In progress at UNHQ

PRESS CONFERENCE BY REPRESENTATIVES OF HUMANITARIAN GROUPS

13 April 2000



Press Briefing


PRESS CONFERENCE BY REPRESENTATIVES OF HUMANITARIAN GROUPS

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The United Nations could be more effective in protecting civilians in armed conflicts, said Paul Smith-Lomas, Humanitarian Director of Oxfam Great Britain, at a Headquarters press conference yesterday evening. Also present were James Orbinski, MD, President International Council, Médecins sans Frontières, and Guy Tousignant, Secretary-General, CARE International. The press conference was sponsored by the Canadian Mission to the United Nations.

Earlier, the representatives of the aforementioned non-governmental organizations (NGOs) had briefed the Security Council under the Arria Formula, a special informal arrangement that allows the Council to hear from experts on international peace and security issues.

Speaking about Oxfam’s experiences in Sierra Leone, Mr. Smith-Lomas said that United Nations efforts could be made more effective by increased support for the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration process, by a stronger mandate for the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL), and by addressing the important question of illegal trade in arms and diamonds.

He expressed his support for the Secretary-General's and the Security Council's focus on protection of civilians in armed conflict as a global priority. Welcome as meetings like the one with the Security Council might be, he said, there was a need for a change in protection of people's lives on the ground in real life situations.

Dr. Orbinski, President, Médecins sans Frontières International Council, said that it was vital to establish a clear distinction between political actions -- including military and security actions -- and humanitarian operations. Humanitarian actors had to be allowed to pursue their objectives independently of any political agenda.

He had urged the Council to be very clear in its political problem definitions, and in the solutions that it seeks to impose in particular circumstances, and not to rely on feasible but imperfect solutions. As an example, he mentioned the situation in Rwanda in 1994, where the inability of the United Nations to identify a political crisis as a political crisis, coupled with its use of humanitarian language that sanitized the political reality of the genocide, had led to the perpetuation of that genocide.

In relation to issues of protection of civilians in conflict situations, he said the Security Council should consider new rules to govern use of the veto -- including abandonment of the veto and the requirement that members explain their vote.

Mr. Tousignant, Secretary-General of CARE International, said that implementation of the Secretary-General's recommendations in his report on protection of civilians in armed conflict would save lives, help prevent conflicts, and lessen human suffering. If the Security Council were to ignore the recommendations, it would have the reverse effect.

NGOs Press Conference - 2 - 13 April 2000

He said that during the discussion with the Council, three themes had emerged. First, in complex emergency situations, robust peacekeeping operations allowed humanitarian agencies to deliver assistance where it was needed. Second, there was a need for a political response to political problems, a humanitarian response to humanitarian problems, and robust and credible peacekeeping forces for military problems. Third, there was too often a tendency to take a short view of conflicts, rather than a long-term view of what was the root of the problem. Economic and social development was as important as anything else in providing protection to civilians at risk.

In answer to a question about "lessons learned", Dr. Orbinski noted the honest approach of the Secretary-General in evaluations of circumstances that had created failure. There was a need for absolute clarity and rigour in problem definition and in the solutions proposed for those problems, he said.

Asked whether the intervention in Kosovo was a military or humanitarian one, he answered that in his organization's view the term "humanitarian war" was an oxymoron. "One cannot use the tools of violence in the name of humanitarianism”, he said. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) action in Kosovo had had clear and obvious political causes. The "humanitarian" actions of NATO had put civilians at risk. NATO was a belligerent in the war. NATO refugee camps had been shelled because they were NATO sites. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had been effectively sidelined by the power of NATO, because of NATO’s public relations need to use a humanitarian justification for its actions.

The problem with the Rwanda genocide, he said to another correspondent's question, was that no member of the Security Council was able to call a genocide a genocide. The United States did not want to commit troops in the wake of its soldiers' death in Somalia in 1993. There should have been an intervention by the Council under international law and within existing frameworks. That would not have been a humanitarian intervention, but a genocide intervention.

The Rwanda genocide had been systematically organized and implemented by the army and militias, he went on. It was a State act against a section of that State's population. Genocide anywhere in the world was a complex situation requiring a robust force with the will to use force and take risks to stop it, he said.

Asked whether he believed that despite the earlier discussion with the Council, NGOs would be sidelined again, Mr. Smith-Lomas of Oxfam said that that would be inconsistent with the themes discussed. He had no fear of being sidelined. For years, NGOs and the United Nations had been on parallel tracks, but had seldom talked to each other in order to coordinate actions in the field. He therefore welcomed initiatives such as today's, where the Council had asked NGOs for their views. He hoped the discussions would be useful for the Council. He had always believed in working together on strategies, identifying problems and preventing the duplication of efforts. "The victim certainly deserves that much”, he said. Now, dialogue was taking place, both in the preventive phase, and during and after the conflict. The NGOs' independence or mandates need not be compromised in that process.

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For information media. Not an official record.