By Joanna Weschler
Undiplomatic TimesOctober 1999
The day in September when hurricane Floyd threatened New York and the United Nations sent all non essential employees home by one in the afternoon, will be remembered for something unrelated to the weather. September 16, 1999 will be remembered because on that day, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, for the first time ever, addressed a session of the Security Council.
For years, the Council has operated on the basis that human rights were separate from security issues. That attitude has evolved in the recent past, thanks largely to the efforts of Secretary General Kofi Annan, who in numerous statements has emphasized the intimate connection and interdependence between human rights and security. But the Council, while slowly incorporating this approach into some of its pronouncements and activities, had until now resisted having the highest United Nations human rights official address it
This has been a selective resistance. For several years, the Council has been briefed, informally at first and then formally, by Sadako Ogata, the High Commissioner for Refugees. There was little opposition because UNHCR deals with issues that are often closely related to conflict situations. The Council has also benefited from briefings by several other in-house experts, including Sergio Vieira de Mello, the UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, and Olara Otunnu, the Secretary General's Special Representative on Children in Armed Conflict.
Several efforts were made to invite the High Commissioner for Human Rights to brief the Council, most recently in August, on the topic of Angola, but they were blocked by governments that did not want the Council to involve itself with human rights. They did not object this time because of the generic nature of the topic under discussion - the Secretary General's report on the protection of civilians in armed conflicts - and Mrs. Robinson's undeniable ability to speak authoritatively on a critical aspect of the problem.
She had just visited the East Timor region and was able to report to the Council first hand about "the murders, maimings, rapes and countless atrocities" to which innocent civilians there had been subjected. She could also report on recent visit to Sierra Leone, Colombia, Cambodia and the Balkans, all areas of conflict with serious human rights violations. As these examples show, most conflict situations with which the Council deals these days are internal conflicts and almost invariably have human rights violations among their root causes, a factor that Mrs. Robinson noted.
She underlined that in such conflicts, civilians are no longer merely the victims of war but the primary targets of attack. She pointed out that respect for human rights was an indispensable element in building peace, and that systematic violations of the rights of civilians was closely linked to the erosion of international peace and security. Prevention of conflict, Mrs. Robinson said, was the best protection for civilians. All these linkages demanded the attention of the Security Council.
The intervention in a formal Security Council debate by the High Commissioner for Human Rights marks a welcome and much overdue breakthrough. It is to be hoped that this will change the way the Security Council views its role vis a vis human rights, and that a precedent has been established. The High Commissioner for Human Rights should become a regular in the debates of the Security Council.
Joanna Weschler is United Nations representative of Human Right Watch.
