Interventions

Chapter VII

Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter entrusts the Security Council with the responsibility of determining “…the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression…” and guides the Council’s actions to maintain international peace and security, once a threat, breach or aggression is determined.

Chapter VII governs the Council’s prescription of measures short of the use of force and authorization of mandates to use force in the maintenance of international peace and security. Measures short of the use of force include for example, partial or complete economic blockades, air and sea disruption, freezing of foreign assets, and suspension of diplomatic ties. In the event that these measures fail to achieve the desired outcome of the Council or the Council deems that such measure would be ineffective, the Council acting under Chapter VII can authorized the use of force to maintain or restore international peace and security.

Chapter VII in practice

The following case studies demonstrate how the Security Council has used Chapter VII, or strong language reminiscent of Chapter VII, to mitigate mass human rights violations and maintain or restore peace and security.

Kurds in Northern Iraq (1991-1992)
Following the 1990 Iraqi invasion, occupation and annexation of Kuwait, the UN Security Council, having exhausted all peaceful means, including authorizing progressively tougher sanctions and blockades to make Iraq yield, passed Resolution 678 authorizing allied intervention under Chapter VII to expel Iraq from the sovereign territory of Kuwait. Resolution 678 paved the way for “operation desert storm” in which coalition troops liberated Kuwait after 6 weeks of air strikes and 4 days of ground combat.

Soon after the defeat of the Iraqi army in Kuwait, the Kurds in the north of Iraq, who had suffered severe repression under Saddam Hussein’s regime in the past, found new hope and the Kurdish independence movement was reanimated. Facing Kurdish revolts, Saddam deployed Iraqi troops to squash the movement, forcing almost 2 million Kurds to flee their villages in the north. Confronted by a growing humanitarian crisis and after much negotiation the Security Council passed Resolution 688, condemning the repression of minorities in Iraq, in particular the Kurds and demanding an end to aggression and humanitarian access to affected populations. The resolution hinged on the identification of the refugee flows across borders threatening international peace and security. Although the Council did not specify that this was a Chapter VII resolution, the strong language meant that it was interpreted as such by a handful of states, including the United States. Although initial international action was limited to humanitarian aid, US troops eventually set up camps along the Iraq/Turkey border to secure the safety of refugees. Eventually no-fly zones in the North and South of Iraq were also set up to secure humanitarian aid lifts and delivery.
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Somalia (1991-192)
In 1991, following years of poverty and corruption, the ousting of President Mohammed Siad Barre sealed Somalia’s fate as a failed state, plunging the country deep into a clan based civil war. The United Nations responded to the crisis in Somalia in 1992, after international humanitarian aid organizations reported that hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees were on the brink of starvation and that thousands were fleeing the escalating violence in the capital of Mogadishu for neighboring states. In January 1992, the Security Council passed a [Chapter VII-based] resolution 733, authorizing an arms embargo against Somalia. By the end of the year, confronted by an acute humanitarian crisis with no peaceful resolution to the civil war in sight, The Security Council passed Resolution 794, a Chapter VII-based mandate, which authorized the intervention of a US led coalition to use all necessary means to secure humanitarian relief efforts, promote reconciliation and remove the main factors that created the humanitarian emergency. This was a purely humanitarian based intervention authorized under Chapter VII of the UN charter.
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Haiti (1991)
In 1992, two years after the September 1991 military coup ousting of the democratically elected Jean-Bertrand Aristide, and the refusal of the military to reinstate the democratically elected leader, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 841. UNSC Resolution 841 was a Chapter VII mandate which established an economic embargo on Haiti and froze foreign held assets of the leadership. When it was apparent that none of these steps were working, the Security Council adopted Resolution 940, a Chapter VII authorization of a multinational intervention to use all means necessary to restore the democratically elected presidency and restore international peace and security. The resolution was justified based on the humanitarian crisis, mass displacement and widespread persecution culminating in a threat to international peace and security. With the threat of a multilateral intervention looming the military leadership resigned paving the way for an authorized US led intervention to “uphold democracy.”
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Cote d’Ivoire
In 2002, a military mutiny plunged Cote d’Ivoire into an all out civil war between the north and the south. Although a ceasefire was reached in May 2003, and the United Nations established the UN Operations in Cote d’Ivoire (UNOCI) to monitor the ceasefire, the country remained divided between the rebel held north and the government controlled south. Elections, which were to be held originally in 2005, were postponed till 2006. In 2006, tensions between north and south remained high, prompting visiting UN OCHA coordinator to call for immediate action saying that "when hate media in a Rwandan style asks for attacks against defenseless civilians, for minorities being chopped up and for international humanitarian organizations to be attacked, people should be brought to justice."

Targeted sanctions applied by the United Nations Security Council are credited with dampening tensions and violence in Cote d’Ivoire. Acting under Chapter VII authority, the Security Council passed resolution 1572 of 2004, demanding Ivorian authorities stop all radio and TV broadcast which were inciting hatred, intolerance and violence. The Security Council decided to impose a 13 month arms embargo against Cote d’Ivoire, and a 12 month targeted travel ban against individuals deemed a threat to the peace and security of Cote d’Ivoire, as well as a 12 month freezing of all foreign held funds and assets of designated individuals. In 2006, seeing that the situation had not improved, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1727 renewing the sanctions called for in Resolution 1572 until October 2007. In its 2006 resolution, the Council made clear that it was ready to take action against any individual deemed to be a threat to the peace and reconciliation process in Cote d’Ivoire, responsible for human rights and humanitarian law violations, responsible for attacking and or obstructing UNOCI, and responsible for spreading hate speech.
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International Tribunals
The establishment of International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda fall under Chapter VII measures to maintain international peace and security. These developments signal a commitment to ending impunity and serve as a deterrent against future atrocities. The Security Council adopted resolution 827 in May 1993 establishing the ICTY. The The ICTY statute's definition of genocide is taken verbatim from the Genocide Convention. In November 1994, UN Security Council Resolution 955 similarly created the ICTR under Chapter VII enforcement measures. However, these chapter VII measures are not a solution to the broader challenges concerning the prevention of Genocide.

For more information please consult list of resources.
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Resources

UN Documents
SG Progress Report Prevention of Armed Conflict 2006
UN Peacemaker



Other Documents and Links
The Responsibility to Protect: Research, Bibliography and Background


Articles:
Akhavan, Payam. “Enforcement of the Genocide Convention: A Challenge to Civilization.” Harvard Human Rights Journal 8 (1995): 229

Osterdahl, Inger. “By All Means, Intervene! The Security Council and the Use of Force under Chapter VII of the UN Charter in Iraq (to protect the Kurds), in Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda and Haiti.” Nordic Journal of International Law 66 (1997): 241