Hans Blix

I have not worked intensely in the field of Human Rights but I have worked in another field, where it is also important to eradicate an evil, to prevent it from arising and to stop it when it is developing: the field of dealing with the Weapons of Mass Destruction. Since there are about 8 + nuclear weapon states in the world we obviously have some way to go to success. Even so I think there could be something we could learn from this field.

Let me first touch the Institutional Side.

It is, of course, striking that we have far more developed and institutionalized means of identifying and tackling the immergence of the weapons than the virus of genocide. In the areas of weapons, billions are devoted to surveillance through satellites, electronic monitoring, border controls, export license system, and inspection and monitoring. Governments have also established some permanent watch dogs apart from the many national ones.

I am not suggestion that we should set up more intergovernmental watch dogs to specifically identify symptoms of genocide. I thing the question is more of making full use of what we have, both at the intergovernmental and the non-governmental level. Secretary-General Kofi Annan talked this morning about a standing committee under the Genocide Convention and a kind of Commission. This is a possibility and could serve as an official monitoring function.

In the UN system and in regional organizations there are many human rights oriented bodies, within whose mandate it falls to monitor violations and identify and register any symptoms of genocide. They may have their own mechanisms for fact finding which are available at any moment, when the political will is there.

The General Assembly of the UN and its Third Committee as well as the Economic and Social Council and the Human Rights Commission of the UN obviously have the duty of watching and they are rightly watched in their work and prompted by many non-governmental institutions.

I must also mention the Security Council. We mostly think of it in relation to interstate conflicts or the risk of such conflicts, but there is no doubt that the Council can undertake both fact finding to obtain and check evidence or symptoms of genocide and authorize powerful action to ensure intervention. I do not think constitutional obstacles will be found to stand in the way.

We have seen how the Security Council has gradually become engaged in these matters. In my view, this is a healthy development. Clearly, there will be thresholds of intensity below which the Council will not intervene, but symptoms of genocide will be a serious matter and could not easily be brushed aside. I do not think that Constitutional reservations will stand in the way. Costs in life and other resources could have a restraining effect.

If public opinion in member countries is ready to support or even demand international action and accept the costs, I think the governments will heed such opinion. The opinion, in turn, is increasingly made aware and engaged through the information of TV or radio. Perhaps 50 years ago people around the world might not have been aware what happened in Rwanda or Burma. Today this is unlikely and the outlook for international action, I think, therefore may be better. The advantage of such a joint actions lies not only in a pooling of resources but also in the legitimacy that it adds.

After looking at intergovernmental bodies, I’ll look at Non-Governmental; The Media. The diversified media are the greatest fact finding force we have. It is true that they can spread lies and contribute to prejudice but I take of my hat for the enormous capacity and ability of the investigative journalism.

The non-governmental institutions are also a great fact finding and analyzing force.

The area in which I have been working in the last few years has seen a great deal of carelessness in the examination of facts and great deal of spin.

There are many evils and injustices that we can identify, but all are not genocide. We must take care with our facts and diagnosis. Putting the label genocide on lesser evils may undermine the categorical reactions that we should reserve for genocide. It is a horrendous human affliction against which we must mobilize humanity.

I should like to end on an optimistic point.

Many national declarations of man, of the rights of citizens etc, have seen the light as a reaction against horrible regimes.

This is also true of the movement that we have had in favor of human rights since the second world war: the conventions, the declarations, the commissions, the courts etc. It all started as a reaction against totalitarian oppression and, indeed, the holocaust. What is new, I think, is the international dimension. The values and protections, which we insisted upon at the national level, appear equally cogent at an international level. And we have to know much better what is going on in the many corners of the world. What I think we see in the international instruments for the protection of the human being and peoples and ethnic groups, is that common global values are evolving based in no single faith, but in common ethical values, which we have found.

It is important that we rally to support and strengthen these common values and their legal expression and application. We do not want a war of civilizations and I do not think there will be such wars. We want peace through law for all – individuals, ethnic and religious groups and nations.