International Responses to Mass Atrocities in Africa. Kurt Mills
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Название: International Responses to Mass Atrocities in Africa
Автор: Kurt Mills
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Юриспруденция, право
Серия: Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights
isbn: 9780812291605
isbn:
Heading Toward Genocide
The early 1990s were a period of hope internationally. The Cold War had ended, the UN was no longer deadlocked, conflicts such as those in Namibia and Mozambique were being settled, and the UN began to flex its muscles a bit more as it expanded peacekeeping operations around the world. Yet this optimism was soon dashed as the UN failed for three years to adequately address the spreading conflict in the former Yugoslavia and also failed to bring to an end the fighting in Somalia, which began in 1991 and continues to this day. The Rwandan genocide has been covered in exhaustive detail elsewhere.1 Rather than going over old ground, the discussion below will highlight details that are salient for the ensuing analysis of competing responsibilities and pinpoint how the international community’s failure to deal with the genocide and its aftermath led directly to a much bigger crisis.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries Rwanda was controlled by Germany. After World War II, control of Rwanda was transferred to Belgium. As part of their strategy to control the population, the Belgians manipulated and reified previously fluid identities, resulting in two major groups—the minority Tutsi who ruled over the majority Hutu (as well as a much smaller group of Twa). Rwanda has experienced multiple instances of genocide and other conflict since it became independent of Belgium in 1962. Many Tutsi fled the country, in fear of the Hutu majority regime that took power at independence. Genocide occurred in 1963, and more Tutsi fled to neighboring countries—in particular Uganda—with more fleeing in 1972. In 1973, Juvénal Habyarimana, a Hutu, took power in a coup.2
In 1990, Tutsi militants in the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF)—many of whom had been trained and incorporated into the Ugandan military—invaded Rwanda. This failed, at least partly because France and Zaire sent forces to protect the government. Killing of Tutsi followed, as did further incursions from Uganda.3 An RPF attack in February 1993 led to renewed negotiations in Arusha, Tanzania, eventually resulting in a peace agreement (the Arusha Accords) and the creation, later in 1993, of a UN peacekeeping mission—the UN Mission in Rwanda (UNAMIR), led by Canadian general Roméo Dallaire.4 General Dallaire had originally planned for 8,000 troops, although the eventual number agreed on was 2,548. This was due to reluctance on the part of the United States and UK to fund yet another mission, with 80,000 troops in 17 UN peacekeeping missions already deployed, and with the U.S. responsible for one-third of the peacekeeping bill. Furthermore, the failure of the U.S. in Somalia made the U.S.—and the UN—more skittish about robust peace operations. They were worried about crossing the “Mogadishu Line” from peacekeeping to peace enforcement. Both UN and U.S. reviews of peacekeeping led to criteria that would constrain the use of force in UN operations, and thus delimited the possible boundaries of UN peacekeeping operations, including Rwanda.5 The U.S. initially wanted a token force of 500 troops, but eventually relented to a certain extent, allowing a large, but still inadequate, force to be created.6 The mandate of the mission was to support the transition to democratic governance. However, UNAMIR was severely underequipped and undersupported from the start, lacking a full complement of troops, key equipment such as helicopters and armored personnel carriers, desks, and chairs, and money to pay the troops.7
Map 2. Rwanda, Map No. 3717 Rev. 10, June 2008. United Nations.
On 11 January 1994, Gen. Dallaire sent a cable to the Secretary-General’s military adviser in New York, informing him that the Hutu leadership was planning to engage in mass killings against the Tutsi population,8 and indicating that he intended to seize weapons being stockpiled for the genocide.9 He was told not to undertake this activity, and the cable disappeared into the ether.10 UNAMIR’s second in command, Luc Marchal, said the “Mogadishu Syndrome”—the reluctance to engage in robust peacekeeping activities in the wake of the disastrous U.S. mission in Somalia in 1993 (also known as the “Somalia Syndrome”)—explained this inaction.11 On 3 February, Dallaire was told that he could monitor action by the police to investigate reports of, and seize, arms caches. He would have to inform the government, and since members of the government were complicit in the planned genocide, they were given plenty of warning of any operations, and the arms caches were never found.12 He also informed U.S., French, and Belgian diplomats. The first two countries dismissed the threat, while Belgium argued for more robust preventive measures, which came to nought.13
Three months later, on 6 April 1994, President Habyarimana’s plane was shot down. There is great speculation as to who was responsible; most point to Hutu militants,14 although Tutsi leader Paul Kagame has also been accused.15 Kagame was cleared in a 2012 French report.16 This event provided the shock that started the genocide. The killing of Tutsi by Hutu extremists—the interahamwe—started immediately. On 7 April ten Belgian peacekeepers, who had been sent to protect the prime minster, were killed. Belgium decided to pull out its peacekeepers on 12 April.17 There were calls in the Security Council to pull UNAMIR out entirely,18 even though Dallaire had asked for more troops to reinforce his dwindling force. At one point he estimated that 4,000 troops would have been sufficient to stop the killing and protect hundreds of thousands of lives.19 On 10 April he requested 5,000 troops and a more robust mandate. By this time, while not using the word genocide, he realized that widespread crimes against humanity were being carried out, with 50,000 people killed in four days.20 An independent report looking back at the events argued that 5,000 troops could have saved 500,000 lives, more than half the estimated 800,000 killed in the ensuing three months.21 Indeed, nineteen years later, President Clinton admitted that the United States could have saved at least 300,000 people if it had intervened.22 The president of the Security Council that month, Colin Keating from New Zealand, appealed for a robust response.23 Reports were sent by Gen. Dallaire and others detailing the killing.24
The pleas fell on deaf ears. Iqbal Riza, deputy to Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) head Kofi Annan, questioned whether peacekeepers should be involved in protecting civilians.25 The U.S. had little interest in Rwanda, which was strategically unimportant. It did not want to send in its own troops, and it did not want to fund yet another expanded peacekeeping operation with a much more robust enforcement mandate. Not wanting to commit to anything, it indicated from the beginning that the UN was the best place to address the situation. At the UN, it argued for pulling out of UNAMIR.26 The UK, too, was little interested.27 The French, who were deeply implicated in supporting the Habyarimana regime and had strategic and culture interests in Rwanda, did not want to support any action that might in the end support the English-speaking RPF, which had immediately entered the country to stop the genocide of its co-ethnics.28 Western countries did, however, send in forces to evacuate foreigners, a task with which UNAMIR had been authorized to assist.29 On 13 April, the RPF sent a message to the president of the Security Council describing the situation as genocide,30 invoking the Holocaust.31 Nigeria, which sat on the Security Council, wanted UNAMIR to be able to act more robustly, a suggestion that went nowhere.32
The Security Council took its first action on 21 April. It did not withdraw UNAMIR. Neither did it reinforce it. Rather, it decided to draw UNAMIR down to a force of 250 troops to negotiate a cease-fire, assist humanitarian operations, and “monitor and report on developments in Rwanda.”33 Observe is what it mostly did. With so few troops and a weak mandate, its hands were tied. The members СКАЧАТЬ