20 May 2012

Before I begin this week article, I just briefly want to comment on the high level of variance in the amount of activity from week. Last week, I struggled to find enough material worth commenting. In contrast, I had three topics for this week's article by Wednesday, before the Security Council adopted two new resolutions. In addition to the two resolutions, I'll be commenting on two high level events that began this week, and on a report from the High Commission for Human Rights that was released on Wednesday.

This week really marked the beginning of the end of an era in the Balkans, as the trial against Ratko Mladić began at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). During the Yugoslav Wars Mladić was a general in the Yugoslav People's Army and commander of the Serb forces in Bosnia. He stands accused of four charges of war crimes, five crimes against humanity charges and two counts of genocide, for actions including the massacre at Srebrenica and the siege of Sarajevo. For all of Mladić's crimes, what I find most appalling is that in all likelihood, he will be acquitted on at least one of the Genocide charges. 

The prosecution in this case were careful when charging Mladić with genocide to separate Srebrenica from the rest of the Bosnian War. They did this for a reason. There is an incredibly strong precedent in international law with regards to genocide during the Bosnian War. In it's judgement of 26 February 2007 in the case Application of the Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro), the International Court of Justice ruled that Serbia had not committed genocide, and that it had failed in its obligation to prevent genocide only with regards to the events in July of 1995 at Srebrenica, meaning that for legal purposes, there had been no genocide elsewhere during Bosnian War.

Eight of the nine other charges relate to systematic attacks against the Muslim and Croat populations of Bosnia and Herzegovina, ranging from murder and extermination to persecution and deportation. The final charge, the taking of hostages, relates to events of which I had been previously unaware. Shortly before the events Srebrenica, NATO began conducting airstrikes against Serb military targets so as to bring an end to the war. In May and June of 1995, Bosnian Serb forces kidnapped UN peacekeepers and civilian personnel in order force NATO to stop the bombings. The prosecution alleges that Radko Mladić ordered these kidnappings, or had reason to know that they were about take place.

The second high level event that began this week was part two of this year's session of the Conference on Disarmament (CD). The Conference is the main forum the negotiations of international agreements on the regulation of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons, and other weapons of mass destruction. It currently counts sixty-five members including all nine nuclear weapons states, and most states with civil nuclear programmes. In the past it has produced the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), the Biological and Chemical Weapons Conventions, and the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). 

 

Since the early nineties, the CD has been in grid-lock. Given the current state of affairs, I am thoroughly amazed that a consensus on the text of the CTBT (opened for signature in 1996) was even reached. At present, the two main agreements being negotiated are a Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty, which would ban the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons, and an agreement to prevent an arms race in outer-space. 

Best I can tell, the grid lock at the CD is a direct result of the end of the Cold War. The tri-polar nature (east/west/non-aligned) of negotiations, made them run a lot smoother. During the Cold War, it was the aligned powers that were the greatest threat. This meant that if east and west managed to agree on something, the non-aligned countries would generally follow suit. For example, this is how the NPT came to be. Nowadays, it is the rogue nuclear nations, in which other countries have only limited influence in defence matters, by this I mean North Korea, Iran, India, Pakistan, and Israel, that pose the largest threat. So long as they don't cooperate, the other nuclear powers will not push matters with other states as they see their own security interests at risk. Getting two sides to reconcile their often conflicting interests was difficult enough. Today, there are between ten and fifteen key players on any given issue, in which there are multiple pairs of states which view each other as mortal enemies.

Next I'll cover the two resolutions adopted by the Security Council. I'll start with the second chronologically. After the resolution on the Sudanese conflict two weeks ago, this was a fairly routine decision. On Friday, the Council decided to extend the mandate of the UN Interim Security Force in Abyei, one of three peacekeeping missions operating in the Sudans. 

The other resolution was on the current situation in Guinea-Bissau. After extensive consultation with regional partners, namely the African Union (AU), the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Council imposed travel bans on five of the leaders of last months coup d'etat and established a committee to determine which other people should be prevented from leaving Guinea-Bissau. While I feel it's certainly a step in the right direction, I wonder how much of an effect these measures will actually have. I mean these people have a highly unstable country to run. If they were to leave Guinea-Bissau, there's a reasonable chance that they may no longer be in power by the time they get back. 

What surprised me, at least at first glance, is that ECOWAS, represented by Togo on the Council, objected to referring to the pre-coup government as the legitimate government of Guinea-Bissau, as ECOWAS has been a key player in mediating a return to constitutional rule. That being said, a number of ECOWAS member states are themselves military juntas whose legitimacy could be called into question.

The final point I'd like to address this week is the Report by UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food on his Official Visit to Canada. The report begins with a criticism of Canada's track record on economic, social, and cultural rights as a whole. This is particularly interesting against the background of the on going student strikes in Quebec, taking due note that there is little to no constitutional and legal protection of economic and social rights. The report criticises the absence of a national right to food strategy, and proceeds to analyse the adverse affects of agricultural policy, and of poor social policy on food security. Notable statistics include the fact that roughly 10% of Canadians live in poverty, of which 1 in 5 are children, One in every thirty Canadians depends on food banks for food security, and perhaps most appallingly, one in every four First Nations children do not have enough to eat on a regular basis.

The content of the report aside, the reaction of the Canadian government to the report is also of some interest to me. First of all, that it was Jason Kenny, the immigration minister, instead of someone from Agriculture, Foreign Affairs, or Fisheries and Oceans, said more than the statement itself. Mr. Kenny stated that Olivier de Schutter, the Special Rapporteur, was an ill-informed, patronising, academic, and that the UN should focus its efforts on the third world. The obvious deflection of the content of the report only further only further reinforces Mr. de Schutter point that the right to food has not been a priority in Canada, and that this government is flouting its international and domestic obligations. It should also be noted that Mr. de Schutter conducted his visit at the request of the Canadian government.