Responsibility to Protect: from Concept to Implementation

Abstract

Responsibility toProtect: fromConcept to Implementation Peter Power, TD Minister of State for Overseas Development at theDepartment ofForeign Affairs Chairman, distinguished guests, I am delighted to have the opportunity to participate in this discussion on what is one of the leading challenges of our time? implementing and giving effect to the responsibility to protect, one of the most significant conceptual developments in international law and practice since the promulgation of theUnited Nations Charter in 1945. INTRODUCTION In recent years, the failure of the international community to protect vulnerable populations from mass atrocities has provoked horror, shame and remorse. The development of the doctrine of responsibility to protect (R2P) cannot atone for past failures; but it can ensure that all stakeholders?governments and their leaders, the international community and the Security Council?are aware of their roles, obligations and responsibilities when faced with the threatof the four specific crimes of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. If applied correctly, theR2P doctrine can assist in prevention; facilitate a timely, coherent and effective international response if required; and ultimately act as a deterrent to the perpetuation of these crimes. R2P is firmly based on the evolving precepts of international humanitarian law, particularly the Genocide Convention and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.1 Conceptually, itoffers a new perspective on the relationship of the individual to the international order, formerly exclusively mediated by the state. Heads of state and government at the 2005 World Summit held at theUnited Nations inNew York unanimously agreed thatR2P rests on three pillars: * Address to the Royal Irish Academy CommitteeforInternational Affairsannual conference,entitled A responsibility toprotect?Sovereignty vs. intervention', Dublin, 21November 2008. irThe 'Convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide' was approved on 9 December 1945by resolution260A(III) of the UN GeneralAssembly, and itenteredintoforceon 12 January 1951. The text of the convention is available at: http://www.unhchr.en/html/menu3/b/p_ genoci.htm (20 May 2009). The Rome Statute,which established and which now governs the International CriminalCourt, enteredintoforceon 1July2002. The textof thestatuteisavailable at: http://www2.icc-cpi.int/Menus/TC^ (20 May 2009). IrishStudies inInternational Affairs, Vol. 20 (2009), 15-20. doi: 10.3318ASIA.2009.20.15 16 Irish Studies inInternational Affairs (1) the responsibility of the state to protect its population from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity; (2) the responsibility of the international community to assist states in meeting theseobligations,includingthrough capacitybuilding;and (3) where states are manifestly failing to provide such protection, the responsibility of the international community to respond in a timely and decisive manner to ensure protection in accordance with international law, and in particular with theUN Charter.2 As these three pillars demonstrate, R2P is not a licence for interventionism, as is sometimes charged. It is a response that carefully places the primary responsibility on the state concerned in the first instance. EVOLUTION OF THE CONCEPT OF R2P The catalysts forR2P were the terrible events inRwanda and Bosnia. These came as ominous reminders of the potential for crimes against humanity in areas of fragility, ethnic tension and unresolved conflicts. Any casual student of history would know this of course. The surprise lay in the ineffectiveness of the international response. There seemed to be a fatal weakness in the system when itcame to giving effect to the post-World War II imperative of 'never again'. The weakness lay in the understandable deference toward the fundamental building block of the international order, the notion of the sovereignty of the nation-state. The question was how to balance this deference, quite legitimate for normal diplomatic relations, with the growing body of international and human-rights law and its attendant imperatives. The terrible events of the 1990s, then, forced the international community to face up to the apparent, and I stress the word apparent, conflict between respecting sovereignty and preventing crimes against humanity, like genocide. In short, the international community had to reconceptualise a notion of unfettered national sovereignty, which had its roots in theTreaty ofWestphalia in 1648.3 This process was, of course, complicated by the sensitivities ofmany decolonised states intent on guarding their new found sovereignty. It should be pointed out...