NEWS RELEASES

January 27, 2000 (12:00 p.m. EST) No. 13

CANADA ON THE UNITED NATIONS SECURITY COUNCIL:

FIRST YEAR REPORT

Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy today released a report on Canada's roles and achievements during the first year as a member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The report also contains a look ahead to Canada's priorities for the second year of its UNSC term. In its bid for election to a UNSC seat, Canada had defined human security, UNSC leadership and effectiveness, and making the UNSC more open, transparent and responsive as key objectives.

"Canada is a very active member of the Security Council. We are continuously pushing for the Council to broaden its concept of security to include conflict prevention, peacebuilding, human rights and humanitarian issues," said Minister Axworthy. "We will continue to work hard in the second half of our mandate to sustain the momentum that we generated last year."

Achievements reflect Canada's UNSC objectives including:

• launching a major human security initiative on the protection of civilians in armed conflict during the February 1999 UNSC presidency;

• chairing a UNSC working group with a mandate to lock in key recommendations of the Secretary-General's ground-breaking report on the protection of civilians in armed conflict;

• proposing an initiative that successfully broke a UNSC impasse on Iraq, and paved the way for the adoption in December 1999 of a new resolution on Iraq;

• actively chairing the UNSC committee that manages sanctions against the Angolan rebel movement UNITA; and

• securing UNSC agreement in December 1999 to a number of Canadian proposals for making the work of the UNSC more transparent and inclusive, including greater use of more open meeting formats to increase the UNSC's interaction with non-members and others who could contribute to the UNSC's deliberations.

"Human security will be Canada's main focus during the remainder of its UNSC mandate," said the Minister. "The action plan for this year includes consolidating the protection of civilians initiative and broadening participation in it beyond the UNSC, promoting more humane and effective UNSC sanctions, advancing the debate on humanitarian intervention and continuing to focus on transparency by including the wider UN membership in UNSC deliberations."

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A backgrounder is attached.

For further information, media representatives may contact:

Debora Brown

Office of the Minister of Foreign Affairs

(613) 995-1851

Media Relations Office

Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade

(613) 995-1874

Backgrounder

CANADA ON THE UN SECURITY COUNCIL

"The sovereignty of states remains a fundamental tenet and key measure of peace and security. But it is neither absolute nor a shield behind which the most egregious violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms can be protected."

(Minister of Foreign Affairs, Lloyd Axworthy, UN General Assembly, September 23, 1999)

Introduction

Over the past several years we have witnessed a growing recognition of the relevance of human security. Security, once the sacred domain of the state, is broadening to include individuals, peoples and their concerns. It is increasingly accepted that human security and national sovereignty are two sides of the same coin. They are mutually reinforcing and complimentary.

This past year has seen a marked increase in the number of actions taken in the name of human security around the world. In Kosovo, NATO nations undertook unprecedented military action to stop massive violations of human rights and war crimes, part of an orchestrated campaign of ethnic cleansing against innocent civilians by their own government. In East Timor, an international force was dispatched when rogue elements attacked helpless civilians in order to undo the results of a free and fair poll.

New willingness is emerging to demand and enforce adherence to international humanitarian, human rights and refugee laws and norms. There is also a growing recognition of the validity of Canada's multi-track effort over the past several years to put human security on a standing similar to national sovereignty.

This has been no small task. Canada has worked hard in several forums to make this a reality. In the past year the G-8, NATO, ASEAN and, of course, the UN have all been vital venues to promote this agenda. In our first year on the Security Council Canada used every possible opportunity to underscore, in the words of Minister Axworthy, that "threats to human security -- the risks that individuals, communities, people face in their daily lives -- often outweigh the risks to security occasioned by conflicts across borders." The following outlines some of the major initiatives Canada undertook on the Council and the most pressing issues and events which occupied the Council's time and energies over the past year.

CANADA ON THE UN SECURITY COUNCIL: FIRST YEAR REPORT

I. Canada's Agenda

Human Security

Canada took its seat on the Security Council with the belief that humanitarian principles and human rights should be given greater weight in its calculation of when to act. Egregious abuses of human rights tend to be harbingers of significant threats to international peace. Interpretations of the UN Charter must be more in step with the changing nature of conflict and the new challenges it poses, not only to international peace and security, but to fundamental values. Increasingly, conflicts are intrastate and their casualties overwhelmingly civilian, very often as deliberate targets, not collateral effects. In the absence of a Charter amendment which, given the veto, is close to impossible, the principles of state sovereignty and human security must be reconciled in practice. This necessitates a political, not a legal or constitutional, decision by the Council on how to respond.

Canada's seat on the Security Council is a powerful vehicle to drive this agenda. However, it should be noted that it was not the only means at our disposal, nor was it always the best means, given current political realities, to push our agenda forward. Having said that, Canada was able to accomplish much in terms of the human security agenda through the judicious use of this venue in 1999.

Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict

At the top of this list was the Secretary-General's Report on the Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict. During our presidency of the Council in February 1999, and in a presidential statement delivered by Minister Axworthy, we called on the Secretary-General to produce a report on the devastating effects of armed conflict on civilians and outline a series of recommendations that would better ensure their protection. The Minister spoke about how civilians were no longer innocent casualties of war, but often the targets. He outlined the challenges this disturbing reality presents to the international community and called for the Council to better ready itself and the United Nations as a whole to deal with them.

The result was the Secretary-General's Report to the Security Council on the Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict which, along with its forty recommendations, was presented to the Council in September 1999. The Secretary-General painted a stark and disturbing picture. He outlined how conflict destroys individual lives, families and entire societies -- how it often results in people being "forced from their homes, driven to borders that are open one minute and closed the next, forced into hiding, separated from their families, made to act as human shields, stripped of their identities and callously killed." His recommendations outlined key measures the Council and the international community should take to increase both the legal and physical protection of civilians. The key recommendations include efforts to: strengthen the UN's ability to respond rapidly when a crisis breaks out, through rapidly deployable units and mission headquarters; impose arms embargoes; make greater use of targeted sanctions against belligerents; underscore that civilians must have unimpeded access to humanitarian assistance; authorize missions to close down hate media outlets; and consider the imposition of appropriate enforcement action in the face of massive and ongoing abuses.

In order to maintain the momentum of the report, Canada now chairs an informal working group of the Security Council to further lock in its key recommendations when we again assume the Council's presidency in April. Canada will also establish a "friends of civilians in armed conflict" group which will include like-minded governments, UN departments and others within the UN system, as well as members of civil society and the NGO community. Canada will attempt to ensure that the recommendations are implemented horizontally in specific operational situations as they arise, such as decisions on peacekeeping mandates (e.g. Sierra Leone) and sanctions regimes.

We are also working with the International Peace Academy on a political and humanitarian assessment report on sanctions. In the Secretary-General's report, sanctions are an essential tool to protect civilians in armed conflict. The assessment will propose concrete options for making sanctions more humane and effective. The report and its recommendations will be made available in March and presented to the Council during Canada's April presidency. Canada will also follow up this report in the Peacekeeping Committee of the UN General Assembly.

More Effective and Humane Sanctions

In line with the report being produced with the International Peace Academy, Canada believes that the current thinking on sanctions must be updated. Sanctions, if they are not implemented judiciously, can often harm civilians. Comprehensive sanctions often result in high humanitarian costs, the disruption of trade, the emergence of a black market and the requirement of further humanitarian assistance. They can also have a negative impact on social infrastructures, resulting in higher levels of dependence on, and sympathy for the regime, both domestically and internationally.

The Council has at times resorted to sanctions as a substitute for the use of force when the will for the latter has been lacking; the results, however, have been mixed. Their indiscriminate qualities and potential for harming innocent civilians argue for "smarter", more focussed sanctions and increased enforcement capacity. Such sanctions include the freezing of assets of regime members and those who support them; suspension of credit and grant aid to the government; denial and limitation of access to overseas financial markets; embargoes on luxury goods; flight bans; diplomatic isolation; and denial of travel for members of the regime and their families.

As Chair of the Angola Sanctions Committee, Canada has explored ways of tightening the sanctions against UNITA, particularly curbing the illicit trade in arms and diamonds, and has set up an expert panel that will propose additional practical measures for consideration by the Council. The acceptance of these measures will be a test of Council resolve in making sanctions in Africa work. The combination of these initiatives establishes Canada as a leader on sanctions reform and provides one focus for the remainder of our Council term.

Greater Transparency

Canada believes that when dealing with issues like sanctions, the Security Council should be more transparent. Deliberations and decision making continue to be dominated by private "informal consultations" limited to Council members. Despite sometimes strong resistance from the P-5 (Permanent Members China, France, Russia, U.K. and U.S.), we have made considerable progress on our proposal to open informal consultations to non-Council members in cases where it could have a positive effect on conflict prevention and resolution. In December, for example, the Council agreed to a number of Canadian transparency proposals, including greater use of more inclusive meeting formats. We have strongly advocated more frequent use of thematic discussions and the "orientation debate," a meeting of the Council open to non-members which allows for an airing of views on an issue before the Council takes a decision. When Canada joined, open Council debates were rare; now we are working with like-minded members to bring about a new openness.

We have drawn to the attention of the Secretary-General and the P-5 our objection to the continuing practice of restricted private P-5 meetings on issues that concern or require decision by the full Council. To counter the culture of secrecy further, Canada provides regular, detailed briefings to non-Council members, including both traditional and new partners, and we continue to post a wealth of information on Council activity on our Security Council Web site at http://www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/ONU2000UN.

More generally, Canada has supported bringing greater transparency to the UN system as a whole in the form of public diplomacy. Public diplomacy has had a very positive impact on issues and events relating to the human security agenda. The participation of non-governmental organizations, as well as public and state actors, has been a powerful instrument in the efforts to eliminate threats to the security of civilians. For instance, the coming together of government, NGOs and civil society was instrumental in the success of the Ottawa Convention banning anti-personnel mines.

II. Council Responses to Key Issues

Kosovo

One of the key events of the past year and of the Council's first post-Cold War decade was the Kosovo crisis, resulting in NATO action.

The UN was actively engaged in the Kosovo situation in the months leading up to the start of the hostilities. The Security Council, acting under Chapter VII, issued several resolutions regarding the Kosovo crisis, which identified the conflict as a threat to peace and security in the region. These resolutions imposed clear legal obligation on the FRY to respect a cease fire, protect the civilian population and limit the deployment of its security forces in Kosovo, which the FRY failed to meet.

Faced with a humanitarian crisis in Kosovo, the NATO allies acted. A Russian resolution to end NATO action was defeated by a vote of 12 opposed, 3 in favour and no abstentions, indicating strong support for the intervention.

During the NATO air campaign, however, Canada continued to press for the Kosovo crisis to be brought back to the Security Council. It was, and the Council adopted a resolution bringing the conflict to a close -- a resolution, it should be noted, that was negotiated at the G-8 Foreign Ministers meeting in Cologne.

The action in Kosovo was a clear triumph of human rights and humanitarianism over tyranny. As Minister Axworthy said at the G-8 meeting in Cologne, "Kosovo was a recognition that the human security agenda is an effort to construct a global society in which the safety of people is an international priority and a motivating force for international action; where international humanitarian standards and the rule of law are advanced and woven into a coherent web protecting the individual; where those who violate these standards are held fully accountable; and where our global, regional and bilateral institutions are designed and equipped to enhance and enforce these standards."

Iraq

When Canada joined the Council in January following the U.S.-U.K. bombings of Iraq a month earlier, the Council was at an impasse. We took the initiative in January to help extricate the P-5 from their entrenched positions and move the issue forward. Under the Canadian plan, expert panels were set up to review disarmament, humanitarian, Kuwaiti prisoner of war and reparations issues. On the basis of the panel reports, the outline of a new Council policy on Iraq began to emerge. An "omnibus" draft resolution, based largely on the three panel reports, became the focus of protracted P-5 negotiations. Finally adopted in December, the resolution failed to attract P-5 consensus, with Russia, France and China abstaining on the vote.

The resolution provides for the restoration of UN weapons inspections, enhanced humanitarian measures and, pending Iraqi compliance with disarmament requirements, an eventual relaxation of sanctions. The resolution attempts to strike a balance between, on the one hand, Iraq's obligations to adhere to all previous Council resolutions and to agree to the return of weapons inspectors, and on the other, addressing the humanitarian situation. Canada pushed for sanctions relief targeted at the civilian population, in the form of increased humanitarian aid and essential civilian requirements such as vaccines and water infrastructure equipment. In a special mission to Iraq in November 1999, a Canadian delegation met with Iraqi officials on these issues and encouraged them to comply with their international obligations. Similar efforts at opening a constructive dialogue with Iraq to promote its compliance will continue in the new year.

Africa

The response of the Council to conflicts and crises in Africa has on occasion not been as timely or as robust as many situations have required. The Council has, for a combination of reasons, often preferred to leave responsibility for conflict prevention, mediation and resolution, to regional and sub-regional organizations and leaders. And sanctions regimes have failed to have any decisive impact. The UN's peacekeeping record is also mixed.

In Angola, where renewed hostilities led to the termination of the UN mission (MONUA), the Council mandated only a small follow-on presence limited to representation, monitoring human rights and encouraging dialogue between two sides more intent on waging war than talking (Luanda continues to oppose a political role for the UN office).

On the positive side, an important success was registered in October with the authorization of a new 6000-strong UN mission force (UNAMSIL) to help implement the peace agreement in Sierra Leone. This "hybrid" mission is deploying alongside the Military Observer Group of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOMOG), which had hitherto shouldered the burdens of protecting the government and people of Sierra Leone at enormous human and financial cost, and which will continue to perform key security roles. Canada left its mark on UNAMSIL by insisting that the mission be given an explicit mandate, under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, to protect civilians. In anticipation of ECOMOG's withdrawal, Canada also argued for provisions to upgrade UNAMSIL's troop strength and mandate to enable it to assume key ECOMOG security functions. Canada also contributed $9 million to ECOMOG and set up a program to disarm, demobilize and reintegrate the child soldiers of Sierra Leone.

The UN Mission in the Central African Republic -- with Canada being the only non-African nation to contribute troops, and having contributed to peaceful presidential elections there - will be phased out gradually and succeeded by a smaller post-conflict peacebuilding presence.

East Timor

Following the total breakdown in security after the independence referendum, Canada was among the first to call for a peacekeeping intervention. Canada also made efforts within the ASEAN forum to build regional support for United Nations action in East Timor. During the negotiations on the Security Council resolution on East Timor, Canada supported the inclusion of language on the protection of civilians. The following is from Security Council Resolution 1272: "Deeply concerned by the grave humanitarian situation resulting from violence in East Timor and the large-scale displacement and relocation of East Timorese civilians, including large numbers of women and children, Reaffirming the need for all parties to ensure that the rights of refugees and displaced persons are protected, and that they are able to return voluntarily in safety and security to their homes,...the Security Council...authorizes UNTAET to take all necessary measures to fulfil its mandate".

Canada also called for the early transition from the International Force for East Timor (INTERFET), which is paid for by its limited number of participants, to its UN successor the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET), which will be funded through the obligatory system of assessed contributions. This will enable more inclusive participation and universal cost sharing in the East Timor peace effort, as foreseen in the Charter.

Afghanistan

Regarding Afghanistan, while Canada endorsed the sanctions against the Taliban as a strong statement against terrorism, we maintained that other egregious Taliban practices, particularly human rights violations against women and girls, should not go unsanctioned. We shall return to this issue in the coming year.

III. Key Constraints and Challenges to Action

Humanitarian Intervention

One of the greatest challenges facing the international community today is how to react in the face of massive abuses of human rights and ongoing humanitarian crises. Kosovo and East Timor, each in its own way, brought this challenge to a head. Kosovo, in particular, challenged the heretofore undisputed supremacy of state sovereignty. The NATO military action over Kosovo was a recognition that the rights of people also have weight. The developments on this front bolster the contention that legitimacy derives from the sanction of the governed and sovereignty comes with certain irrefutable responsibilities.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in his address to the opening session of the 54th General Assembly put this issue squarely on the international agenda when he said, "State sovereignty, in its most basic sense, is being redefined...The state is now widely understood to be the servant of its people, and not vice versa."

The Secretary-General said that gross and systematic abuses of human rights must not be allowed to stand, noting that nothing in the UN Charter precludes a recognition that there are rights beyond borders. He challenged members of the Security Council and the UN more broadly to unite behind legitimate intervention to protect civilians. Mr. Annan has brought this challenge to international peace and security to the heart of the global agenda.

At the recent G-8 Foreign Ministers meeting in Berlin, Canada presented a paper outlining our views on humanitarian intervention and how we can move discussions and actions on it forward. In the coming year, at the United Nations and elsewhere, Canada will undertake to refine further the concept of humanitarian intervention.

International Security and Human Security

Fundamental constraints to the Council's effectiveness are both the mandate assigned to it in the UN Charter and the reticence of many member states, including some Permanent Members, to broaden the definition of security to encompass new human security imperatives. The Charter clearly prescribes aggression against states as a threat to international peace and security, and provides legitimate authority to the Security Council to decide on measures, including the use of force, to restore order. The Charter does not, however, contemplate as explicit a response to intrastate threats to peace, including acts by governments against their own subjects, even when they have destabilizing consequences for neighbouring countries and whole regions. While the UN has quite often found ways to respond to humanitarian crises under existing criteria, there is mounting concern that it is not fully equipped to deal with the increasing frequency of internal conflicts.

The Charter's provisions on the sovereign equality of all its member states and non- intervention in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state continue to be interpreted by some as privileging the security of the state over that of individuals, and providing a basis for opposition to Council action on behalf of human security. At the same time, however, human rights and humanitarian norms have been gaining strength through a gradual accumulation of treaties, covenants, other instruments and action, including most recently the creation of international criminal tribunals and the adoption of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. These developments have contributed to an erosion of state sovereignty when it conflicts with human rights and humanitarian principles.

The entire corpus of language framing the UN's role and mandate, including the Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other conventions, treaties and protocols, argues for a basis for action on humanitarian and human rights grounds to protect people, their rights and their freedoms. For instance, the covenants on human rights, adopted in 1966 and which entered into force a decade later, are legally binding on state parties. On the basis of their sovereign right to do so, states have therefore become Parties to conventions, treaties and protocols and committed themselves to fulfill certain obligations derived from those international legal instruments. Such developments limit state sovereignty when it conflicts with already agreed upon human rights or norms pertaining to international humanitarian laws. The effective enforcement of those international legal instruments rests, inter alia, with the political will of UN member states, especially the members of the Security Council, to take the necessary action to protect people.

UN Peacekeeping

There is a sharp contrast between the readiness earlier this decade to deploy major operations (e.g. Cambodia, Angola, Mozambique, Croatia, Bosnia) and the reticence apparent today. While new missions in Sierra Leone and East Timor are encouraging signs of a resurgence in will, the negotiations to establish them were difficult, particularly on mandate and funding issues. This same reticence will likely characterize decision making on UN peacekeeping for the foreseeable future. Canada supports a change in the approach to the authorization of UN missions and the deployment of peacekeeping forces, so that we do not see a repeat of the humanitarian and human rights catastrophes that so scarred the past decade.

Many of the UN's recent and current military deployments, while authorized by the Council, are coalitions of the willing no longer under UN command. With the exception of UNAMSIL, most UN missions in Africa have been smaller, largely symbolic deployments of civilians and military or police observers monitoring the work done by other organizations. In the Balkans, NATO, not the UN, is the principal military peacekeeper. The role assigned to the UN in Kosovo, while substantial, is of a civilian nature and poorly resourced. This devolution of military roles to other bodies represents a retreat of the UN from the multilateral collective security mandate at its heart. Canada opposes the increasing reliance on regional or sub-regional groups for both peacekeeping and other security roles, as they will produce uneven results because of the varying capacities for carrying out those functions in different parts of the world.

The establishment of several large peace support missions this year has exposed capacity and funding gaps (evidenced by a growing reliance on trust funds) at the UN for managing this new type of operation. Of particular concern, given the increasingly important role played by civilians in protectorate-type operations in Kosovo and East Timor, is the UN's inability to deploy civilian experts quickly and effectively. A reluctance to assign Chapter VII peace enforcement roles to UN-commanded forces fuels the tendency to contract out robust military action to coalitions of the willing. We need to reflect further on the efficacy of coalitions versus UN-commanded operations in potentially high-intensity missions.

Canada remains a strong supporter of the life-saving capacity of a well-funded and supported peacekeeping or peacebuilding mission. Canada has taken on a significant role in Haiti, which remains a regional concern. When the Security Council decided not to renew its mission to Haiti, Canada was instrumental in having its mandate and that of the existing General Assembly mission combined into the new International Civilian Support Mission in Haiti (MICAH) under the sole authority of the General Assembly. This new mission will continue to carry out policing and human rights functions as well as undertake issues related to justice. Canada will continue to remain engaged in Haiti.

P-5 Disunity and the Veto

Council unity remains elusive on a wide range of issues. Secretary-General Annan recently lamented what he called a "progressive erosion of the collegial atmosphere and spirit of collective responsibility" that marked the early post-Cold War Council. The result is a diminishing capacity to act. Political and policy differences among the P-5, particularly combined with the veto and the need for consensus, create barriers to action. These constraints can encourage the resort to other forums with more flexible and serviceable procedures and a negotiating climate more conducive to compromise and consensus. For example, the Kosovo mission was undertaken outside the bounds of the United Nations precisely because it was clear to all, that two Permanent Members would have vetoed any resolution calling for action.

National vs. Collective Interest

The continuing tendency of some of the Council's Permanent Members to use the Council for advancing national rather than collective interests is another inhibiting factor to Council effectiveness. Last February, Canada found the veto of UNPREDEP, the UN's preventive deployment mission in Macedonia, on the eve of the war in Kosovo, to be particularly counterproductive.

Conclusion

Throughout 1999, the Council continued its work at a high tempo, leading the New York Times to comment that while the Council was doing more and more things, the things it did seemed to matter less and less. While accurate in reference to Council paralysis on key issues early in the year, this judgement may yet prove to be overly harsh. An encouraging feature of the Council in 1999 has been its capacity for re-engagement amid major failures of collective action. Moreover, sharp disagreements among Council members on certain issues, including fundamental ones such as enforcement action in Kosovo, do not necessarily preclude consensus or meaningful engagement on others such as East Timor and Sierra Leone.

To be an indispensable tool of multilateral security, the Council must accommodate itself to the changed security context. This year the Council suffered a loss of authority when it failed to do so. As Minister Axworthy said to the Council, "The Security Council has a vital role to play in confronting threats. There should be no mistake. Promoting the protection of civilians in armed conflict is no sideshow to the Council's mandate for ensuring international peace and security. On the contrary, it is central to it."

When Canada undertook its human security agenda, few predicted that it would have the legitimacy it does today. The centrality of human security to the events of the past year is testament to the emerging change from Cold War thinking to a new approach better equipped to deal with the emerging threats to global, ie. human, security.

In the year ahead, Canada, having laid a strong foundation in its first year on the Security Council, will pursue a vigorous agenda. We will seek progress on instituting the key recommendations of the Secretary-General's Report on Civilians in Armed Conflict - especially on physical protection.

Canada will also place the issues of targeted sanctions, humanitarian intervention, transparency and war-affected children high on its agenda at the United Nations and elsewhere.