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WORLD CITIZEN LETTERSThanks for visiting my website.
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LATEST ON SITE - WCL 587 Jul 2008 NATO and the EU World citizens in Europe and elsewhere should welcome a recent speech by David Miliband. The British Foreign Secretary argued in support of the French president that the EU should reorganize its military capabilities in more regular and useful fashion. This would be in order not to be dependent upon NATO for peacekeeping (and other) responses to external challenges. He pointed out that any action then undertaken would have to be with the unanimous consent of all EU members - although the recent suggestions of guarantee in Ireland's neutrality might impugn that proposition. The reasons for such a proposal are fairly clear. The contrast between Bosnia today, with European troops engaged in ensuring peace and the 1990's, with civil war and war crimes rampant, is compelling. The appalling example of the Dutch troops whose presence as a supposed peace-keeping force that watched the crimes at Srebrenica is a warning of what can happen when European troops are engaged without proper direction and rules of engagement. A similar situation could be met with a united response within days, instead of the slow and chaotic response that took place during the break-up of Yugoslavia. The speech offers an attractive line of reform. Any military action undertaken or foreign policy initiatives need to be within the limits of international law and generally in support of the United Nations (not always quite the same thing). There is more chance of this occurring if the European Union is the initiator of decisions than if NATO is in charge. NATO is a military alliance, dominated by the paymaster, the United States whose president has shown little respect for law and for human rights. The illegal attack upon Iraq and notably in his refusal to abide by the Geneva Conventions dealing with prisoners taken in armed conflicts has shown a contempt for law matched by the kidnapping known as "extraordinary rendition" and the concentration camp at Guantanamo Bay. Law is the key. The E.U. was founded on the principles of law (and justice) and by the incorporation of the European Court of Human Rights and the erection of the European Court of the E.U., it has consistently followed a path to legality. The formidable array of European law governing its activities has laid down a new chapter in the making and functioning of international law. This has been pioneering. Never before has an international group set about transforming a multi-lingual community of allies into a governed alliance using law rather than military regulation. David Milliband spoke of "conflict prevention and crisis management, whether it is in providing civilian experts - the police trainers. judges, civil servants and aid workers - that are needed alongside the military or deploying soldiers from national armies in roles where NATO is not engaged", but that is inadequate. We should appreciate the difference between soldiers, whose primary function is to obey the commands of a military hierarchy, and police, whose whole purpose has to be to uphold law and order. We should always be seeking ways in which our governments can make the transition from a world in which soldiers are used to keep order into one policed through the application of law. European leaders, even where still in nationalist mould, are constantly faced with the practical tasks of making agreements based on law, to regulate conflict and eliminate tension. In the final show-down, they have to abide by European law to settle differences or change it to accommodate new ways of working. The other great wielders of power - American, Chinese and Russian leaders - finally retain a recourse to military force as a seeming last resort. We should welcome the European alternative and show it as an example to the world. John Roberts
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