be prevented largely through the good offices and efforts of lhe l, Jnited Nations. As Ramsbothanl and Woodhouse (1999) note:

The end of the Cold War. follow- ing upon the seismic changes to the re,,imes in the USSR and east- ern f{uropeail countr ies , has rneant that the Security Council is no longer automatical ly di- vided or is necessarily locked into an "'ug and then1"" sol of responses. In the growth in recent years of situations requiring t iN action o r

interverition, peacckeeping has played a central role in the col- lective response of the inlefnil- tional community to international conflict. The optimism surrotlnd- ing the potential posl-Cold W~.lr role of the United Nations, and its peacekeeping arm. was most clearly expressed in the A,<4cnda ,fi)r Peace (1902:45}.

II was at the behest of Ihe UN Security Council that then Secre- tary (]enefal Boutros Boutros-Ghali developed An A<~,,emla ./or Peace, which algued thai in Ihe af ler- math of the Cold War it was time to reinvigorato [ :N enl'orcemeni efforts and bring It) f ru i t ion the early hope envisioned at the out- set of the es tab l i shment of the Uniled Nations that the Security Council would ser~.e as the global peacekeeper via ('hapter VII of the UN Charter. But the "'Agenda for Peace" resuhed in its being its OWll "'dead letter" of sorts. Indeed, when genocide reared its ugly fiice shortly after the publication of An A,k, emht .ft," Peace, the UN was not Lip I t )

the task of ac t ing d e c i s i v e l y . boldly or oll lerwise. In fact, it fai led i l l iscri iblv. Both the 1994 genocide in Rwanda and the geno- cide perpelra ied in Srol'u'enica, wl-iere the Serbs, in July 1995, o v e r r a n a U N - d e c l a r c d " 'safe area" and s laughtered approxi - nlatc ly 7,()()0 M u s l i m inen and boys the largest illassacle ill Eu- rope since the t[oh)causl-- consti- tt.le incontrovertible evidence Io such lailurc.

/ks for the UN's role in Rwanda, Christian ,lennings (2000), in Iris chill i ng bo~lk ,4cro.v~ the Red River." Rwamla, thu'u#uli and lhe ttearl o l Darkne.vs'. asserts that

What was staggering, with the UN pci'soru'iel, is that such a huge col- lecliori of capable, intclligenl people, from dozens of different countries being paid quite enor- nlous sahuies, could collectively get it so V, Tong. The first major di- saMer was the L'NAMIR nlission. and its failure to avert the begin- nine of the genocide. The second was UNAMIR's wilhdrawal I fronl 2,500 peacekeepers to 2701 in the face of the mass slaughter of hun- dreds of thousands of people: lyet another] was Ihe UN tlUlllan Rights Moni tors Miss ion in

Rwanda (p. 330)....The deploy- rnent of UN hunlan rights moni- tors had become a nseful, face-sav- ing tool in the UN arnlory. It showed thai they were concerned. it showed thai the3.' were willing to send somebody anybody o n Io the ground, a l l d . m o s t inl- portantly, it meant that they coukl stall their detractors in the press and elsewhere .... JoseAyahl Lasso [UN I ligh Conmfissioner for tlu- man Rights]. staled that "'The commission...shoukl consider ap- pointing a special rapporteur to examine all htiman rights aspects of the situation, itlclnding causes and responsibilities...such a rap- porlcur should be assisted by a team of human rights f ie ld officers"....Whal l,as~,o was saying was lhat his response to tim swift- est genocide in the history of the planet was to dispatch one man to "examine" the situation. 111 the seven Weeks it look Mr. Lasso to comes to this conclusion, 75(),00() Rwandans were kilh_'d'" (pp. 170. 171).

]Ollllino, s is corrocl, as filf ilS tie goes, but flleio are additional rea- sons a:-; to why ih0 { !N acted the way it d id (and st i l l does) in R\vallda and other htlnlan rights disasters throu-h lhe 1990s and early 2000s. Another grave elTOl was "'how the United Nations used the rules of peacekeeping to coil- elude in the first weeks that no duly Ito iniervon0 in the k i l l ing l +xisled hv a,r ibuHng dw Ull ings to lhe ##to#'e <'ausalh" /HY)##Ii/I#Ill civil war" (italics added) (Barnett, 2003, p. 175). To he able to use such "'ll.lies'" in such a illilnnel speaks volumes to the dysfunctional nature of I)oth the "'rules" and the { IN btlreiltlClacy.

Bul there is even sonlellling more fundanlental than all of lhe above, and that is the simple but profound fact that the UN not only seems to be at il loss over whal its

TIlE UNITED NATIONS AND GI':NO(qI)I': 7

peacekeeping operation "'rules" al- low, but has lost its sense as to that which constitutes its "real" mission. As Barnett (2003)notes:

Between 1989 and 1994, the Se- curity Cotmcil authorized twenly- six operations across the globe, dot, bling in five years the nun> ber of operations it had authorized in the previous lbrty....The inser- tion of peacekeepers into more complex and unstable environ- ments and growing humanitarian sentiments triggered a debate over what the rules of peace-keeping should be: (I) when is peacekeep- ing a proper and effective instru- ment for international peace and sect, rity: (2) whether or not en- forcement operations are desir- able; and (3)what is the meaning of UN neutrali ty and impartiali ty .... How would the United Nations construe impar- tially and neutrality in the face of human right abuses, cr imes against humanity, or active ob- struction by the parties to the itnplementation of la t;NI inandate?....Whe sheer nunlber of operations and the expansion of the rnles of peacekeeping had two painful results. One was moral overload. The United Nations had jumped onto a slippery slope with- out much consideration of how It) arrest its possible descent ....

The Iother was thatl the t;nited Nations. financially strapped, bu- reaucratically challenged, and comprised of self-absorbed states, did not have political+ logistical or financial resources to accept all the opportunities and invitations. Consequently, it had to ask tough questions about who would re- ceive its scarce resources .... Head- quarters started to ask whether an operation had a reasonable degree of safety and chance of success...A related result was "'failures" in the field .... [Fo,'merSecretaryGeneral] Boutros-Ghali, who was once an enforcement enthusiast, tempered

his zeal becat.se of Somalia and Bosnia: "'...The United Nations cannot impose peace: the role of the UN is to maintain peace. This, he publicized, was the new "'UN mentality." [Current UN Secretary General Kofil Annan summarized the lessons he learned from recent experiences: "'...The inspiration for acceptable and viable peace can only spring from the leaders and the people in the country" (pp. 178. 179. 180).

One has to wonder, where this leaves the victims of genocide, es- pec ia l ly when the perpe t ra to rs have no interest at all in making peace.

In August 20()0, the United Na- tions issued the Brahimi Report , named af ter Alger ian d ip lomat Lakhdar Brahimi, the chairperson of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations. It was a hard- hitting, no pulled-punches critique of UN peace operations. In part, the report pointedly commented on the UN Security Council 's members ' propensity of "approving peace- keeping mandates without making available the quality and quantity of f inancial and m a n p o w e r re- sources required to meet the se- curity challenoes~, . likely to arise in the field" (Crocker, 2001, p. 239). Chester Crocker (2001), a former U.S. d iplomat , asserted that ++If implemented in a serious manner, the Brah imi Repor t could point the way toward best practice in UN peace operations by curtail- ing i l l - c o n s i d e r e d anti inad- equately supported interventions, encourag ing the grea ter use of career military officers to assess r e q u i r e m e n t s , and f o s t e r i n g greater wil l ingness to make re- s ou rce s and po l i t i ca l suppo r t available so that the United Na- lions can do those jobs it is asked to do" (p. 239). "17tat, thou t+h, is a

huge "ifi " Indeed, it would essen- tially require a sea-change in the

way nations currently perceive and act upon such concepts and notions as sovermgnty, "'internal affairs,'" and realpolitik, not to mention, the way the UN is accustomed to oper- ating.

As strong as the Brahimi Report is, it is not without its weaknesses. In this regard, Crocker (2001) as- serts that "'Even the Brahimi Re-

pot7 understates the critical impor- tance of identifying precisely who will marshal Ikey] tactical, opera- t ional capab i l i t i e s - - r e a l - t i me military intelligence: meticulous tactical planning" seamless internal, interservice, and interallied com- m u n i c a t i o n - t h a t a rapid reaction or expedit ionao' fort 'e mlISl po.sse.ss to be {{[lective even in l imited op- erations. Yet, these ingredients may spell the difference between smooth operations and total fiascoes" (ital- ics added) (p. 240).

More recently, on 31 November 2004, a United Nations panel issued a report that proposed wide-sweep- ing reforms that included a recom- mendation to "'overhaul its deci- s ion-making organ, the Security Council" (ltoge, 2004, p. 2a). In actuality, two proposals were set forth. Both proposals called for an increase in the membership of the Security Council . One proposal suggested increasing the permanent membership flom five (Great Brit- ain, China, France, Russia, and the United States) to eleven. The other suggested adding "'eight semi-per- manent members chosen for renew- able four-year terms" (Hoge, 2004, p. 2A). The hope here is that a more "'balanced" membership will, hopefully, make more "'enlight- ened" decisions.

Notably, the authors of the re- port asserted that " 'nightmare sce- nar ios ' facing the international community may justify the use of lkwce, 'not just reactively but pre- ventively"" (tloge, 2004, p. 2A). If such a stance is ultimately en-

8 SOCIETY': �9 MAY/JUNF+ 2(X)5

dorsed it could lend itself to a I,;N that acts in a more efficacious man- ner in the face of genocide.

The panel also expanded the understunding of "'global threats" that could require military aclion to include the iwotection of civil- tans./)'ore (4enoci+le aml other atro~'i- tie.~ (italics added). Only linlc will tell whether the proposals resuh in positive, systemic changes lhat streamline the work of the UN and make ii more efficient and effec- five in addressing potential and/or actual genocides , or if the UN lapses back into its disturbing state of somnolence.

Perpetrators of Genocide hi 1993 and 1994 two ad-hoc

international courls were estab- lished by the United Nations Secu- rity Council for the express purpose of trying those indicted for geno- cide, cr imes against hunlall[ly, and war crimes, as they pertained to the violent conflicts in fOllllet" Yugoslavia and Rwanda. The texl of the UN Securi ty Resolut ion es t ab l i sh ing the In te rna t iona l Criminal Tribunal fl)r the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) reads, in part, us follows:

Expressing once again its gfave ahunl of continuing reports of widespread and flagrant viola- lions of inlernatioim] humanitaf- ian law occurring wilhin the h.'rri- tOl+y of the JOflllei" Yugoslavia, and especially in the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, inchid- ing reports of mass killings, inas- sive, organized alld systematic detention and rape of women, and the continuance of tile practice of "'ethnic cleansing."...acting tlllder Chapter VII of the Chartef of the Ltnited Nations, Idle t;.N. Sccurily Councill...decides hereby to es- tablish an international tribunal for the sole purpose of pro,,,ectlt- ing persons respcm~,ible t'or scri- ous viohil ions of inlernatitmal

humanitarian ]a\v coininilted in the lerrilory of tile ['Ofl/lel Yugo- shivia belweeli [ Janti,ifv 1091 and a dale to I~e deternlined b'r the Security Council..." (!,Iniied Nations. 1993: 121)4).

Mally Ilave noted that the estab- Iishnlent of tile I C f 7 was not due to the altrtiiSill of tile international ct)mmuilily. I:or example, Pow.'er (2(il)2) algues thai "'As punic pres- sure mounted for Amelical l and Europeun leaders Io "tit) sonlelhing" to stop the l:~oSllian Cal'lltttge, croat- ing a COtlrt It) punish perpetrators seemed a low-cost, low-tisk \~ay for Western stales to signal that despite their opposition to militaFy inter- vention, they were not indifferent to Bosnia's suffering" (p. 4M4). Be that ,is it intly, tile estahlistnnents of both the ICTY and the Interna- tional Cr in l ina l T r ibuna l for Rwanda (ICI 'R) i'epiesenl historic occas ions , as well as signs of progress with respecl to tile effort to stanch the perpetration of geno- cide.

The ICTY anti Ihe I('TR have been nlodertitely successful {even i f excruciatingly slow) in ohtuin- ing prosectitions. I:g)r example, in September 1998 the ICTR made history when it fourid Jean-Paul Akayesu. tile fornler inayor of the R'<vandan town +.5I" Tab;_i, guilty +.51" the c r i me ~51 ge n oci de. Th i s \vas ttle first time ally inie;'nutional COl.lrl had isstied ,+uch a verdict ft)r the speci fic crime of genocide. It is also worth noting thai as a result of ccr- ruin cases, particularly at the ICI'Y. case-law precedent,, in the law of genocide plosecl.llions LIFe n o w

growing. Be that as it may, far nlole defendants were found guilty of havin- COlnmitted crimes a~:.iillsl hulnanity and/or Wal cfiines than those found guilty of genocide.

I n t e r n a t i o n a l C r im in a l C o u r t As if to demonstrate tile f irm-

ness of the in ternat ional

comlYItnlity's resolve to do SOllle- t h i n - about <.zcnocide--and to "prove" that impunity is no longer till option |'(51" those who conlmit it- -the Rome Sitilule of Ihe Inter- national Crinlinal (7ouri l i f e ) was adopted on 17 July 1998. The ('ourt was established by tile United Ha- trims undel" the aegis of tile [ ;N

Security Council. The Statute gives the Cotlrt .jurisdiction for tile crime elgenocide, crimes ugahlsl hunlan- fly, and war Clillles. It is holh an exteilsiOll of the ICTY and tile ICTR, and tile fulfillment of the promises first articulated in the af- ternlalh of 1945 (Sc]lahas, ]()()()). The I c e , after considcltlhle debttte, decided to absorh the t:N Conven- l ion on Genocide, including its dcfinition, directly into its Charter.

The Ct)urt heCallle operative on 1 July 2002, after a nlinimunl (51 sixty t i n countries had ratified it. Notable anlong those Iefusillg to ratify was the United States. Cog- nizant of the United .Slates" inlran- sigence, nlosl |:.uropeall countries decided early on that the leadership of the U.S. would I1CII be required lt)r the esttiblishnlent o1" what \vas seen hy nlally ,is a highly moral body. the purpose of which would he to assist in saleguul'ding the peace of the world alltl the lives of ils citizens, Tile U.S. pronlpt ly SOtlghl. and received, an agreeliienl wi th the US that \~.tsuh.l place Alner icans servin~ in fore ign postings o,tsid(, tile ('out't "<, .juris- diction. The United Slates" position and denlunds were. Ullsurprisingiy. looked uskallce at hy ill,my illelll- hers of the international COllllllU- nity. Not surprisingly, nlany niem- hers of the international conullunity looked askance tit the t;nited Stales" position and deulands.

Early Warning Sys tem Over tile past twenty-five years

or so, nluny scholars of genocide st,idles have either called Iksr tile

TIlE UNITEI) NATIONS AND (;ENOCII)I! 9

itnpletnentation of or worked on the development of a genocide early warning system, it is the hope of such scholars, as well as others, that with such a system in phtce, the international community will be able to detect potential genocides early on and then act to prevent thetn froth taking place.

In regard to the deveh)pment and itnplenaentation of such a sys- tem, Barbara Harff, Professor of Political Science at the U.S. Naval Acadctny and a scholar ofgcnocide studies, commented and then re- ported back in 1993 that

The LN is in principle structur- ally capable of dealing with hu- man rights abuses. One problem lies in the lack of data that allows for accurate predictions thal would give adequate time to deal with impending crises. The estab- lishment of an early warning sys- tem similar to forecasting is in- dispensable to both prevention and readiness to respond in a nlanner that would prevent esca- lation. Databanks nausI include background information on pre- conflict situations. Early warn- ing models need to be tested against real world conflict sce- narios. Although early warning of e.,,calation may not lead necessar- ily to ef fec t ive responses, it makes phmning relief and peace- keeping ef for ts feasible . At present, the UN is cooperating with an international network of scholars (including tiffs author) to develop such an early warning system (p. 4).

Such an early warning system is certainly needed, but having a sys- tem in place is no guarantee that early warning signals will be acted upon by the United Nations. In this regard, Barnett (1996,1 comments and then perspicaciously asserts that

...a, as.wmq~tio, o f the search Jor earh" war , i ,g indicators...sug-

gests that kmm'ledge brings ac- rio,. There is an unwritten belie.[ that with km)wled,q,e the interna- tio,al cOmmltnilv will act. Yet it was not the lack <{1" kmm,h'dge that halted action i , either Bostt ia or R w a n d a . it wa.~ politics, ht both cases, states a , d UN q/.'[h'ials knew of but chose to ig,ore the war CI' i l I I t 'S that were bei ,g c o r n -

mitteN. In both case.s' UN t"or('es were on the ,grollltd altd were eyc-

witnesses to acts o f ethnic ch'a,s- ing and genocide, and lit both c a s e s the r i d e s o[ elt ga,gelltellT

prevented UN fi)rce.v l)o,t comi ,g to the active aid o.f civilians. More tech,ologies and capabilities are , o elivir and , o substitute .for a politics o f e , g a g e m e , t (italics added} (p. 156).

Tellingly, the very same state- ment is just as apropos today in re- gard to the current situation in the l)arfur region of Sudan. The kill- ing of innocent Black African men, women and children by Sudanese government forces and Arab militias (the Jan.jaweed) goes on unabated despite the fact that the United States, for one, has declared the situation to be a case of genocide.

Although the workl community is, ostensibly, more concerned about the perpetration of genocide today than it was during the period of the Cold War, when all is said and done, Kuper 's criticism lodged against the United Nations--again, realiz-

ing that the Uni ted Nat ions is a collective o f imlividual mt t ions- - sotne twenty years ago still holds true to a large extent. Sadly and disturbin,dy there are many ex- amples that sttpport such a conten- tion. First, many nations--includ- ing those on the UN Secur i ty Council--frequently argue in favor of the protection of the sovereign rights of the state no matter how badly the leaders of a nation may be treating its own people. A clas- sic case is the recent offer by the

UN to send a peacekeeping mission into Burundi to try to quell the on- going and deadly ethnic violence only to be informed by Burundian officials that such a mission would be perce ived as a viola t ion of Burundi's sovereignty. Second, the UN is often slow to recognize--and even slower to act--when a geno- cide is on the horizon. The 1994 Rwandan genocide and currently the genocide in I)arfur (Sudan) pro- vide ample evidence in this regard. Third, the UN has repeatedly sent under-manned, under-resourced missions, with weak mandates, into areas of conflict. Two of the most recent a , d classic examples are the debacle in Srebrenica in 1995, where approximately 7.000 Mus- lim boys and men were tbrced out of a so-called UN "safe area" by Serbs and s laughtered in cold blood; and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. Fourth. communications between the UN Secretariat and field operations arc often chaotic at best and nonexistent at worse. Furthermore, the commands com- ing from the Secretariat often ap- pear as if there is a "'disconnect" between UN tteadquarters and field command posts. The maddening t'rusm~tion experienced by General Romeo Dallaire, head of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) during the period prior to and during the 1994 Rwandan genocide, is a classic ex- ample of the latter. Fifth, while many of the UN's icleas are good on paper, their inaplementatiola leaves much to be desired, and this has been particularly true in regard to the issues of so-called "safe ar- eas.'" A weak mandate, poor lead- ership, lousy decisions, and a ten- lativeness by UN troops to protect those under their care resulted in the disastrous set of events in Srebrenica in 1995.

The list of problems goes on and on. These inclt.de, but are not lira-

I0 SOCIETY ~ ~ MAY/JUNE 2(~)5

ited to, the following: tile ongoing debate over that which does or does not constitute genocide accoMing to tile UNCG: the structural prob- lems within both the UN Secrelarial and the UN Security Council that militate against effective action to intervene and prevent tile perpetra- tion of genocide; the UN's Byzan- tine bureaucracy (which was dis- t u rb ing ly de ta i l ed in Michae l Barnett's (2002) telling book. Eve- witness to a Genocide: The United Nations and Rwan&t, in whicll he asserts that tile UN's indifferent response to the events in Rwanda was "shaped and filtered through the organizational culture and bu- reatlcratic interests of the l..;nited Nations .... IF]ram the UN's per- spective, the I;nited Nations had more to lose by taking action and being associated with another fail- ure (e.g., along lhe lines of Soma- lia) than it did by mJt taking actiori and a l l owing the g e n o c i d e in Rwanda to take its course. The choice was straightforwaM: gem> tide was acceptable if the alterna- tive would harm tile United Na- tions" future. I In other words, l the bureaucratization of peacekeeping contributed to tile indifference to the suffering of tile very people that it was mandated to assist ." (pp. 129. 130); the make-up of the UN Security Council. along with its own machinations, whi ms, and way of voting (including vetoes): the ongoing problem of realt~olitik', various policies of the UN, espe- cially related to peace operations: the UN's tendency to use the wrong type of mission demanded by a con- flict (e.g., iml)lemenlin-~ a peace- keeping mission versus a peace en- forcernent mission): tile UN's htck of atlention to the many. varied und complex systemic issues thul huve the potential to lead to outbreaks of violence, including lnassacres and geriocidc; the hick of a truly effective effort hy the UN to assist

stales fronl stumbli l lg towaM a breakdown or cornplele failure; ;.in inadequate priority on n'lobilizing political and nlaterial resources for conflict prevention: the hick of a highly ef fec t ive genocide early warning system; profound weak- nesses in tile current sanclions rc- gimc implernented by the t;N in variotts crisis situations: and the hick of a t in force ready for Jill- mediate uction.

Obviously, any genuine effort to prevent genocide, or intervene early on, in no easy task. ('ufrenily, the {;N is hardly in a position to act in a quick anti el'fective fush- ion, even if ii st) desired. When ii comes to genocide the UN has been, nlt)le often lhall not, a reactive. rather thun a proactive, hody and all too often its reactions have boon inadequately, i f not poorly, ex- eculed. The likelihood of lhe hiller changiilg anytime soon--or lhefe being any real hope of alnciior;.it- ing the lituny of problenas men- tioned above- - i s extremely tnixed.

This is not to say thai all UN efforts have been failures. In fact, tile {;N's actions in t:'ast Timer in 1999 proved to be solncwhat of an exception to tile usual course of affairs. For close to thirty years--- following Portugal's relinquishing control of its colony on the eastern hal f of the island of East Ti inor alld the inunediate seizure of the terri- toiv bv Indonesia- tile Indonesian mil i tary carried out a systematic cainpaign of hulnall rights abuses which resulted in the lllass nlurder, sitifvalion, and death by torture of up to 21)0,()()1) people ---about a thiM of tile pro-invasion East Timorese population (1)unn, 2004, p. 274).

For decades, the internationail response to what was happening in East Timer was one of apathy and indiffererice, but finally, in 1999, following tile threat of another out- break of genocidal violence by ln- donesian-I~acked militias and units

of the Indonesian army, tile inter- nationul community chose to act--- or at leusl appeared to act. After tile East Timorese begged the t.lnited Natioris to send in a. peacekeeping lorce, the UN sent in an unarmed mission to oversee the first free elections in East Timer--e lect ions which were to decide the fate of East Timer (tllat in, whether East Timer was going to become un in- dependent state Oi" rcnlain under the control of Indonesia). Once the vote was h e l d - - a n d the East Tinlore,,,e overwhelmingly voted for independerlce---tlle pro-Indonesian militias and their allies in tile In- donesian military went o11 a lanl- page that resulted in the deaths of hundreds, and possibly thousands, of people. It also resulted in the destruction of the infrastructure of lhe arch. Tile UN mission oversee- ing the vole was unarmed and felt ltlal it had no choice but to leave lhe lerritory----a there for which it was roundly and bitterly criticized by the East "[imoresc.

As a result of intense interna- tional ci i t icism and pressure (in- chiding cuts in ill i l itary assistance and threats of serious financial sanctions), on 12 Seplcinber 1999, tile oo;'el'nnleni of Indonesia lllade a fornla] request to the United Na- tions to establish and send a tnuhi- national force (ul t imately com- prised of l l ,( l[)0 troops fronl eighteen countries) to East Timer for the express pl.lrpose of restor- ing peace and ,~ccurit\'. It was thai " ' inv i tat ion" Illat, in large part, though not solely, finally induced the (;N to act. Many schohns and activists claim thai had the [IN not received the invitation froln Indo- nesia, il <the U N) woulcl have l i kely, alld cavalierly, ignored the ever- increasing violence and not inter- vened.

In nlid-Sel~tenlber 1999, the United Nations Security Council, acting under Chapter VII of the

Tllt'] UNITED NATI()NS AND Gt']NOCII)E I I

Charter of the United Nations, voted unanimously to send an Aus- tralian-led multi-national peace- keeping force (the International Force for East T imor or INTERFET) to the island. Report- ing on the vote, UN Secretary-Gen- eral Kofi Annan stated that the UN resolution provided the intervention force with the mandate to "'use all necessary measures" to quell the violence and restore order and peace to East Timor.

Three weeks after the election, the first peacekeepers appeared in East Timor. it is assumed by many that had the UN not acted and sent in the multinational force, another genocide would likely have been perpetrated in East Tilnor. It is worth noting that such forces often take a minimum of three to four months to deploy, and thus the ra- pidity with which this particular force was deployed heartened those in favor of quick, effective inter- ventions when a potential genocide is on the horizon. At one and the

.~'anle tinle, it must also be #toted

tllat, vet again, the United Nations

had neglected to act until violem'e

had erupted and resulted i#1 the

death.s o f hundreds, ~ not thou

,sands, of innocent people. In 2002, East Timor established

its first parliament, elected by uni versal suffrage and guaranteed by the United Nations, and took its rightful place in the community of nations. With the sorrowful excep tion of the deaths of the many in nocent people prior to UN action, Ibis was one of the UN's brighter moments in the post-Cold War years.

One event (or, for that matter, even several, if we include the es- tablishment of the ICTY, ICTR and ICC) though, does not a policy make. And indeed, several positive actions out of hundreds hardly con- stitute a sea-change. So, despite its recent and somewha t pos i t ive

record--with the major exception being the cur rent s i tuat ion in Darfur, Sudan--the UN is still the UN, meaning that it still, for the most part, operates in its "old" and ineffective mode.

That said, by the end of the 1990s the international community had, more or less, come to a con- sensus that nations intent on wip- ing out groups of their own citi- zens could no longer defend their actions by referring to principles of sovereignty-- the latter of which had, more or less, ostensibly been carved in stone since the seven- teenth century. And, despite till the weaknesses and the problems that plague it, the beginning of the twenty-first century saw the United Nations as the world's reference point regarding intervention or non- intervention in genocidal situations. Furthermore, unilateral actions of intervention by individual nations or regional organizations (such as in Kosovo in 1999) were more or less measured against whether or not the UN had previously given or withheld its approval to act.

This "stance" was reinforced by the General Assembly itself, in 1998, in a resolution timed to co- incide with the fiftieth anniversary of the UNCG. By October 1998, the UNCG had been ratified and acceded to by 127 states. The crux of the resolution referred to the need for nations to continue to re- view and assess the progress made vis-;?l-vis the UNCG's implemen- tation since its adoption; to iden- tify obstacles to its implementa- t ion: and to cons ide r ways in which such obstacles could be o v e r c o m e - - b o t h through mea- sures at the national level and through enhanced international cooperation. While realfinning its commitment to the UNCG, and restating its significance, the UN General Assembly made an impor- tant statement about the ongoing

need for such a convention in light of the upsurge in the perpetration of genocide over the previous half century. Many, no doubt, were fo- cused on the travesties of the last decade (the 1990s) in such places as h'aq, the former Yugoslavia, and Rwanda.

To date, the UN has not been effective in preventing genocide, and has had only a slightly better record in halting it once it has be- gun. On numerot~s occasions it has acted to intervene, but only after a genocide had snuffed out the lives tens of thousands of people. In re- ality, as a body, the UN has not even begun to approach the fulfilhnent of its mandate as articulated in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Geno- cide--at least not in regard to the issue of prevention. Its stren,,ths so far as there have been any, have focused on balancing great power interests with demands to intervene more forcefully. While the years leading tip to 1989 could be seen as a way of maintaining the peace (albeit over the dead bodies of vic- tims of genocide in places such as Burundi , Cambod ia and East Timor), since then the UN has at- templed, at least in certain cases, to act with greater resolve and pur- pose. However , the fai lures of Bosni,'l, Rwanda, Kosovo, and now Sudan, call into question the sin- c e r i t y - - a n d certainly, the effi- c a c y - o f its efforts.

SUGGESTED FURTttts REA DING

Barnett, Michael (2003), "'Bureaucra- tizing the Duty to Aid Tile United Nations and Rwandan Genocide." pp. 174-191. In An- thony F. Lang. Jr. ted.) Just Pre- vention. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press.

Barnett, Michael (2002). Eyewitness

to a Genocide: The United Na-

12 SOCIETY" �9 MAY/JUNE 2005

/ions am/ Rwanda. Ithaca. NY:

Cornel[ University Pres',.

Barnett, Michael N. (1996). "'The

Polit ics o f Indif ference at the

lJnitcd Nations and (]enocitlc in

Rwanda alld ~tll'tlndi.'" pp. 128-

162. In Thomas Cuy, hnlatl and

Stc.icpan G. Mestro\'ic (t:'d,,,.)

Thi.v Time We Km'w. Wewern ReSlm#rvc,~ to Genocide i#t Bo,wtia. New York: No~ York

Uriivcrsity Pres~..

Crocker. Chosler A. ( 2001 ). "'I n h+'rvcn-

lion: Toward Bcsl Practices alid

a Holistic View." pp. 229-248.

h+l Chester A. Crocker. Fen Osier

Hanlpson. and P:.inlela Aal]

(Eds.) 7+.rbulen[ Peace: The ('halh, nge.v oJ Mana.~in,c' hm'r-

national ('otl/li~'t. Washington.

D.C.: United States Institute t)f

Peace Press.

Duns. James (2004), "'Genocide in

East Timer,'" pp. 263-293. In

Sanluel "It)ItCh. Willial+n S. Par-

soils, and Israel W. Ch',llTl\ I I{d>,.)

('enturv Of (;cnocide. Critical

l;s.~ax'.~ a/td Eyewitness A('('OIllIL%.

New York: Routledge.

t larl+f+ l?>arhara ( 19q3 ). "'An Earl v Warn-

in~ SyslciTi is Needed." 17m ISG I lnstitulc for the Sltidy of GctlO-

,:idol Nen.sh,/ter, Fall. I 1:3-5.12.

Jennings. Christian (2()00). Across

the Red River. Rna#tda.

Burtmdi and the Ih'art qf Dark-

m'~. Ixmdon: Phoenix.

Kuper. l.eo (1981)+ Genocide: It.s"

Po/itical Use in the 7henticth

('cntttrv. New tlaven. ("I': Yale

t;ni,.ersity Prc~,s.

Pov,.cr, Sainantha (2(X)2). "A Prohh'm

.~)'ore ~lull"." A#m'ricu and the

A q'c o f GemJcidc. Ne\~ York:

Ba~,ic Books.

Ratnsh.otham. Oliver. and Wotldhouxc.

Tom (1999). Encychqwdia q[

Int<'rtmtio#ud Peacekcelfing Op-

eratio#ts. Santa Barbara. CA:

At{('-CI ,IO. Inc.

Schahas. Wil l iam A. (2i)00). Geno-

cidu in //Slel'/ldlio/la[ Law: 77re

('rime.~ qf ('rime,s. New York:

('ambridge University Press.

United Nations (1993). "'United Ha-

lion:,: Security Cmlncil Roy, oh.l-

l ion on F.stahlishing all lntcrna-

lional Tribunal for the Pron0cu-

litm of Persons Responsiblo for

,~orlotls Violation,~ o1 l l l lcrna-

tional l.aw Isic) Ih.imanit:+uian

[.aw ('onltnittcd in the Tcrrilor~,

of the Porllier Yu~tl~l;.i\ ia,'" ]n- tcrnati<mrd l.c.+ml Yhm'rials. 32,

1203-1205,

Scutions of this article original ly ap- /)eared in "The U, ited Nation.~ and

Genocide: fb'eventimr Intervention. and Prosecution'" by Samuel Tollen

and Paul Barlrr)l~ ill Geriocidc tit the

Mil lennium: A Critical Bibliogral)hic

Review edited hv Samuel 7btte#r New

Briers'wick. NJ." 77ansaction Puhli.dt-

ers, 2005. ()lie scf'tio/t q / t lw paper

that irhich deals with the f !N actions

in t+7lst 7bm~r in 1997 - wt/.s written

primari ly by Pats/Bartrop.

Critical Bibliographic Review Volume 5 Samuel Totten, editor

The focus of Genocide at the Millennium is both the genocidal activity that has taken place over the past fourteen years (including that in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia) as well as a critique of the international community's response to genocide and potential genocidal situations (including those of the United Nations and nongovernmental organizations). In keeping with the multidisciplinary approach of previous volumes in this series, each of the essays and accompanying annotated bibliographies have been written by experts in their fields, many of whom have worked for many years wrestling the thorny, and often horrific, issues germane to the issue of genocide. ISBN: 0-7658-0263-5 / Cloth / 302 pp. / 2005 / $49.95, s $59.95Can

transaction Publisher of Record in International Social Science

transaction Rutgers--The State University of New Jersey Department BKAD05 GM 35 Berrue Circle

o3o5 Piscataway. NJ 08854-8042

Available at bookstores worldwide or direct from the publisher.

Toll free (US only) 1 *888-999-6778

or fax 732-748-9801 w w w . t r a n s a c t i o n p u b . c o m

THN UNITED NA'I'I()NS AND GI'N()(ql)E 13