July 1, 2002
US
Vetoes Bosnian Peacekeeping Resolution In Protest Against International
Court
By
Ariel Meyerstein
United
States opposition to the International Criminal Court has led to
a diplomatic showdown in the United Nations Security Council that
may force an end to the UN peacekeeping mission in Bosnia.
In
a vote last night on a Security Council resolution extending the
mandate for the UN peacekeeping operation in Bosnia, the United
States exercised its veto power, effectively discontinuing the mandate
of the mission. The US was the only country on the 15-country Council
to stand in opposition to the resolution. Bulgaria, one of the sponsors
of the resolution, abstained.
The
mandate was originally due to expire on June 21, but was extended
temporarily until June 30. After vetoing the resolution, the US
agreed to another extension until midnight of July 3, which would
allow all sides more time to search for a compromise. The United
States has refused to support the resolution because it wants UN
peacekeepers to have immunity from prosecution by the new International
Criminal Court, which came into existence today. The other countries
in the Security Council are strongly resisting this US demand.
US
Ambassador to the UN John Negroponte explained the USs vote
by saying that the US has exposed its people to risk in peacekeeping
operations around the world. "Having accepted these risks by
exposing people to dangerous and difficult situations in the service
of peace and stability," he said, "we will not ask them
to accept the additional risk of politicized prosecutions before
a court whose jurisdiction over our people the government of the
United States does not accept."
The
standoff began on June 18, when the US introduced an amendment to
the resolution that would renew the Bosnia operations mandate,
giving peacekeepers involved in the mission immunity from arrest,
detention or prosecution in connection with all acts committed on
the territory of UN-member states (with the exception of their own
country of origin). At the same time, the US introduced a more sweeping
resolution that would make such immunity an automatic feature of
all future UN peacekeeping missions.
The
direct UN peacekeeping operation in Bosnia involves 1,500 international
police officers, of which 46 are American. In addition, the NATO-led
S-For mission in Bosnia (comprising 17,000 troops, including 3,100
Americans) operates under the UNs authorization, which will
also expire on July 3 if no resolution is passed. It is possible
that the NATO mission would continue even if UN backing is withdrawn,
though Germany would be forced to withdraw its troops, because its
domestic laws would not permit its continued participation if the
mission were to lose its UN mandate.
The
US tried to make similar amendments to a resolution for a new peacekeeping
mission for East Timor last month, but eventually yielded to the
strong opposition it faced from other Council members. Of the fifteen
members of the Security Council, six have already ratified the ICC.
Six others have signed the Rome statute establishing the ICC, and
are expected to ratify it soon.
Beyond
the immediate dispute over Bosnia, the US initiative appears to
threaten its future involvement in all United Nations missions.
Richard S. Williamson, US Alternate Representative to the UN, said
on June 19 that "the whole spectrum of United Nations peacekeeping
operations will have to be reviewed if we are unsuccessful at getting
the protections we demand be in place for UN peacekeeping operations
to have United States citizens participate."
Apart
from the NATO forces in Bosnia and Kosovo, US participation in peacekeeping
operations is limited. As of April 30, there are 677 police and
only 35 troops from America serving as peacekeepers in the field
out of a total UN peacekeeping force of 47,000 worldwide stationed
along the Iraq-Kuwait and Ethiopia-Eritrea borders, and in Georgia,
East Timor, and the Sinai.
However,
if the United States chose to withdraw its financial support for
peacekeeping operations, the consequences would be much more serious.
The US currently provides 27% of the entire United Nations peacekeeping
budget.
A
"Frontal Attack on International Law"
The
US stance on the ICC and its current efforts in the Security Council
have become a major source of tension between the United States
and some of its closest allies, who are staunch supporters of the
ICC. Nancy Bergerson, a Foreign Affairs spokeswoman for Canada,
called the USs maneuvers a "frontal attack on international
law," urging the Security Council to reject any proposed US
alteration to the resolution on peacekeeping in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Another
UN diplomat told The New York Times that, "What member
states find most irritating is this perennial argument that the
United States is a special case, that rules are for everybody else.
Even close friends are very, very nervous. This is really a serious
assault on the international legal order."
Richard
Dicker of Human Rights Watch has called the US gestures an "ideological
jihad against international justice." In reaction to the Security
Council vote, Dicker said that "by threatening to end peacekeeping
operations in Bosnia and holding the people of Sarajevo and Srebrenica
hostage, the U.S. has stooped to a new low in its efforts to undermine
the court and the rule of law".
Human
Rights Watch has argued that the US initiative represents an attempt
to revise a treaty that has already been ratified by over seventy
countries, because the language of the US proposals would "drastically
alter the obligations of States Parties to the ICC treaty, specifically
the obligation to surrender an accused to the Court."
Under
the ICC, if alleged crimes are committed on the territory of a State
Party, the ICC could have jurisdiction to try the accused regardless
of his or her nationality. This would in turn obligate the rest
of the States Parties to surrender the accused to the ICC. The US-proposed
resolutions, however, would change all that, requiring states to
ignore this directive. The result, according to Human Rights Watch,
would "effectively rewrite the ICC treaty and nullify the national
laws of many States Parties that have now incorporated the ICCs
"prosecute or surrender" obligations.
In
response to such criticism, US officials have pointed out what they
consider the hypocrisy of some of their allies. The US cited an
agreement negotiated by Britain on behalf of itself and the 19 other
countries comprising the International Security Assistance Force
(ISAF) in Afghanistan, in which the Interim Afghani Authority agreed
that all members of the force there "may not be surrendered
to or otherwise transferred to the custody of an international tribunal."
In light of this agreement, Williams said, "Our reaction is
that sovereignty is a two-way street and we have the same concerns
that they had."
Human
Rights Watch called the text of the ISAFs agreement "ill-conceived,"
but emphasized that it differed from the USs current attempts
to undermine the ICC in two important ways. First, the ISAF agreement
must be viewed in the context of those governments pledge
as States Parties to cooperate with the ICC in the unlikely event
that a peacekeeper committed crimes and a governments investigation
or prosecution was held to be illegitimate. Second, the ISAF agreement
only sought protection for contributing countries personnel
in the country hosting a peacekeeping mission, whereas the USs
proposals aim to prevent not just countries that receive peacekeepers,
but governments anywhere in the world from sending a peacekeeper
implicated in human rights crimes to the ICC.
Possibility
for Compromise?
One
possible compromise that has been suggested is the creation of the
safeguards the US is looking for through a series of bilateral agreements.
These agreements, such as the Status of Force Agreements (SOFA)
or Status of Mission Agreements (SOMA), however, are not comforting
to the United States because they only work bilaterally, and as
Representative Williams said, "therefore travel to a third
country would not necessarily be covered." The US is seeking
blanket immunity from prosecution for all future peacekeeping missions
everywhere.
Another
proposal was offered by France's U.N. ambassador, Jean-David Levitte,
who urged Washington to withdraw its personnel from the mission,
rather than voting to shut it down altogether. Only 47 members of
the mission would be affected -- the U.N.'s top official, Jacques
Klein, and the 46 American police officers.
There
was also talk of expediting a planned European Union takeover of
the 1,500-member police-training mission. As of now the transfer
of power is scheduled to take place January 1, 2003, but there is
a possibility that efforts could be increased so there would be
no downtime between the operations.
Despite
these creative solutions, it seems that the two camps are standing
their ground. The Guardian reported that British officials describe
Washington's stance as "bloody-minded" and "very
unhelpful." Sir Jeremy Greenstock, the British ambassador to
the UN, noted that for the past seven years, American forces have
operated in Bosnia and Kosovo under the jurisdiction of the UN ad
hoc war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Considering this
and other aspects of the vote, Ambassador Levitte said the American
veto was "difficult to understand in many ways."
US
Battle Against the ICC Continues on Domestic Front
The
battle against the ICC is being waged on the domestic front, as
well. The American Servicemembers Protection Act, dubbed the Hague
Invasion Act, has been passed by both the House of Representatives
and the Senate, and is currently in conference. If signed into law,
the act would enable the President to use all means necessary
to free American servicemembers from detention by the ICC, which
will sit in The Hague. Traditionally, such language implies the
ability to declare war. Both the Netherlands and the US are party
to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), whose member states
have agreed to not attack one another.
The
Senates recent passage of the Act provoked a flood of hostile
and occasionally ironic comment in the Dutch press. On June 12,
the US Embassy in the Netherlands was forced to issue a formal statement,
declaring that "obviously, we cannot envisage circumstances
under which the United States would need to resort to military action
against the Netherlands or another ally."
Related
chapters from Crimes of War: What the Public Should Know
Bosnia
Humanitarian Intervention
Jurisdiction, Universal
United Nations and the Geneva Conventions
Related
Links
U.S.
Proposals to Undermine the International Criminal Court Through
a U.N. Security Council Resolution
Human Rights Watch Statement
June 25, 2002
United
Nations Website for the Rome Statute of the International Criminal
Court
NGO
Coalition for the International Criminal Court
The
American Servicemember and Citizen Protection Act of 2002 (H.R.
4169)
US
Vetoes Bosnia Mission, Then Allows 3-day Reprieve
Serge Schmemann
July 1, 2002
The New York Times
Human
Rights, American Wrongs
Kenneth Roth
July 1, 2002
The Financial Times
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