7621st Security Council Meeting: Maintenance of International Peace and Security - Part 1

Speakers in Security Council urge balance between UN role in state sovereignty and human rights protection, but differ over interpretation of charter principles at 7621st meeting.

• Categories: Meetings & Events / Security Council
• Video Length: 02:47:10
• Production Date: 15 February 2016
• Asset Language: Arabic; Chinese; English; French; Russian; Spanish
• Personal Subject: BAN KI-MOON
• Subject Topical: INTERNATIONAL PEACE AND SECURITY
• MAMS Id: 1565250
• Parent Id: 1563654

Description

Speakers today called for the United Nations to strike a balance between the fundamental principle of State sovereignty and the need to protect human rights, as the Security Council held a day-long debate on the tenets of the Organization’s Charter.

Many of the nearly 70 speakers differed, however, on their interpretations of that founding document, with some underscoring the primacy of non-interference in domestic affairs and others expressing the need for action in cases where States were unable to protect their people — or were themselves the perpetrators of human rights violations.

“For the millions living amidst war and extreme poverty, and for the countless others whose rights are violated or neglected in other ways, the ideals and values of the [United Nations] Charter remain elusive,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as he addressed the 15-member body. Bringing the promise of the Charter to the most vulnerable must continue to be the main goal, he added.

While the primary responsibility for preventing conflict and protecting human rights lay with Member States, the United Nations could help countries meet their national challenges and uphold their responsibility to protect. Among other things, the Organization offered assistance in building up national capacity to identify and address the precursors of genocide and other grave crimes, he said.

It was violence and conflict — not the United Nations attempt to help Member States prevent it — that threatened State sovereignty, he continued. When considering items on the Council’s agenda, he hoped that States would be driven by the principles enshrined in the Charter and not by geo-political rivalries and other external dynamics.

A number of speakers underscored the changing nature of the threats facing international peace and security — which now ranged from terrorist acts to pandemic diseases and unprecedented migration flows — with some stressing that interpretations of the Charter’s core principles must also evolve. In that regard, the representative of the United Kingdom cautioned against the use of “outdated” interpretations to excuse inaction on the part of the international community. Indeed, he said, the concept of sovereignty itself had changed; today, it should amount to a contract between the Government and the governed.

The Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Argentina agreed that there existed in the Charter a “dynamic equilibrium” between non-interference in internal affairs and the promotion of human rights. States could not hide human rights violations behind the principle of sovereignty. While it was difficult to strike an accurate balance, it was preferable to make errors while defending human rights than to show “excessive zeal” in respecting, to the letter, the principle of non-interference.

Other speakers, however, emphasized that the principles of sovereignty and non-interference must be respected at all times. In that regard, the representative of Iran, speaking on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement, said global peace had become elusive due in part to a tendency to resort to unilateralism. States should refrain from implementing extraterritorial or coercive measures and condemn the categorization of countries as “good” or “evil” based on unjustified criteria, he said, warning against resorting to the Charter’s Chapter VII to address issues that did not threaten international peace.

Several delegations, including that of Ukraine, pointed to the Russian Federation’s actions in Crimea as an act of aggression that ran counter to international law and disrespected the Charter. The country had amassed troops and equipment at its borders and on Ukraine’s soil, he said, adding that it had supported terrorists. There had been a significant deterioration of human rights in Crimea, he said, urging the Council and other international bodies to explore every opportunity to restore respect for the Charter.

Responding to those allegations, the representative of the Russian Federation said an intervention had taken place in 2014 — with support from the outside — in favour of an anti-constitutional coup. While some blamed the Russian Federation for Charter violations, he cited several such violations by other States, stressing that some presumed themselves to be above the Charter.

The representatives of Japan and the Republic of Korea took aim at the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea for conducting four nuclear tests over the past decade, in what they said was not only a flagrant violation of Council resolutions, but also a direct challenge to the Charter. They pressed the Council to condemn those violations and adopt tough sanctions to show it would not tolerate such behaviour.

A number of speakers cited the “vicious” conflict engulfing Syria as an example of a situation where the human rights of civilians had not been properly defended by the international community due to obstructions in the Council. Others, however, said the conflict had been worsened by interference by forces outside of Syria. In that connection, the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Venezuela stressed that terrorism was being used to disintegrate Syria, as was interference in the State’s internal affairs by Governments that violated the Charter principle forbidding such behaviour.

The Council itself should be more agile and better able to respond to rights violations, some said, noting that the use of the veto power in the Security Council was anachronistic and had, in some cases, paralysed the body to the point of inaction. In that regard, the representatives of Spain and Lichtenstein - both signatories of the Accountability, Coherence and Transparency Group’s proposed “Code of Conduct regarding Council action against genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes” - urged other States to follow suit in order to restrict the use of the veto in such serious cases.

Also speaking today were senior officials and representatives of Angola, Egypt, France, Malaysia, Senegal, New Zealand, Uruguay, China, United States, El Salvador, Brazil, Chile, India, Viet Nam, Sweden, Syria, Hungary, Nicaragua, Kazakhstan, Cuba, Colombia, Israel, Italy, Eritrea, Kuwait (on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation), Algeria, Pakistan, Georgia, South Africa, Morocco, Panama, Ecuador, United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Thailand, Poland, Maldives, Nigeria, Cyprus, Tunisia, Latvia, Peru, Armenia, Guyana, Costa Rica, Turkey, Albania, Ethiopia, Azerbaijan, Guatemala and the Netherlands.

Representatives of the African Union, European Union, League of Arab States, Holy See and Organization of American States also participated.

The meeting began at 10:05 a.m. and ended at 6:52 p.m.