Alberta, Marzo/March 2009
17
ALTERNATIVA Latinoamericana
ENGLISH SECTION
Focus: Human Rights and the UN
More harm than good?
They are meant to
protect the innocent and
vulnerable in times of war
and conflict. Instead, UN
peacekeepers are
sometimes guilty of
perpetrating the very
crimes they are meant to
protect innocents from.
A spate of scandals
involving UN troops,
including child abuse, rape
and gold smuggling, has
left a stain on the UN's
humanitarian credentials.
And while they involve only a tiny minority of UN
peacekeepers, or blue helmets as they are
known, deployed around the world, they have
shaken many people's confidence in the UN
enterprise.
In May, a report by the British charity Save
the Children found widespread sexual abuse of
children by UN peacekeepers in southern
Sudan, Haiti and Côte d'Ivoire.
"Children as young as six are trading sex
with aid workers and peacekeepers in exchange
for food, money, soap and, in very few cases,
luxury items such as mobile phones," the
charity's report stated.
The abuse extended to child pornography,
prostitution and human trafficking of minors and
the charity found that of the 250 boys and girls
aged 10-17 it interviewed, half knew of such
cases but were afraid to come forward.
The problem is not a new one; UN
peacekeepers are alleged to have committed
abuses in Bosnia, Cambodia, East Timor,
Kosovo, Mozambique, the Democratic Republic
of Congo and Sierra Leone.
"Zero-tolerance"
While, after each reported case, the UN is
forceful in its condemnation and insists it is
doing something to tackle the problem, it seems
that with nearly every new UN peacekeeping
mission tales of abuse and exploitation follow.
In 2005, following a string of scandals, Kofi
Annan, the then UN secretary-general,
announced the UN's `zero-tolerance' policy on
sexual exploitation by peacekeepers and
appointed Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein as
his special advisor on sexual exploitation and
abuse by UN peacekeeping personnel.
In his final report, Prince Zeid described the
UN military arm as deeply flawed and
recommended a range of changes to help
stamp out abuse.
His recommendations included that troop-
contributing countries hold on-site court martials
in cases of alleged abuse and that a UN unit,
which would investigate allegations of abuse, be
established.
Many of his recommended changes have since
been implemented but the problem remains.
In 2007, there were 127 new allegations
against UN peacekeeping personnel - down from
357 in 2006.
Sacred Trust
According to the UN's department of
peacekeeping operations, as of December 31,
2007, the UN completed 123 investigations into
allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse. The
result of these investigations; 114 repatriations
of UN peacekeepers and no suspensions.
So, is the UN really doing enough to stamp
out the abuse and punish the offenders?
According to Michael Doyle, a UN specialist
at Colombia University, `enough' must mean the
complete elimination of abuse.
"Peacekeeping is a sacred trust, a
commitment to serve and protect the most
vulnerable," he said. "The UN can and should
expose abuses that come to its attention and it
should actively monitor peacekeeping forces to
make sure any abuses are exposed."
In 2007, the UN
announced additional
measures which included
providing victim assistance,
conducting information
campaigns and embedding
investigators within UN
missions.
Upon notification of a
case of serious
misconduct, the UN now not
only informs the country
concerned but also invites it
to investigate the incident in
co-operation with its own
Office of Internal Oversight Services.
This approach was applied for the first time
when Sri Lankan peacekeepers were accused
of abuse in Haiti; more than 100 Sri Lankan
troops now face court-martial.
But can the UN be sure that, if found guilty,
they really will be held accountable?
Legal immunity
Because of sovereignty issues, the UN
does not have the authority to discipline
peacekeepers who hail from its member states.
And therein lays the problem. Only the
peacekeepers' home states have the authority to
try and punish them.
Equally, the UN has no right to conduct
background checks on the personnel a country
contributes to a mission.
In many cases of alleged abuse, the
peacekeepers involved have simply been sent
home, where they seldom face prosecution.
As peacekeepers enjoy absolute legal
immunity, the host country is not able to step in
and prosecute those involved.
The only power the secretariat has is to
deport those allegedly involved to their home
country, as was done with the Sri Lankan
peacekeepers in November 2007.
The UN has sought the power to try
offenders itself but this continues to be resisted.
Most peacekeeping troops come from the
developing world; the largest troop contributors
are Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, Nigeria and
Nepal, which together provide more than 40 per
cent of all blue helmets.
The UN walks a fine line between acting
forcefully to tackle abuse while not discouraging
countries from contributing troops. With the
number of peacekeeping operations around the
world continuing to increase, and with close to
100,000 peacekeepers currently involved, the
UN does not want to alienate contributing
countries.
Cover-ups?
One creative solution has been the
deployment of an entirely female peacekeeping
unit in Liberia.
But while the UN searches for solutions, the
problem continues and in August, an internal UN
investigation found evidence that some Indian
peacekeepers may have engaged in sexual
exploitation and abuse in the Democratic
Republic of Congo.
These allegations surfaced after attention
was focused on the UN mission in DR Congo
following a damning report released earlier this
year by Human Rights Watch.
The report accused the UN of covering up
alleged involvement by Pakistani and Indian
peacekeepers in arms and gold smuggling in
eastern DR Congo, supposedly to avoid
jeopardising any future Pakistani troop
commitments.
While the UN struggles to address the
problem, according to Steve Crenshaw, a UN
advocate at Human Rights Watch, the ongoing
allegations against some of its peacekeepers
"undermines peacekeeping efforts and the
reputation of the UN itself".
Julian Madsen (Al Jazeera)
information from simple sources but difficulty in
applying written instructions about medication";
and level 3 meant "ability to find answers by
locating pieces of information from simpler
sources" this was the minimum required to
understand/use information in a knowledge-
based economy. Levels 4 and 5 meant "people
access information and draw multifaceted
conclusions from complex and lengthy written
sources."
The survey showed that in Sweden 23% of
the population were at levels 1/2 and 34% were
at levels 4/5; in Canada 42% were at levels 1/2
and 23% at 4/5, in Australia 43% were at levels
1/2 and 17% at levels 4/5; in the US 48% were
at levels 1/2 and 18% at levels 4/5; in Chile 85%
were at levels 1/2 and 3% at levels 4/ 5, in
Mexico 84% were at levels 1/2 and 1.7% at
levels 4/5. Clearly, there are differences of ability
between Sweden and other First World
countries and clear differences between them
and the Third World countries included Chile
and Mexico, which had only 15 to 16% of their
population at level 3 and above (compared to 52
to 77% in the others).
Early education focuses on literacy, on
numeracy, on inquiry and on play. Numeracy
includes understanding concepts such as "taller
than," relationships between objects, counting
them and classifying them and games that use
one to one correspondence. Inquiry refers to
scientific reasoning, such as how objects move
and behave. It includes developing abilities to
gather information, build patterns/expectations,
predicting, recording and talking about findings.
Play is the best strategy: it expands intelligence,
serves as testing ground for language and
reasoning, develops confidence and a sense
about strengths and weaknesses in the child,
stimulates the imagination and positive attitudes
towards learning.
In Canada nearly 9 million adults lack
literacy skills to cope with everyday life. We
know that about 24% of Canadian children (ages
0-6) experience some learning or behavioural
difficulty, problems we know correlate with
difficulties later in school performance, social
adjustment and health. Socioeconomic status
contributes to children's developmental
outcomes but stimulation during the early years
is crucial too. Despite this knowledge Canada
continues to come last among First World
countries' spending in early childhood programs:
Canada spends 0.25% of GDP (Gross
Domestic Product). The US spends 0.48%.
Denmark spends 2%.
Canada supports commission after
commission reporting on the importance of early
childhood education but, with the exception of
Quebec, programs are fragmented,
stigmatizing, they are not universal. Programs
for children under 6 and education from 6 years
on have developed separately (have different
governance, funding and training). Public
education is oldest and strongest. Early
childhood services were slower to develop and
placed on the welfare side of social policy -
founded as charitable services to children and
families in distress. There is positive public
perception protecting education as an
entitlement of children while fragmentation
plagues child care and family support services,
which are not perceived as priority. Still, the
connection between early childhood
development and adult literacy is obvious.
Evidence shows the benefits of literacy are
intergenerational: "A child's best start is closely
linked to the literacy levels of his parents."
It is an issue of justice, we have to change
our ways and we need to start somewhere;
focusing on children is most effective in cost
and chances of success. We cannot continue
condemning humanity to misery, poverty,
mediocrity. The planet has reacted to our
oppressive ways. In the past we could feign
ignorance; we can no longer deny what we
know. Failing to provide for children in terms of
health, nutrition and stimulation will be now a
conscious crime.
Brain, Early Development ,
Justice