HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE COMMENDABLE, BUT ROOTS OF CONFLICT MUST BE ADDRESSED, SAYS SECRETARY-GENERAL TO GENEVA CONFERENCE
Press Release
SG/SM/6164
IHA/620
HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE COMMENDABLE, BUT ROOTS OF CONFLICT MUST BE ADDRESSED, SAYS SECRETARY-GENERAL TO GENEVA CONFERENCE
19970220 Following is the message of Secretary-General Kofi Annan to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Carnegie Commission Conference on Humanitarian Response and Preventing Deadly Conflict, delivered on his behalf by Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Yasushi Akashi, in Geneva, 16 February:I am pleased that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Sadako Ogata, and the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict have convened this forum. This is a timely and necessary exercise with great potential to influence future United Nations efforts in two key areas of its global mission: conflict resolution and humanitarian assistance.
The 1990s have seen an upsurge in the number and intensity of internal conflicts. We have witnessed massive displacements of people, extensive violence and loss of life, and widespread damage to the affected societies and economies. Ideally, each of these conflicts should have been prevented. Prevention is by far the best medicine, for countries as it is for people. Unfortunately, the practice of prevention has been uneven.
In some cases, the international community has not taken sufficient notice of early warning signals, which would have allowed a response at more manageable pre-crisis stages. The international community has also been unable to prevent the outbreak of conflicts, as illustrated by the examples of Somalia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda and more recently the Great Lakes region. We must remember, too, that even when a conflict cannot be averted, there remains a need for preventive action; to keep a conflict from escalating, and to preclude its resumption should diplomatic efforts to end it succeed.
Experience has shown that once crises erupt, the international community can move swiftly to address the suffering of innocent civilian victims. The United Nations and its humanitarian partners -- donors, non-governmental organizations, the Red Cross community -- have raised billions of dollars to deliver food to the hungry, provide shelter to refugees and internally
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displaced persons, and support children, women and the elderly. This has been accomplished despite the major constraints that often accompany deadly conflicts: difficulty in reaching populations in need, a lack of security for relief personnel and disregard for fundamental principles of humanitarian law and human rights.
While the international community is to be commended for its rapid responses to complex and large-scale humanitarian emergencies, such efforts would not have been necessary had we been able to prevent identifiable threats from becoming terrible realities. The lesson here is clear -- humanitarian action must not be the only measure to which the international community can quickly agree. Our response must also include political efforts to defuse conflicts, to promote peace and stability, and to foster economic and social development.
A comprehensive approach that allows us to address the root causes of a conflict in all its dimensions -- political, military, developmental, humanitarian, human rights -- will lead us to long-term solutions. Humanitarian assistance by itself cannot suffice. Indeed, the provision of humanitarian aid alone can, in some cases, and despite our best efforts, lead to unintended adverse consequences. None the less, the international community has not yet come to terms with the challenge of implementing such a holistic vision.
The United Nations, the humanitarian community and our partners in civil society must always keep one eye on the crisis of the moment while training the other on the threats of the future. We must work together to analyse the complex and changing environment in which humanitarian assistance is delivered, and we must improve our understanding of the impact humanitarian intervention has on an ongoing conflict. We also need to develop policies to facilitate the transition from short-term operational action to longer-term structural prevention in order to break the cycle of violence and human suffering. Only then will we be able to adjust national, regional and international mechanisms for political and humanitarian response to deadly conflicts.
This forum has been convened to discuss these and other important issues. Among the participants are many eminent persons who have received international recognition for their contributions in the political and humanitarian fields. I am confident that your in-depth discussions over the next two days will produce many ideas and initiatives from which we all can benefit. I wish you every success in your deliberations.
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