By Polly Johnson
Senior Desk Officer, Europe
NEW YORK, United States – United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stressed the importance of the “responsibility to protect” populations from genocide, war crimes, and atrocities at the Ministerial Roundtable Discussion on Responsibility to Protect: Responding to Imminent Threats of Mass Atrocities, held in New York yesterday and co-hosted by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Guatemala, in association with the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect.
Ban, who delivered remarks at the meeting, began by noting that Responsibility to Protect, which has become known as “R2P” is at a “critical moment,” as since its endorsement by the World Summit in 2005, “this doctrine has gone from crawling to walking to running.”
R2P’s mission and doctrine is rooted in protecting populations from crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and atrocities. The roundtable discussion was meant to share ideas, discuss responses and policy instruments, and initiative effective and coordinated international responses.
Focusing his remarks on how to put R2P’s mission into action, Ban noted that information and assessments about states under stress must be shared. “Effective prevention requires early, active and sustained engagement,” he said, adding that R2P and the international community “need to look at our development, capacity-building and peace-building programmes through the lens of atrocity prevention to be sure they are healing fissures within societies, not deepening them.”
Ban cited specific examples. He noted that in Libya, “the international community found the will and the means to respond.”
However, such responses are not the norm. He cited Syria and Juba as examples of places where authorities have failed to meet their responsibility to protect.
Ban’s office will collaborate with other UN groups to conduct training sessions on genocide prevention and the R2P in South Sudan, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Colombia and Cambodia, among other places.
Mr. Ban concluded hopefully, commending the “remarkable progress to date” and sustained efforts contributing to the momentum. “Let us do our utmost to ensure that this umbrella of protection covers all who need it.”
For more information, please see:
UN News Centre – Responsibility to protect principle must cover all who need it, Ban says – 23 September 2011
UN Secretary-General Office of the Spokesperson – Secretary-General’s remarks at Breakfast Roundtable with Foreign Ministers on “The Responsibility to Protect: Responding to Imminent Threats of Mass Atrocities” – 23 September 2011
Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect – Joint Statement: Ministerial Roundtable Discussion on Responsibility to Protect: Responding to Imminent Threats of Mass Atrocities – 23 September 2011
