The lessons of Darfur for the future of humanitarian intervention

Global Governance

Volumn 13, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 365-390

  Piiparinen, Touko ^a  

^a Ulkoasiainministerio   (Finland)

Author keywords

Conflict management; Darfur; Humanitarian intervention; Peacekeeping; United Nations

Indexed keywords

EID: 34748842008     PISSN: 10752846     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1163/19426720-01303006     Document Type: Review

References (90)

1. Human Rights Watch, Darfur in Flames: Atrocities in Western Sudan 16, no. 5 (April 2004): 14.
2. United Nations, Report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and Follow-up to the World Conference on Human Rights: Situation of Human Rights in the Darfur Region of the Sudan, UN Doc. E/CN.4/2005/3 (7 May 2004), pp. 15-16.
3. Alex de Waal, "Darfur's Deep Grievances Defy All Hopes for an Easy Solution," The Observer, 25 July 2004.
4. Alex de Waal, "Counter-insurgency on the Cheap," London Review of Books 26, no. 15 (August 2004): 2.
5. See, for example, Nichols J. Wheeler and Justin Morris, "Justifying the Iraq War as a Humanitarian Intervention: The Cure Is Worse than the Disease," in W. P. S. Sidhu and Ramesh Thakur, eds., The Iraq Crisis and World Order: Structural, Institutional and Normative Challenges (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2006), pp. 444-463.
6. At that time, AMIS was composed of 1,732 force protection troops, 451 military observers, 460 civilian police, and 31 other staff members. See United Nations, "Monthly Report of the Secretary-General on Darfur," UN Doc. S/2005/378 (9 June 2005), p. 6.
7. The strengthened AMIS force was planned to include 6,171 military personnel and 1,560 civilian police.
8. Edith M. Lederer, "Darfur Violence Drops but Rape Persists," Associated Press, available at http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/ 20050721/ap_on_re_af/un_sudan_darfur_2 (accessed 22 July 2005).
9. United Nations, Report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur to the United Nations Secretary-General Pursuant to Security Council Resolution 1564 of 18 September 2004 (Geneva: United Nations, 25 January 2005), p. 3.
10. Human Rights Watch, Too Little, Too Late: Sudanese and International Response 2004, available at http://hrw.org/reports/2004/sudan0504/8. htm#_Toc71531709 (accessed 15 July 2005).
11. On the humanitarian intervention of the UK in Sierra Leone, see Paul Williams, "Fighting for Freetown: British Military Intervention in Sierra Leone," in Colin Mclnnes and Nicholas J. Wheeler, eds., Dimensions of Western Military Intervention (London: Frank Cass, 2002), pp. 140-168.
12. John Borton and John Eriksson, Lessons from Rwanda-Lessons for Today: Assessment of the Impact and Influence of Joint Evaluation of Emergency Assistance to Rwanda (Copenhagen: DANIDA, 2004), available at www.um.dk/Publikationer/ Danida/English/Evaluations/Rwanda/index.asp (accessed 16 June 2006).
13. Roméo A. Dallaire, "Looking at Darfur, Seeing Rwanda," New York Times, 4 October 2004.
14. International Crisis Group, "The AU's Mission in Darfur: Bridging the Gaps," Policy Briefing, Africa Briefing No. 28, Nairobi/Brussels, 6 July 2005, p. 2.
15. Arthur Jay Klinghoffer, The International Dimension of Genocide in Rwanda (London: Macmillan Press, 1998), p. 137.
16. Jonathan Moore, "Introduction," in Jonathan Moore, ed., Hard Choices: Moral Dilemmas in Humanitarian Intervention (Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998), p. 2.
17. Roméo A. Dallaire, Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (Toronto: Random House Canada, 2003), p. 289.
18. See Touko Piiparinen, "Producing Images of Genocide: A Critical Realist Reflection on the Conflict Management Expertise of the United Nations in Rwanda" (PhD diss., University of Wales, Aberystwyth, 2005), p. 206.
19. Pekka Haavisto, special representative of the European Union for Sudan, interviewed by the author, Helsinki, 4 August 2005.
20. According to Michel Foucault, power in Western societies is exercised not only through the military and within political circles, but also in schools, prisons, and expert communities where those subjects labelled "abnormal" are systematically isolated, marginalized, and excluded from the "normal" sphere of life. The criteria determining the cases that deserve attention and those that are bluntly excluded depend less on the case itself (the "Other") than on the insider account (the "Us").
21. See, for example, Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge (London: Routledge, 1989), pp. 32-33;
22. Hubert L. Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow, Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics (Brighton, UK: Harvester, 1982), pp. 184-185.
23. Although African initiatives aimed at managing conflicts on the continent have mainly been undertaken by subregional rather than regional organizations, most notably the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Monitoring Group (ECOMOG), the African Union (AU) has also built peacekeeping capacities at the regional level. In 1993, the Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution was set up by the AU's predecessor, the Organization of African Unity (OAU). The Mechanism established observer missions in Rwanda, Burundi, Comoros, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and the Ethiopia-Eritrea border. With the transformation of the OAU into the AU, its peacekeeping activities increased further. In February 2003, the AU authorized the deployment of 3,500 troops as part of the African Mission in Burundi (AMIB).
24. United Nations, Resolution 1590 (2005) Adopted by the Security Council at Its 5151st Meeting, on 24 March 2005, UN Doc. S/RES/1590 (24 March 2005), pp. 4-5.
25. United Nations, Report of the Secretary-General on United Nations Assistance to the African Union Mission in the Sudan, UN Doc. S/2005/285 (3 May 2005), p. 3.
26. United Nations press release, "Secretary-General Welcomes NATO, EU Airlift of African Union Peacekeepers into Darfur;
27. Also Welcomes Resumption of Negotiations on Political Settlement," UN Doc. SG/SM/9925, AFR/1190, 10 June 2005.
28. "NATO Considers Helping African Union Force in Darfur," USA Today, 27 April 2005, available at www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-04-27- nato-darfur_ x.htm?csp=36 (accessed 15 July 2005).
29. "NATO Starts Airlifting African Union Troops to Darfur," 1 July 2005, NATO Update, available at www.nato.int/docu/update/2005/07-july/ e0701a.htm (accessed 15 July 2005).
30. "Green Light for NATO Support to African Union for Darfur," 9 June 2005, NATO Update, available at www.nato.int/docu/update/2005/06- june/e0609a.htm (accessed 15 July 2005).
31. "NATO to Discuss Supporting African Union in Darfur," NATO Update, 26 April 2005, available at www.nato.int/docu/update/2005/04-april/ e0426d.htm (accessed 15 July 2005).
32. Gérard Prunier, The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide (London: Hurst & Company, 1998), pp. 101-105.
33. Jim Mannion, "NATO Agrees on Plan to Airlift African Troops to Darfur," Defensenews, 8 June 2005, available at www.defensenews.com/ story.php?F= 902465&C=mideast (accessed 15 July 2005).
34. United Nations, In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All, Report of the Secretary-General, UN Doc. A/59/2005 (21 March 2005), p. 52.
35. Ernest Harsch, "Africa Builds Its Own Peace Forces," Africa Recovery 17, no. 3 (October 2003): 15.
36. Wheeler and Morris, "Justifying the Iraq War as a Humanitarian Intervention," pp. 444-463.
37. This term is derived from Michael Ignatieff, "The Stories We Tell: Television and Humanitarian Aid," in Jonathan Moore, ed., Hard Choices: Moral Dilemmas in Humanitarian Intervention (Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998), p. 289.
38. Linda Melvern, A People Betrayed: The Role of the West in Rwanda's Genocide (London: Zen Books, 2000), p. 78.
39. See, for example, Piiparinen, "Producing Images of Genocide," pp. 209-226.
40. Michel Foucault's notion seems apposite here: "We have yet to write the history of that other form of madness, by which men, in an act of sovereign reason, confine their neighbours . . . through the merciless language of non-madness." Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason (London: Routledge, 1989), p. xi.
41. Bhikhu Parekh, "Rethinking Humanitarian Intervention," in Jan Nederveen Pieterse, ed., World Orders in the Making: Humanitarian Intervention and Beyond (Basingstoke, UK: Macmillan, 1998), p. 151.
42. Major Stefan Stec, who was the head of the humanitarian assistance cell in UNAMIR in 1994, gave his opinion on the ETO incident: "What Belgians did in the ETO, it's inexcusable. These soldiers were not in danger. They could literally do what they wanted: drive slowly out, let people march along, or around in front, fire in the air if needed. It would work, it would work. But instead, leaving these people there, give them lunch, and sneak out, and let two and a half thousand people get killed. . . ." Major Stefan Stec, interviewed by the author, London, 27 March 2004. The withdrawal from ETO was purely a Belgian decision, and UNAMIR Force Commander Dallaire was not even informed of the presence of civilians at the ETO site. Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire, interviewed by the author, London, 27 March 2004;
43. Major-General Henry K. Anyidoho, interviewed by the author, London, 27 March 2004.
44. The presence of Ghanaian troops directly contributed to the saving of 25,000 Rwandan lives.
45. Quoted in David Rieff, A Bed for the Night: Humanitarianism in Crisis (London: Vintage, 2002), p. 167.
46. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, former UN secretary-general, interviewed by the author, Paris, 15 April 2005.
47. E. H. Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis 1919-1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations (London: Macmillan Press, 1946), p. 10.
48. Sergio Vieira de Mello, "The Evolution of UN Humanitarian Operations," in D. S. Gordon and F. H. Toase, eds., Aspects of Peacekeeping (London: Frank Cass, 2001), p. 122 (emphasis added).
49. Linda Melvern, The Ultimate Crime: Who Betrayed the UN and Why (London: Allison & Busby, 1995), p. 4;
50. William Shawcross, Deliver Us from Evil: Warlords & Peacekeepers in a World of Endless Conflict (London: Bloomsbury, 2001), pp. 107-108;
51. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Unvanquished: A U.S.-U.N. Saga (London: I.B. Tauris, 1999), p. 130.
52. Dallaire interview.
53. See Edmund Yorke, "Regional Initiatives and Non-UN Forms of Intervention in Sub-Saharan Africa," in D. S. Gordon and F. H. Toase, eds., Aspects of Peacekeeping (London: Frank Cass, 2001), p. 86.
54. Piiparinen, "Producing Images of Genocide," p. 211.
55. Marrack Goulding, Peacemonger (London: John Murray, 2002), p. 17.
56. Lieutenant-Colonel Ben Klappe, special assistant to the military adviser of the secretary-general, interviewed by the author, New York, 1 December 2003.
57. Anonymous official of the Secretariat, interviewed by the author, New York, 4 December 2003.
58. Ibid.
59. The report dates back to March 2000, when Secretary-General Kofi Annan asked Algerian Ambassador Lakhdar Brahimi to give recommendations on strengthening the UN peacekeeping system. Drawing on lessons learned from the UN's failures in Bosnia, Somalia, and Rwanda, the report recommends more robust mandates and rules of engagement for UN peacekeeping missions.
60. See United Nations, Report of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations, UN Doc. A/55/305-S/2000/809 (21 August 2000), p. 10.
61. Kirsti Samuels, Use of Force in UN Peacekeeping Operations, Report of IPA-UNDPKO Workshop, New York, 6 February 2004, p. 7.
62. UN Doc. S/RES/1590 (24 March 2005), p. 6.
63. De Waal, "Darfur's Deep Grievances."
64. African Union press statement, "The Chairperson of the Commission of the African Union Welcomes the Progress Made in Darfur," 13 July 2005.
65. UN Doc. S/RES/1590 (24 March 2005), p. 3.
66. Ibid., pp. 4-5.
67. UN Doc. S/2005/285 (3 May 2005), p. 4.
68. Haavisto interview.
69. The identity of the Secretariat representative is not disclosed in this context because the statement does not necessarily represent his or her personal opinion, but the Secretariat's overall policy at the time.
70. "Notes on the Informal Consultations of the Security Council," in Linda Melvern Rwanda Genocide Archive, The Hugh Owen Library, University of Wales, Aberystwyth, File: Security Council/Informals/April-May 94, p. 87.
71. Colonel Jussi Saressalo, military adviser to the International Peace Academy, personal communication with the author, 1 September 2004;
72. Samuels, Use of Force, p. 5.
73. James Mayall, "Introduction," in James Mayall, ed., The New Interventionism 1991-1994: United Nations Experience in Cambodia, Former Yugoslavia and Somalia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 18.
74. Peter Langille and Tania Keefe, "The Future of Peacekeeping: An Experts' Discussion to Contribute to the Dialogue on Foreign Policy," Draft Report of a workshop cohosted by the Liu Institute for Global Issues, University of British Columbia, Centre for Global Studies, University of Victoria, the Canadian Centre for Foreign Policy Development, and the Canadian Consortium on Human Security, 21 March 2003, p. 20.
75. International Peace Academy and the United Nations, Challenges in Peace-keeping: Past, Present and Future, Seminar Report, New York, 29 October 2002, p. 2.
76. UN Doc. S/RES/1590 (24 March 2005), p. 6.
77. United Nations, Report of the Secretary-General on the Sudan, UN Doc. S/2005/411 (23 June 2005), p. 11.
78. UN Doc. S/2005/378 (9 June 2005), p. 1.
79. Ibid., p. 4.
80. On the emergence of areas designated as "safe havens" or "safe humanitarian zones" in international politics in the early 1990s,
81. see Hikaru Yamashita, Humanitarian Space and International Politics: The Creation of Safe Areas (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2004).
82. Stuart Gordon, "Icarus Rising and Falling: The Evolution of UN Command and Control Structures," in D. S. Gordon and F. H. Toase, eds., Aspects of Peace-keeping (London: Frank Cass, 2001), p. 25.
83. Ibid.
84. Quoted in Margaret P. Karns and Karen A. Mingst, "The Evolution of United Nations Peacekeeping and Peacemaking: Lessons from the Past and Challenges for the Future," in Michael T. Klare and Yogesh Chandrani, eds., World Security: Challenges for a New Century, 3rd ed. (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1998), p. 211.
85. Paul D. Williams and Alex J. Bellamy, "The Responsibility to Protect and the Crisis in Darfur," Security Dialogue 36 (March 2005): 44.
86. Ibid.
87. UN Doc. S/2005/467 (18 July 2005), p. 2.
88. UN Doc. SG/SM/9197, AFR/893, HR/CN/1077 (7 April 2004).
89. Yorke, "Regional Initiatives," p. 86.
90. "EU Votes EUR12 Million to Support African Union Peace Keeping Operations in Darfur," EuropaWorld, 11 June 2004, available at www.europaworld.org/week181/euvotes11604.htm (accessed 26 July 2005).