The Legitimacy of Humanitarian Interventions

2006 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 669-692 ◽  
Author(s):  
RONALD JANSE
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Humanitarian Interventions ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Democratic Rights ◽  
Rule Out

According to many international lawyers, humanitarian interventions without authorization by the UN Security Council are unlawful, but are sometimes morally justified. This discrepancy between legality and legitimacy has led to proposals for making international law more congruent with morality. This article examines the legitimacy of humanitarian interventions by discussing the major justifications by Walzer, Rawls, and Tesón. It argues that these justifications are open-ended: they fail to show that intervention should be limited to cases of violation of basic human rights, and do not categorically rule out intervention in the name of liberal and democratic rights. This is one more reason for being cautious with attempts to establish a law of humanitarian intervention.

Humanitarian Intervention

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Caplan
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Future Development ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Responsibility To Protect ◽  
Real Effect ◽  
General Decline ◽  
Humanitarian Crises ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
The Way

States – Western ones, at least – have given increased weight to human rights and humanitarian norms as matters of international concern, with the authorization of legally binding enforcement measures to tackle humanitarian crises under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. These concerns were also developed outside the UN Security Council framework, following Tony Blair’s Chicago speech and the contemporaneous NATO action over Kosovo. This gave rise to international commissions and resulted, among other things, in the emergence of the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ (R2P) doctrine. The adoption of this doctrine coincided with a period in which there appeared to be a general decline in mass atrocities. Yet R2P had little real effect – it cannot be shown to have caused the fall in mass atrocities, only to have echoed it. Thus, the promise of R2P and an age of humanitarianism failed to emerge, even if the way was paved for future development.

Intervention by Invitation

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gregory H. Fox
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
Democratic Legitimacy ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Government ◽  
Internal Armed Conflicts

This chapter examines the debate concerning a state’s intervention in internal armed conflicts based on invitation, either from the government or from a rebel group fighting against the government. It looks at the issues that arise from intervention by invitation, particularly those relating to the territorial integrity of the state, the status of the actors involved, the nature of the consent, and implications for international law in general and for politics and human rights in particular. The chapter first considers the traditional view of intervention by invitation and the recent challenges to that view. It then discusses the negative equality principle as it applies to intervention in civil wars, as well as the link between intervention by invitation and democratic legitimacy. It also analyses the position of the UN Security Council on intervention by invitation.

scholarly journals United Nations Security Council Intervention Towards Gross Human Rights Violation of The Rohingya Ethnicity

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (06) ◽  
pp. 6464-6474
Author(s):  
Nizam Safaraz
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Security Council ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
International Peace ◽  
Humanitarian Interventions ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
Human Rights Violation

Abstract             Every human being has the rights to be protected from discrimination by any party, especially the act of gross human rights violations. In order to prevent this, the Security Council has a function to secure international peace and security from threats to international peace. One of the case that is becoming an international concern is the human rights violations on Rohingya by Myanmar Military. In its implementation, the UN Security Council can intervene a country known to violate human rights of its people, however the Security Council's intervention caused a controversy that questioned the validity of the intervention by Security Council. Thus, the purpose of this research is to find out whether the situation in Myanmar is valid for the UN Security Council to carry out humanitarian interventions. Accordingly, this research also analyzes legal measures by the UN Security Council in dealing with human rights violations in Myanmar. Keyword: Human Rights, Humanitarian Intervention, Rohingya, UN Security Council

Part I The International Law of Tainted Money, 6 International Legal Sources V—the UN Security Council Delisting Procedure

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grant Tom
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
National Level ◽  
Procedural Fairness ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
International Level ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
The Individual

This chapter considers a particular aspect of the UN Security Council sanctions regime: the procedure for removing individuals or entities from the Sanctions List. The novelty of the delisting procedure justifies considering it in some detail. The delisting procedure is the main response at the international level to the human rights question raised by the Security Council sanctions regime. Because certain consequences for an individual follow at the national level from the fact of the individual having been listed, a procedure that goes to the listing itself holds particular interest for those to whom the regime might apply. The chapter concludes that the delisting procedure will continue to evolve as the Security Council grapples with procedural fairness and individual rights with which it has not historically had much to do.

Between the Margins and the Mainstream

2019 ◽  
pp. 205-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hilary Charlesworth ◽  
Christine Chinkin
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Women's Rights ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
Human Rights Standards

This chapter investigates the conceptual limits of the field of women’s rights. It identifies two main currents of activity in the field: the elaboration of human rights standards, particularly through the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women of 1979; and the development of the ‘Women, Peace and Security’ agenda by the UN Security Council since 2000. Both areas are limited in their understandings of the diverse lives of women. The chapter argues that campaigns for the recognition of women’s rights shuttle between the mainstream and the margins of international law and that the structural bases of women’s disadvantage remain obscured in both locations.

‘Humanitarian Intervention’

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nigel S. Rodley
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
State Practice ◽  
Human Rights Violation

This chapter examines whether so-called humanitarian intervention is a lawful exception to the international law prohibiting use of force when rescuing populations from widespread grave human rights violations, without UN Security Council authorization under Chapter VII. It considers what type or level of human rights violation or abuse justifies ‘humanitarian intervention’ if it were permitted, with reference to the R2P categories of genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. It discusses the UN Charter provisions and state practice on the prohibition on use of force, and criteria used to determine the legality of action deemed humanitarian intervention. The chapter describes tests that an intervention would have to pass and would be applicable to mitigate culpability, including gravity of the situation, political neutrality, the circumstances of the Security Council’s inability to act, and principles of necessity and proportionality. It argues that there is no humanitarian exception to the prohibition of the use of force in international law.

The Responsibility to Protect and the Fate of the Rohingya

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 435-450
Author(s):  
Simon Adams
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
International Community ◽  
Responsibility To Protect ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Un Security Council

The failure of the international community to adequately respond to patterns of discrimination against the ethnic Rohingya minority in Myanmar (Burma) eventually led to a genocide. The so-called “clearance operations” launched by Myanmar’s military in August 2017 tested the resilience of the international community’s commitment to defending human rights and upholding its Responsibility to Protect (R2P) populations from genocide, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity and war crimes. Two years later the UN Security Council has still not adopted a single resolution to name the crime committed against the Rohingya, or to hold the perpetrators accountable. Nevertheless, Rohingya survivors and international civil society have continued to campaign for justice under international law, and to advocate for targeted sanctions to be imposed on those responsible for atrocities. Faced with an inert Security Council, some UN member states have adopted inventive diplomatic measures to uphold their responsibility to protect.

NATO’s Humanitarian Intervention in Kosovo: Making or Breaking International Law?

1999 ◽  
Vol 36 ◽  
pp. 303-333 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Currie
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Customary International Law ◽  
Conventional Analysis ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Regional Concentration ◽  
Regional Character ◽  
Acting In Concert ◽  
Atlantic Area

SummaryNATO’s seventy-nine-day campaign of air strikes against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia has sparked a wide-ranging debate as to the legality of such military action. NATO has consistently justified its intervention on humanitarian grounds, thus clearly resorting to the controversial doctrine of “humanitarian intervention.” The author argues that while a conventional analysis of the purported right of unilateral humanitarian intervention under international law and of NATO’s acts on the Kosovo issue might lead some individuals to the conclusion that such acts were illegal (or, at best, of dubious legality), this conclusion fails to take into account the fact that state actors, particularly when acting in concert, tend to influence the content of international law itself. The author suggests that the true significance of NATO’s forcible intervention in the Kosovo crisis is that it sets a clear precedent that may well crystallize an emergent norm of customary international law permitting forcible intervention by one or more states against another on humanitarian grounds, even without prior UN Security Council authorization. While such a norm may acquire universal status, it is also possible, in light of the regional concentration of the primary actors involved as well as of important objections from some quarters as to its legality, that it will acquire (at least in the first instance) a local or regional character, perhaps confined to the Euro-Atlantic area.

R2P and International Law

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nigel S. Rodley
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Armed Force ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Human Rights Violation

Reluctant for its first two decades to consider states’ human rights performance, the UN gradually developed an extensive network of machinery to examine human rights violations in some states and categories of violation in all states. Action was limited to investigation and condemnation. The overwhelming majority of states and commentators rejected the notion of ‘humanitarian intervention’ that had had some currency until the UN Charter’s proscription of the use of force by states. It took the UN sixty years to accept that the Security Council could and should take necessary coercive measures, including armed force, to confront the most extreme forms of human rights violation or atrocity such as genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. In doing so, it sanctified a new doctrine and codified its scope. Political and material realities seem to require sober expectations about the UN’s actual ability to protect populations from these atrocities.

Unauthorised Humanitarian Interventions – Armed Violence in the Name of Humanity?

2001 ◽  
Vol 70 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 65-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Humanitarian Interventions ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Armed Violence

AbstractThis article seeks to analyse the various responses given after NATO's intervention in Kosovo to the question of the lawfulness of unauthorised humanitarian interventions, i.e. armed interventions without authorisation of the UN Security Council. While some scholars maintained that such interventions are lawful, others held that they were clearly unlawful. The article includes a survey of previous incidents of armed interventions, but no clear answer to the question can be derived on the basis of these earlier cases. On this background, the article suggests that contemporary international law is unable to provide an answer to the question of whether or not unauthorised armed interventions for humanitarian purposes are lawful. Instead, attention should be drawn not only towards the formulation of certain criteria according to which the lawfulness of future interventions can be tested, but also to the identification of an institution or a procedure to handle the test.

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