Somalia: World pays attention to pirates again

The United States, Britain, France and Panama introduced a draft resolution, urging maritime powers to fight off pirates on the Somali coast that have been endangering cargo and fishing boats. UN officials said it is time for action to be taken, arguing that the government of Somalia is not in a position to deal with the escalating piracy on its own. (Side note to pirate fans: Piracy definitely still exists in the modern world...and not just along the coasts of Somalia. Check out this "2008 piracy attack map," created by the International Maritime Bureau.)

The latest on the crisis
For background on the crisis in Somalia, click here.

On Jan. 30, UN officials said the situation in Somalia is "the world's worst humanitarian crisis," even worse than the ongoing genocide in Darfur that has now lasted over four years. On April 25, the UN reported how renewed violence has driven 7,000 more people from Mogadishu. According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, 700,000 people have been driven from the capital in 2007 alone. The transitional government's army; intervening Ethiopian troops; as well as dozens of clan-based militias, anti-Ethiopian groups, and Islamic militants have been clashing violently since Jan. 2007 to devastate the nation's capital and its surroundings. Rarely does the word "chaos" characterize the circumstances of a city so perfectly as it does today in Mogadishu. Refugees International also calls Somalia the "world's most neglected crisis," as the violence has been significantly hampering international relief efforts.

The UN envoy to Somalia Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah is trying to bring together the pertinent actors for a low profile meeting in Djibouti on May 10 to restart a dialogue so the various actors can come to a "minimal political understanding." Though Somalia has been requesting the deployment of a UN peacekeeping force, Ould-Abdallah says that the force would probably not have much effect until there has been internal political progress. This is a wise statement, given the poor history of humanitarian intervention in Somalia (shadows of Black Hawk Down) and the almost undecipherable state of affairs Mogadishu.

After both the transitional government and some opposition groups began circulating peace proposals in March, the ENOUGH Project , released a report on April 24th that argues how a rare window of opportunity for peace may be emerging. Prendergast, authoring the report, rightly says how securing a ceasefire will entail addressing the opposition's basic demand of Ethiopian troops withdrawing. The core of initial negotiations need to center around the terms of the withdrawal, taking into account any consequences this may impose upon the political process and the lives of civilians. As the transitional government's mandate is running out, the challenges that lie ahead include complex negotiations of all parties to form a power-sharing agreement and a transnational unity government for Somalia to be able to function as a state. UN envoy Ould-Abdallah will need significant international support as this process hopefully moves forward.

The report further recommends that the UN Security Council undergo the following to create international leverage:
• Impose targeted sanctions against any Somali leader clearly fomenting further violence and the small percentage of the Somali diaspora that is financing the fighting
• Establish a commission of inquiry to investigate violations of international law
• Refer the case of Somalia to the International Criminal Court for investigations into war crimes and crimes against humanity. Until the cycle of impunity is ended, there will be no hope for peace in Somalia.

Iraq: Tariq Aziz's trial begins

Yesterday, the Iraqi Special Tribunal opened the trial of Tariq Aziz, a former Iraqi deputy prime minister and one of Saddam Hussein's most prominent lieutenants, who is charged of genocide for approving the execution of scores of business people while Iraq faced economic sanctions. Aziz's team of lawyers includes our favorite, Jacques Verges, who has a history of defending some of the most evil men of contemporary history. (Read more about Verges from this previous post).

The court quickly adjourned yesterday, however, due to the fact that a co-defendant, Ali Hassan al-Majid (a.k.a. "Chemical Ali"), was too ill to attend. Chemical Ali is already on death row and was sentenced to hang. In June 2007, he was convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes for the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Kurds during the "Anfal" campaigns. For background on the genocidal "Anfal" campaigns in Iraq of 1988, click here.

It is also important to note that the procedures of trials in the Iraqi Special Tribunal have come under some scrutiny from human rights groups. Human Rights Watch has extensively written on flaws of the tribunal, especially regarding Saddam Hussein's trial, which found him guilty of committing crimes against humanity in Dujail. Below are some of the flaws that have been highlighted in their reports.

Regarding the trial:
• regular failure to disclose key evidence, including exculpatory evidence, to the defense in advance;
• violations of the defendants’ basic fair trial right to confront witnesses against them;
• lapses of judicial demeanor that undermined the apparent impartiality of the presiding judge; and
• important gaps in evidence that undermine the persuasiveness of the prosecution case, and put in doubt whether all the elements of the crimes charged were established.

Regarding the judgment:
• Relying solely on the defendants’ government positions to establish that they had knowledge and intent to commit the crimes;
• Failing to show the actual lines of command and control needed to establish the responsibility of leaders for the acts of their subordinates;
• For lower-level defendants, relying on their status as Ba`th party members to show that they had the intent to commit the crimes without pointing to evidence of the nature of the Ba`th regime and instead relying on “common knowledge” to determine the defendant’s individual criminal intent; and,
• Failure to address numerous instances of same-day or late disclosure of prosecution evidence to the defense that was used at trial.

DRC: The mess continues and the world needs to care

A messy confluence of multiple armed conflicts has been endangering civilians in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) for decades. The background and the roots of violence are simply too complex to synthesize in a blog post. Click here to learn about the conflict in the Kivu regions of the country that this post discusses.

Just a bit of background on recent developments in the Kivus for some context -- starting in August 2007, General Laurent Nkunda's militias began to launch major campaigns of indiscriminate attacks against pro-government camps and villages, committing massive human rights violations against thousands of civilians. Meanwhile, the Congolese army has also been summarily executing civilians and has been using excessive force to combat Nkunda's armies. As the violence almost led the country into yet another major civil war, regional and international pressure allowed for a peace agreement to be signed on Jan. 23 in Goma, with the parties agreeing to an alleged ceasefire.

Although the violence did calm down for a few months, the Goma agreement largely failed as civilians are still being killed and raped on a regular basis by multiple actors. Bound to happen, a new wave of renewed violence begun last week, forcing hundreds to flee the Kivu regions once again (some report thousands), adding to the approximately 1.5 million people who are displaced in the DRC. This time the violence mainly involved clashes between the government and former Rwandan militias known as the Forces Démocratiques de la Libération du Rwanda (FDLR). Since the Rwandan genocide, the FDLR has also been a major player in the Kivu conflict along with the Congolese army and Nkunda's troops. Clashes between rival militant groups also have been continuing to the plight of civilians, as eight people died yesterday according to MONUC (the UN peacekeeping force in the DRC).

Other routine atrocities in the region are continuing as well. UNICEF expressed concerns of heightened levels of recruitment of child soldiers in March. Landmines continue to haunt the daily lives of the millions of displaced people in the country.

Given its complex nature, the deeply-rooted conflict in the Kivus is one of several ongoing in the world where there really seems to be no end without: (1) focused, robust diplomatic pressure from the international community; and (2) a significant boost in funding for the region's UN peacekeeping force. Unfortunately, as it does not look as if though either will happen in the near future given everything else that is going on in the world, expert human rights groups are trying to take it one step at a time. On April 22nd, 63 leading non-governmental organizations (NGOs) urged the United Nations and officials who helped negotiate the Goma agreement to appoint a high-level special adviser to look into the human rights violations in the eastern DRC.

On the judicial end, warlord Thomas Lubanga Dyilo's trial will be beginning in June at the International Criminal Court (ICC). Lubanga has been charged for conscription and enlistment of children under the age of 15, and the use of children for active participation in hostilities. In addition, the ICC just today controversially issued a warrant for Laurent Nkunda's military chief Bosco Ntaganda, also known as "The Terminator," also for the recruitment of child soldiers. Critics argue the warrant was untimely and did not consider the sensitivities of the peace process, similar to the case of Joseph Kony in Uganda (see previous post).

Though these marginal steps are being taken and negotiations between regional governments continue, there is still a lot of ground to cover...literally. The DRC is huge. The country is approximately the size of western Europe. It is so big, in fact, that there are regions that have not even been mapped yet! Therefore, despite the fact that MONUC is one of the largest UN peacekeeping missions deployed, the force is more than overstretched. Keep in mind the situation in the Kivus is only one of a number of conflicts that is devastating the country. Just imagine 16,000 peacekeepers having to protect endangered civilians and 1.5 million displaced people in all of western Europe with serious eruptions of violence happening all over the place. It's impossible. And, to make matters worse, the peacekeeping force itself is committing human rights violations, according to Human Rights Watch!

Depressing, eh? Is there even a solution to this? Check out the International Crisis Group's recommendations here. As they indicate, this will never end unless the root-causes of the crisis are addressed. Though there are short-term steps that need to be taken to implement the Goma agreement, in reality, a long-term peace plan needs to be laid out for all parties in multiple conflicts to come to terms with the government. In future posts, I'd like to address what this entails in more detail.

Why focus on this? In the long term, the DRC will be one of a number of conflict-ridden countries in Africa that will become important in the global economy. The beginnings of this are already starting to surface. On April 21st, banks, businesses, and representatives of African nations met in London to discuss building what would become the world's largest dam. The $80 billion Grand Inga dam would dwarf China's Three Gorges dam in size. We also see Belgium, the DRC's former colonial ruler, pressuring the government to expedite economic reforms to attract foreign investors, especially in the region's gargantuan mining industry. China Railway recently said it would invest $2.9 billion in a copper and cobalt mining project in the DRC. The potential for economic profits from the vast amounts of hidden resources amidst the jungles and the gunfire of this country are largely unknown to the world. To prevent corruption and mass atrocities to destroy the country's future, the UN needs to come up with an effective long-term strategy to solve the problems in this country asap. And, of course, the millions of civilians who have survived decades of violent chaos really deserve some peace in their lives sometime in the near future.

Zimbabwe: It's getting worse

For background, see previous post on Zimbabwe.

The government of Zimbabwe claims that reports of violence have been exaggerated by the press. Yet, they cannot refute the concrete facts from on-the-ground investigations that have been undertaken by human rights groups.

On April 25th, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported that "President Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party and state security forces have sharply intensified a campaign of organized terror and torture against opposition activists and ordinary Zimbabweans." With documented abuse ranging from ears being cut off to women and children being pelted with rocks and logs, victims of the attacks are watching their flesh rot as they claim that people will come back to kill them if they went to the hospital. HRW also reported that during a raid on the opposition party's (MDC) headquarters, 40 armed policemen forced "scores of men, women and children into a pickup truck and bus"...their whereabouts are still unknown. There were around 250 people taking shelter in the MDC headquarters from the political violence that opposition members have been subjected to. As torture camps have been set up and homes are being razed, political violence has begun to reach gruesomely, alarming levels.

Reverend Stephen Maengamhuru from a local NGO called ZimRights said: "We now have a situation where people sleep out in the open because they fear spending the night at their homes." A New York Times article today recounts the story of villagers in Manicaland who were taken from their beds at midnight, pelted with stones, ordered by the police to empty their homes the following day by the police, and watched as their houses were destroyed by young thugs. This BBC report catalogues further stories.

As these atrocities continue, the "partial recount" of the presidential poll was completed today and the verification of the results by the candidates will start tomorrow and could take up to a week. The results did indicate that the opposition has taken control of parliament. This spurred MDC leader Tsvangirai to further reiterate that he would not take part in a run-off.

Given these grim state of affairs, assistant US secretary of state for African affiars Jendayi Frazer called for international intervention, claiming that the violence has made a credible run-off election "unlikely." Last week, she had announced that Tsvangirai was the clear victor of the elections.

The top UN human rights official Louise Arbour said: "If serious and systematic human rights violations persist, they will undermine national and regional attempts to defuse the present political crisis." As the UN Security Council gets belatedly briefed on the situation next week, the international community needs to act swiftly to prevent these atrocities to escalate to uncontrollable levels. With the political crisis to be undoubtedly prolonged for at least a few more weeks, international pressure and effective negotiations between the parties will become critical for Mugabe to call off the violence.

Darfur: Impunity frustrates the ICC

Darfur and the ICC
For background on Darfur, see links at previous post.

Over the weekend, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Luis Moreno Ocampo, warned the Sudanese government they will start looking into issuing warrants against up to five more Sudanese officials if the two currently wanted suspects are not arrested by June 5th. The ICC issued warrants for Ahmed Haroun and Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-al-Rahman (also know as Ali Kushayb) about a year ago. They have been charged of 51 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, suspected of organizing and inciting murder, rape, and torture, as well as the forced displacement of villagers in the Darfur region of Sudan.

The Sudanese regime has been completely disregarding the requests of the court and has done nothing but to irk the international community by persisting to prolong impunity. Since the release of the warrants, the government commissioned Ahmed Haroun, former interior minister of humanitarian affairs, to co-chair a committee to hear complaints from Darfurian victims of human rights abuses. Meanwhile, Ali Kushayb, after being allegedly charged for committing human rights violations as a Janjaweed leader, was released from prison after the ICC warrant was issued.

The negligence of the Sudanese government to follow ICC requests has spurred some noteworthy activism (Washington Post op-ed by Angelina Jolie). By using Google Earth and Facebook, activist networks are trying to have people all over the world try and track the two fugitives so they can be arrested.

Sudanese officials continue to claim that they have no responsibilities to turn the suspects over, as the government of Sudan has not ratified the Rome Statute of the ICC.

The US and the ICC
On a tangential note, a senior US official said on April 26th that the United States now "accepts the reality" of the International Criminal Court. The US has yet to ratify the Rome Statute of the ICC as well, raising eyebrows from the 100+ countries around the world that have. The state department's chief lawyer John Bellinger said: "The U.S. must acknowledge that the ICC enjoys a large body of international support, and that many countries will look to the ICC as the preferred mechanism."

Presidential candidates diverge on where they stand on this issue but their perspectives may change. Taken from a Wall Street Journal report:

"All three senators running for president -- Republican John McCain and Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama -- have voiced reservations about the court, but said they would consider closer cooperation with it.

In 2002, both Arizona Sen. McCain and New York Sen. Clinton voted for the anti-court legislation. But Sen. McCain said in 2005 that "I want us in the ICC, but I'm not satisfied that there are enough safeguards," Reuters reported.

This year, Sen. Clinton said she would "reassess how we can best engage with this institution and hold the worst abusers of human rights to account," in a candidate questionnaire from the American Society of International Law.

Illinois Sen. Obama said much the same, adding, "I will consult thoroughly with our military commanders and also examine the track record of the court before reaching a decision on whether the United States should" join.

The Darfur investigation "is likely to do more than any other factor...to shape U.S. perceptions of the role and impact of the ICC," Mr. Bellinger said Friday. "We want to see the ICC's Darfur work succeed," and are "prepared to consider" providing assistance, he said."

Niger Delta: A fight for oil and human rights

For general background on the conflicts in Nigeria, click here.

The Niger Delta, about the size of Scotland, has been known to produce a vast majority of oil within Nigeria, one of the world's top crude oil exporters. As millions of impoverished people have been politically and economically marginalized by continuously corrupt political regimes, guerrilla movements have slowly been materializing in the late twentieth century to lash out against the government. In recent years, militants have become more organized under a loose coalition called the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), who strive to gain control of the resources in the region and regularly launch attacks against oil pipelines. For more on the history of the Delta region, check out this briefing [PDF] by the International Crisis Group. One interesting aspect the report highlights is how the Delta was an epicenter for the slave trade in the sixteenth century -- about a quarter of American slaves are said to have come from Nigeria. Some of these past grievances continue to exist today as Chevron's largest production facility has ironically been built at the point on Escravos River where slaves were massively shipped to the Americas.

Another Crisis Group briefing outlines how Nigerian communities see no reason to protect the oil pipelines from militant activities. The government has continued to horde the profits from oil and failed to alleviate the widespread poverty of ordinary civilians. Furthermore, many claim that, over the years, oil companies have spilled enough oil to significantly affect the environment of the region.

Although President Yar'Adua has done more to negotiate and meet some of the demands of MEND, the core points of tension that have to do with local control of oil and other resources remain unresolved. After failed peace talks between the government and militants, new waves of violence have sprung up to affect not only Nigerians and oil companies, but also the global marketplace.

Once again, MEND has claimed responsibility for an attack on a Shell pipeline today. MEND claims it has now blown up four major pipelines in the last week. According to analysts, the already skyrocketing oil prices have once again crept up as a result. MEND leaders are continuing to fight for the government to allocate more oil revenue towards the impoverished communities in the Delta, protesting negligent marginalization. As gang violence and industrial labor strikes are also continuing to increase in the region, the Nigerian government has come under a lot of pressure to put an end to these insurgencies.

This case brings to light the impact that armed insurgencies can have in the conflict-ridden regions of today's world, particularly given the current global food crisis and the skyrocketing prices of natural resources. With proper mobilization in situations, it would not be shocking for rebels to gain significant leverage by targeting pipelines and resource reserves, regardless of the atrocities and the human rights violations committed. If these trends continue, companies that rely on production facilities in these kinds of regions may need to seriously rethink the implications of their operations and strive to understand the impact that human rights violations in these armed conflicts are having on the global economy.

Colombia: Human Rights vs. Free Trade

For background on human rights violations in Colombia, click here.

Though Nicholas Kristoff rightly mentions how violence in Colombia has decreased substantially in the past few years, the situation isn't exactly paradise. With estimates ranging up to 4 million displaced people in the country, Colombia still has the second to highest rate of internal displacement in the world. Many of the displaced now living collectively in what are called "humanitarian zones" are still unable to return to their own land. Additionally, guerrilla warfare against innocent civilians by groups such as the FARC (also on the US terrorist list), abuses by the Colombian military against civilians, assassinations of trade unionists, and threats against human rights activists have been continuing to terrorize the country.

Regardless of these ongoing atrocities, President Bush has become good friends with Colombian president Alvaro Uribe, due to his support for the war in Iraq and the country's nice supply of oil. Deciding to put aside the human rights situation in addition to the fact that the majority of cocaine in the US comes from Colombia, Bush has been aggressively pushing for Congress to ratify a free trade agreement (FTA) with them. In addition to the usual debate over the pros and cons of FTAs, human rights abuses have been highlighted as a disincentive for ratification. With the leadership of Nancy Pelosi, Democrats have put off the vote. Bush concedes that "this free-trade agreement is in our national interests...yet...it is dead unless the speaker schedules a definite vote." At a NAFTA summit yesterday, Bush and fellow partners once again pushed for the FTA. In response, Speaker Pelosi argues that an economic stimulus package for the US needs to come before the trade agreement with Colombia.

If negotiations continue, it is crucial for the US administration and presidential candidates (click here for their stances on trade) to fully take into account all the consequences that will arise from the FTA, not only in how it will affect the US economy but also in how it will affect the lives of civilians in Colombia.

The "devil's advocate" strikes again

If you are ever looking for an example of how some lawyers can be evil, Jaques Verges (aka "the devil's advocate") would be a good one. Policymakers and activists often say "who could possibly defend crimes like genocide." Clearly, Verges can. After already representing Nazi Gestapo officer Klau Barbie, Venezuelan terrorist Carlos the Jackal ("the world's most notorious terrorist"), former Yugoslav president and genocidaire Slobodan Milsosevic, and at times even Saddam Hussein and co.; Verges has now moved on to Cambodia to defend Khieu Samphan, an ex-official of the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime, who has been charged of crimes against humanity. A New York Times article reports how Verges and Samphan actually knew each"since they both were active in left-wing student activities in Paris in the 1950s." Might make sense since he further claims to have been friends with Pol Pot, himself. Good god.

After finding that none of his documents were translated in French, Verges erupted and caused quite the scene at the Special Tribunal for Cambodia. The judges recommended that Samphan seek a new attorney. The Special Tribunal for Cambodia are currently in the midst of initial proceedings in the cases of five former Khmer Rouge leaders, including Samphan.

Human rights litigation in the US: New approaches?

(Note to lawyers/legal scholars: Not being a lawyer, apologies in advance for any awkward legal inferences made in this blog. However, I will actually be starting law school in the fall at UC Hastings!)

An article published in the Notre Dame Law Review, "Arbitrating Human Rights," offers some interesting insights to human rights litigation in the US.

To provide some background, aside from activist campaigns of shaming corporations and divestment movements, lawyers across the world have been using the venue of US litigation to uphold corporate liability for human rights abuses.

The article starts out by questioning whether this kind of litigation can punish the actual perpetrators (often, sovereign entities), rather than just the corporations that serve as "accomplices" to the human rights abuses. Attempts to punish the states directly have largely failed due to the Foreign Sovereign Immunity Act (1976), which grants immunity to all foreign sovereign states from the jurisdiction of US courts. As a result, successful human rights litigation has targeted corporations, often suing for tortious damages incurred by the victims. I'm hoping to post more extensively on this at a later time...this gets discussed in the legal world a lot, the subject rarely comes elsewhere.

Anyway, the article goes on to suggest that litigators can potentially use the playing field of suing corporations as a trigger to indirectly punish sovereign states committing human rights abuses. In the cases where corporations are held liable for human rights abuses, they have generally engaged in contractual relationships with the entity that can claim immunity under US law. The article argues that the sovereign immunity in the US does not prevent a corporation from pressuring the sovereign state they contracted with to share liability. So as a hypothetical example, Exxon has a contract with Indonesia which establishes that the government's military will protect Exxon's oilfields. Although the victims of human rights abuses by the military cannot sue Indonesia, they can sue Exxon. What the article suggests is that there is nothing preventing Exxon from pressuring Indonesia to uphold its share of liability after the lawsuit. This can potentially be done through arbitrating the terms of the corporation's contract with the sovereign entity. So Exxon would engage Indonesia in arbitrations to try and get the government to share the blame and pay up. The article also highlights other possible tactics such as having stakeholders (such as shareholders) of the company to invoke their rights and get involved as well. This tactic is already being used by divestment movements that are trying to get shareholder meetings of companies to highlight their investments' complicity in aiding various human rights violations.

Currently, a whole swath of class action lawsuits are barraging corporations with poor human rights track records, including allegations such as from aiding the South African apartheid regime (the Supreme Court will be deciding whether to hear this case or not on Friday). It will be interesting to see if any litigators pursue these kinds of ambitious but innovative approaches to try and hold the actual perpetrators accountable, rather than just the "accomplices."

Uganda: Continuing Impunity

For background on the conflict in Uganda and the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), click here.

After two years of torturous negotiations, the current situation of peace talks in Uganda currently is in a very delicate phase. With the conflict between the Ugandan government and the LRA going on for over 22 years, a ceasefire was signed on Feb. 2008 with the intention of finally bringing an end to the atrocities that have been haunting civilians for decades. Unfortunately, Joseph Kony, the fugitive leader of the LRA, continues to derail the peace process by failing to show up to sign the peace agreement, as he continues to hide in camps within the Democratic Republic of Congo. Despite international pressure from the United States urging Kony to sign the agreement on April 21st, no progress has been made to bring Kony to the table.

Meanwhile, the ceasefire has been unsuccessful in putting an end to LRA activities. The LRA have abducted over 350 people in the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Sudan over the past few weeks -- most of the abductees being women and children who will most likely become sex slaves and child soldiers. Amnesty International has been active in attempting to get the UN to assist regional governments to find the abducted. Over the years, as many as 60,000 children have been abducted. Reportedly abducted children (ages 11 - 15) make up reportedly 85 - 90% of LRA soldiers. Stories of the "invisible children" have been spurring many to take action around the world. Additionally, over a million people are still displaced as a result of the conflict.

The government of Uganda, a signatory of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, referred this crisis to the court in 2003. In 2005, the Court issued arrest warrants for Joseph Kony, Vincent Otti, Okot Odhiambo, Dominic Ongwen, and Raska Lukwiya. Three years later, shockingly only 2 of these 5 wanted men are currently still alive -- Lukwiya was killed by Ugandan forces in 2006; Vincent Otti was executed by Kony with great mystery at his home in 2007; and recent, internal LRA bouts have resulted in the death of Odhiambo just a few weeks ago.

As the target sources for key judicial investigations are quickly disappearing, it is imperative that the international community strive to put more teeth into enforcing ICC warrants. (This is not a Uganda-specific problem and applies for arrest warrants in Sudan, the Central African Republic, and other conflict-ridden countries.) However, it is also important to note that the timing of the arrest may significantly affect the currently, frozen peace negotiations between Ugandan government and the LRA. The delicacy of these issues continue to rack the nerves of international mediators.

Preparing for the Olympics: Explosions of Activism

For background on the developments of the Olympic protests, click here.

On April 8th, a representative of the International Olympic Committee said Olympic torch relays should be confined to the host country in the future. The scope of campaigns using the Olympics to shame China and raise awareness on the chronic, Chinese human rights violations in Tibet have reached unprecedented levels. Protests and demonstrations have sprung up virtually all over the world to follow the Olympic torch, demanding "a free Tibet." Even in the United States, officials had to fake protesters in San Francisco by changing the torch's route at the last minute to avoid violent clashes.

These large-scale protests have also had unintended consequences to strongly anger the pro-China crowd. In particular, images of a Chinese wheelchair-bound Olympic torch bearer fighting through violent demonstrations in Paris strongly affected Chinese communities. This incident spurred a series of ongoing, counter-protests in China against France and the western media. For a number of days, protests have been ongoing in numerous Chinese cities. Demonstrations have been targeting institutions such as CNN and Carrefour, one of France's largest supermarket chains. Some stories that have received attention amidst the chaos include the death of an American volunteer teacher in an anti-Carrefour protest in the Hunan province; and a Chinese student studying in the US becoming the victim of horrible threats, as she attempts to mediate between pro-China and pro-Tibet activists at Duke University. These incidents demonstrate the breadth to which these campaigns have extended...and the Olympics haven't even started yet.

Tibet activists are not the only ones who have been using the Olympics as a means to pressure China. Darfur activists, organized under the Dream for Darfur campaign, have been emulating torch relays around the world to venues such as Darfur, Rwanda, Bosnia, Armenia, Cambodia, and Germany, spreading the slogan: "the Genocide Olympics." The campaign has been striving to highlight how China's massive investments in the oil and energy sectors in Sudan have been financing the ongoing genocide in Darfur.

One major inference to draw from the massive scale of these incidents is that China and other states who have a record of human rights violations must take great care in promoting any sort of major, international programming they plan to host. Imagine if Sudan, Burma, or Zimbabwe were to host the next World Cup or some sort of an international exposition. Human rights activism is not to be taken lightly anymore. Although Carrefour claims to not be substantially affected by the protests economically, this precedent still gives companies ample reason to strategically avoid sponsoring events held by states with poor human rights records. The willingness of companies to make these conscious choices can be found within the success of the Sudan divestment movement, which has already gotten 24 states, 59 universities, and 19 cities to divest from companies that have investments in Sudan in less than 2 years. The movement has furthermore initiated international campaigns in 18 other countries.

Zimbabwe: Escalating Disaster

For background information on Zimbabwe click here.

State-sponsored violence spurred by Robert Mugabe has significantly worsened as election results have yet to be released. A Human Rights Watch report found that Mugabe's ZANU-PF party has been using an informal network of detention centers to beat, torture, and intimidate opposition activists. The report also indicates how members of the opposition have been largely rendered homeless in Harare, the nation's capital. Church leaders have even gone as far to say that the state of affairs is such that the violence could escalate to "genocidal proportions."(Note: the author is not claiming that the situation is a genocide.)

Having lived in abject poverty resulting in an average life expectancy of 42 years, the daily struggles of hunger and deprivation of human rights have been hitting civilians particularly hard since the country's inflation rate reached 100,000% in Feb. 2008. According to the UN, ZANU activities are also obstructing humanitarian relief efforts, further aggravating the situation for the 4 million people in the country whose livelihoods consist only of foreign aid.

Given these devastating circumstances, the end result of this political crisis will become a significant turning point in the country's history.

Perhaps due to the massive coverage the recent eruption of violence the political crisis in Kenya received in the past months, the international community has begun to stir a little after seeing the situation deteriorating. On April 21st, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon met with opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai for half an hour in Ghana, resulting in Ban to begin belated discussions with the AU on ways to move forward.

One good piece of news: arms shipped from China to Zimbabwe may be recalled. China has been under intense pressure for shipping weapons to the genocidal regime of Sudan in addition to the fire it has been receiving for its human rights abuses against Tibet. Though the shipment to Zimbabwe was allegedly done under "normal circumstances," African countries such as Zambia and South African have asked that the arms be returned given the current state of affairs.

Next steps forward for the international community? Here is a link to recommendations put forward by the International Crisis Group. So far, the major international action that has been taken was the convening of a Southern African Development Community Summit to assess the elections. Unfortunately, the summit disappointed the opposition party and civil society by failing to offer any useful solutions or statements. The Economist released an article on Zimbabwe focused on how "worsening repression inside Zimbabwe provokes only a feeble response from African neighbours."

Both regional and international pressure will become key for the government of Zimbabwe to feel the need to quickly dissolve this crisis. Without the implementation of proper leverage, there is a strong likelihood for human rights violations to escalate to a point where "opposition members" will become loosely defined and a broad scope of civilians will be targeted by mass atrocities via major state-sponsored campaigns.

Darfur: Negative progress but still hope

(For general background on the conflict in Darfur, click here.)

In the wake of the UN Secretary-General stating that the situation may be further worsening in the Darfur region, UN/AU officials said this past weekend: "warring parties have agreed to discuss ways of improving security in the region, but stopped short of promising ceasefires or new peace talks."

This truly demonstrates how the peace process has been devolving from making any progress, as the conflict in Darfur now enters its fifth year. At this point, several major attempts have been made to bring the necessary parties together for constructive negotiations...the most recent ones being in Libya in October 2007. It is extremely disheartening to see how parties have gone backwards to say once again that it is not possible to even talk about the potential for a ceasefire. As an LA Times article puts it: "The long-hobbled Darfur peace process has all but collapsed."

Furthermore, UNAMID, the new joint UN-AU peacekeeping force, continues to encounter obstacles to efficiently carry out its mandate. Although some resources such as desperately-needed helicopters are starting to trickle in, obstruction by the Sudanese government and logistical problems have been severely hampering any potential for progress.

Despite these state of affairs, activists congregated on April 13th around the world for a Global Day for Darfur, with masses gathering in London and students marching to the White House in Washington. The tenacity of young activists, spearheaded by a group called STAND which has over 1,000 chapters across the country, is truly unprecedented.

Sharing a similiar energy and passion towards this issue, Nicholas Kristof listed 8 concrete steps that the US administration could take to help end the conflict. As he says in his article, these steps do not guarantee that the genocide will end. However, if met, these benchmarks will definitely play a significant part in directing the current, shattered state of affairs towards a more workable climate for mediators and peacekeepers.

Peacekeeping for the Next US President

The Stimson Center and the Better World Campaign recently released a report (PDF) called: "Peace and Stability Operations: Challenges and Opportunities for the Next U.S. Administration." (p.8). The report provides a list of recommendations of how the next US administration can work more cooperatively with the UN through, including financial and logisitical support, diplomacy, training peacekeepers, and contributing experts.

The report also touches upon an unfortunate irony embedded within current US-UN relations. Washington is one of the largest donors to the UN peacekeeping budget. However, as the report says, the US "chronically under-budgets its share of UN peacekeeping costs, even as it votes for more and expanded peacekeeping missions on the Security Council." As a result, the US has accumulated the world's largest debt to the UN: $1.5 billion and growing (according to the Better World Campaign).

Yet, here is a list of peacekeeping missions US recently voted in favor for (p.5 of report):

• A new peacekeeping mission in Somalia;
• A seven-fold expansion of the UN’s peacekeeping mission in Lebanon;
• The four-fold expansion of the peacekeeping mission in Darfur;
• Reauthorization of the UN’s peacekeeping missions in Haiti and Liberia;
• A renewed peacekeeping mission for East Timor; and
• New missions in Chad, the Central African Republic, and Nepal.

The report also mentions how "most peace missions struggle to attract the manpower and the funds to make a real change." (p.2)

With regards to UN peacekeeping, it seems that the responsibility of the next administration (and of those in the future) will be two-fold:
(1) To rebudget how to continue sustaining its contributions to UN peacekeeping in an effective way, while also paying off its debt. (This is, of course, after figuring out how they want to refinance new strategies in Iraq and Afghanistan.)
(2) To assume a strong leadership role in the Security Council and ensure that all peacekeeping missions have the appropriate balance of its effectiveness regarding the scope of its mandate, and sufficient funding for operationalization. The US needs to take leadership over this issue so we can overcome the current global norm of failing to muster appropriate manpower and funds to make a real change in conflicts that are devastating millions of innocent civilians.

General post about this blog

This is a blog about global politics, human rights and international law. The subjects that will be discussed here will be focused primarily on political, economic, and legal implications of armed conflicts around the world, where groups are committing mass atrocities against innocent civilians with impunity.

In dozens of regions around the world, innocent civilians are currently being targeted by mass atrocities. In the few years since the turn of the century, we have seen: ongoing genocide in Darfur; massive insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan; prolonged military repression in Burma; political violence in Kenya and now Zimbabwe; resurgence of deadly conflict in countries such as Somalia; Democratic Republic of Congo, Sri Lanka,....the list goes on and on.

Although national and international peacekeeping forces of varying sizes and structures have been deployed and even wars have been waged to combat these egregious acts, the current state of international politics has yet to develop an adequate mechanism that allows for the protection of civilians and the prevention of future conflict. A far deeper problem lies in the lack of infrastructure and resources that is available for post-conflict economic development. Regardless of burgeoning advocacy efforts for civilian protection, victims of mass atrocities continue to be stripped of property, access to economic resources, and political voice.

Furthermore, the pursuit of justice via international criminal tribunals has continued to lack efficiency and teeth. The government of Sudan continues to ignore the International Criminal Court's warrants against its ministers. Criminal tribunals in Rwanda, the former Yugoslavia, and Cambodia continue to encounter hordes of obstacles. With global judicial initiatives proceeding at a snail's pace, impunity continues to thrive unabated. On the US front, the legal proceedings against the alleged terrorists that are controversially detained at Guantanamo Bay have become entangled in jurisdictional appeals and federal intervention. Frustrations and growing pains continue to challenge the field of international law.

As the world emerged from bipolar Cold War politics in the 1990s, effectively responding (or not) to large-scale mass atrocities has been a tremendous headache for policymakers. One of the main points of tension comes from the struggle of finding the right balance between maintaining national interest, and appropriating desired levels of funding and resources. As globalization continues to develop international infrastructure and cooperation, tracking this debate becomes critical in the twenty-first century.

As international norms are beginning to evolve to put a stronger emphasis on human rights, unprecedented levels of activism (especially from students) have surfaced to help end the genocide in Darfur, divest from companies that have investments in the Sudan, protest human rights violations against Tibet, and military repression in Burma. As societal values and demands of consumers begin to take these issues into account in the twenty-first century, these conflicts begin to pose significant implications not only to global politics but also to the marketplace, international law, and cultural interactions.

This blog hopes to bring these kinds of issues up for discussion. All comments welcome!