POLITICS-US: Clinton Defends Efforts to Combat Abuses

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 21 1999 (IPS) - US President Bill Clinton, in an explicit commitment to act against mass killings and displacement, told the UN General Assembly Tuesday that nations had a “shared responsibility” to combat such abuses.

“When crimes are so great that they threaten our common humanity, it becomes the business of humanity to stop them,” Clinton declared.

At the same time, however, the United States “cannot do everything, everywhere,” and sometimes must support other countries’ efforts or UN operations to keep the peace, he added.

Clinton, addressing the 54th annual plenary of the 188-nation Assembly, echoed the plea by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan for concerted action against global human rights abuses.

Clinton said that Annan was right to assert that “ethnic cleansers and mass murderers will find no refuge in the United Nations.”

The US president praised recent peace efforts, including the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO’s) intervention on Kosovo, the Australian-led troop deployment in East Timor and West African states’ involvement in Sierra Leone.

Yet international response “cannot and should not be the same” for every case, varying from military intervention to economic and political pressure, Clinton said.

“The way the international community responds will depend on the capacity of countries to act and on their perception of their national interests,” he said.

Clinton marked out a different position from Annan in supporting interventions against some abuses even when the UN Security Council could not establish a consensus to act.

On Monday, Annan warned that the NATO action in Kosovo could set “dangerous precedents” for allowing future interventions that lacked clear criteria for international involvement.

The 11-week NATO bombing campaign against Yugoslavia was never authorised by the Council because some veto-holding Council members – notably Russia and China – refused to accept it. By the same token, other members like the United States and Britain opposed efforts to criticise the NATO operation.

“The inability of the international community in the case of Kosovo to reconcile…universal legitimacy and effectiveness in defence of human rights can only be viewed as a tragedy,” Annan said.

Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov added that any “coercive measures” taken by countries “should be done in accordance with the UN Charter and following a decision by the Security Council.”

He urged a dialogue next year on how and when to use force.

“Unlawful means can only undermine rightful ends,” Ivanov warned, referring specifically to “humanitarian intervention” – the term for NATO’s reason for involvement in Kosovo.

Clinton, however, defended NATO’s actions in Kosovo, saying the alliance followed a “clear consensus” that “the atrocities committed by Serb forces were unacceptable” and must be stopped.

“Had we chosen to do nothing in the face of this brutality, I do not believe we would have strengthened the United Nations,” Clinton argued. “Instead, we would have risked discrediting everything for which it stands.”

The president’s speech was an unusually forceful defence of US involvement in efforts to combat crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing, following several years in which Washington had seemed to disengage itself from many conflicts.

Following the deaths of 24 US soldiers during a failed operation in collaboration with UN troops in Somalia, Clinton had attached a lengthy list of conditions to future US involvement in UN peacekeeping. Recent years had also seen US troops pull out from involvement in hot spots like Haiti and Bosnia-Hercegovina.

This year, however, that posture changed dramatically, with the United States playing the key role in the NATO attacks on Yugoslavia.

This month, after two weeks of hesitation during which time several thousands of East Timorese were reportedly killed, Clinton also supported an Australian-led, UN-authorised force in East Timor, which landed there Monday.

In general, the US president’s speech at the General Assembly reflected his desire to project US involvement in global efforts at a time when Washington owes the United Nations an estimated 1.6 billion dollars in dues, most of it owed to peacekeeping.

Clinton repeatedly asserted the US government’s wish to work with other governments to achieve progress on a wide list of aims, from the ratification by all parties of a nuclear Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) to a crackdown on child labour and heightened effort to combat AIDS.

He also conceded that Washington has “a responsibility to equip the United Nations with the resources it needs to be effective” and promised, “We will do our very best to succeed this year.”

The US Congress currently is considering a bill to repay most US arrears to the United Nations, with strict conditions attached to the repayment – including one which would reduce future US yearly commitments to UN funding to 20 percent of the world body’s budget, down from 25 percent at present.

The United Nations may not accept such conditions, officials here said.

Even so, the money may never get to the United Nations, with Republicans in the US Congress threatening to attach language restricting US support for population agencies which advocate changes in international abortion laws to the arrears bill.

Such language would likely be vetoed by Clinton, who had vetoed a similar dues repayment bill previously.

However, US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright asserted this week that the dues payment issue should be resolved shortly.

UN officials meanwhile warned that, unless some 350 million dollars in arrears were paid before the end of this year, the United States could lose its vote in the Assembly under UN rules.