Global Governance

Description: Roth, on the significance of the Charles Taylor trial.

Question: Are global institutions capable of defending human rights?

Transcript: There are a number of important international institutions; things ranging from the international criminal court, which is a very important, new institution – basically a global war crimes tribunal – that stands ready to pursue anyone who commits genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity. That’s a very important advance, because traditionally dictators could guarantee their impunity by simply murdering a few judges at home and shutting down their judiciary. And then there’s, you know, no consequence . . . no penal price to pay for their mass atrocities. Today that’s no longer the case because they can’t shoot all the judges in the Hague. And so there is this court sitting there, you know, ready to jump in if local justice systems have been compromised. So that’s an important step forward. There are regional institutions – say the . . . The European Union is one which, in my view, is punching way below its weight, because it still has not found a way to enlist the . . . the 27 members in an active sense. It still has a . . . It gives each of those 27 members a veto, which basically means it’s being led by its most reluctant member. So if any particular EU member happens to have a special relationship with Uzbekistan, or Libya, or whoever the abusive government of the moment is, the EU does not exert its substantial potential power on behalf of human rights in that country. There’s a need to get a better mechanism there, which the EU Constitution wasn’t designed to achieve, but that was defeated, and has not been a good alternative put forward. So that’s an international body that could make a difference.

Question: What about the U.N.?

Transcript: In terms of the United Nations, there is an inherent difficult there because on the one hand, its great strength is that it is a universal body. That brings it special legitimacy. But it also then is a body composed not only of governments committed to human rights, but also governments that are sworn to do everything they can to . . . to . . . to stymie the enforcement of human rights. And so working through the U.N. will always be a challenge. There is a brand new institution set up – the Human Rights Council – which has been a disappointment. But it’s a disappointment that frankly, I think, the responsibility for which lies principally in the west. Because this council, if you look at it, its membership is about roughly evenly divided between governments that are committed to human rights, and governments that are committed to blocking human rights enforcement. And then there were a series of swing votes that could go either way, many of them in Africa. And so far the major governments of the west have allowed the African governments to vote as a block, and to be dominated by the abusive powers in their midst, rather than weaning them from those abusive powers and getting them to stand up in their foreign policy to the values that many of them respect in their domestic policy. And so you find democratic governments in Africa voting with the thugs against human rights enforcement at the Human Rights Council. That’s the current reality, but it’s not the necessary reality. And it’s one that I think could change, but is gonna require real commitment from the European Union; from governments like Argentina, and Chile, and Lati

Question: What is the significance of the Charles Taylor trial?

Transcript: Right. Yeah. When you think about a . . . a . . . a poster child for the regime of new international justice, you might think of Charles Taylor. This was a man who was absolutely ruthless first as a rebel leader in Liberia, then as president. And he committed terrible atrocities within Liberia, and also supported next door in Sierra Leone a rebel group there known as the Revolutionary United Front which itself committed massive atrocities – its signature atrocity probably being the chopping off of people’s limbs. After that war was ended largely through the intervention of British troops, a special court was set up to try those who were responsible for the atrocities of that conflict. And the top defendant was Charles Taylor. Now Charles Taylor at the time was President of Liberia and thought he was pretty safe. But a separate rebel movement emerged there, and he had to flee to Nigeria, where President Obasanjo of Nigeria sheltered him for two years. And it took a campaign that Human Rights Watch was deeply involved in to build up pressure on Obasanjo to surrender Taylor. And . . . and in the end, what did it was that Obasanjo wanted a meeting with President Bush in the White House. And here the Bush administration did the right thing and essentially said at the urging of Human Rights Watch and others, “No meeting until Charles Taylor is surrendered.” And so he was then suddenly, miraculously turned over to . . . to U.N. police who brought him to the Hague. So this is a . . . a huge victory. Here is a man who was above the law, who was absolutely ruthless who suddenly is gonna have his day in court. And that sends the signal to tyrants around the world that if they’re thinking about going down the path of mass atrocities, they may be better off thinking twice because they could face the same end as Charles Taylor. Now in an ideal world, Charles Taylor would have been tried in Sierra Leone or in Liberia among his victims. That was not possible for security reasons. Everybody agreed that he had many allies, and that to try him in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone where the court is located, would simply be too dangerous. And so as a result, Taylor was moved to the Hague literally to the building where the international criminal court runs from, and is gonna be tried there; although not by the international criminal court, but by the special court for Sierra Leone. That distance is gonna make the justice a little less meaningful for the people of Sierra Leone or the people of Liberia, although steps will be taken to try to narrow that distance. The . . . the trial will be televised. It will be broadcast on radio. There will be various ways to make it tangible and real so that this momentous step for international justice will also be an important national step for the people of Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Recorded on: 8/14/07