CYIL 2012

JOSEF MRÁZEK CYIL 3 ȍ2012Ȏ military interventions. Others were in favour of “effective” interventions, stating that the legal status of military intervention poses a profound challenge to the future of global order. Former Secretary General of the UN Kofi Annan stated that a humanitarian intervention presents a “core challenge to the Security Council and the United Nations as a whole in the next century”. 8 He was referring to the twenty-first century. The UNSC recently accepted a far broader conception of what constitutes a “threat to international peace and security”, including serious violations of human rights. It has made several decisions confirming the existence of a threat to or breach of international law not only under Art. 39, but also under Chapt. VII of the UN Charter. 9 After the Cold War we have witnessed renewed attempts and strengthening efforts to interpret Art. 2 (4) narrowly, allowing the use of armed force for military interventions. In 1966 the ILC unresistingly stated that Art. 2 (4), together with other provisions of the Charter, “authoritatively declares the modern customary law regarding the threat or use of force”. 10 Nowadays there is a substantial change in favour of military interventions, especially by the US and NATO countries, who are prepared to rely on the success of humanitarian interventions. The development of doctrines and practice of armed interventions are often confronted with the position mainly of Russia and China. Brazil, India and also non-aligned countries are rather reluctant to accept this practice of interventions. There is a quite new view that the law on use of force has already been modified by the UNSC practice and by the practice of the UN member states. It seems to be clear that any formal modification (by Charter amendment) of the principle of non-use of force embodied in the UN Charter is highly unlikely. Governments have developed a number of justifications for military interventions: to protect human rights and to assist or impose democratic regimes, or historically self-determination or to protect spheres of influence. To justify certain activities involving the use of force, the states mainly rely on the exercise of their right of individual or (mostly) of collective self-defence. Intervention and the United Nations , Charlottesville 1973; Lubell Noam, Extraterritorial Use of Force Against Non-State Actors , Oxford 2010; Oxford Anne, reading Humanitarian Intervention: Human Rights and the Use of Force in International Law, Cambridge, 2003; Murphy S. D., Humanitarian Intervention: The United Nations in an Evolving World Order, Philadelphia 1996; Ramsbotham O., Woodhouse T., Humanitarian Intervention in Contemporary Conflict , Cambridge, 1996; Ruys T., A rmed Attack and Art. 51 of the UN Charter, Evolutions in Customary Law and Practice , Oxford 2010; Seylbolt T. B., Humanitarian Military Intervention, The Conditions for Succes and Failure, SIPRI, Oxford 2007; Schachter O., International Law in Theory and Practice, Martinus Nijhoff, Dordrecht 1991; Schnabel A. L., Thakur R. (eds.) Kosovo and the Challenge of Humanitarian Intervention, United Nations University Press, 2000; Tesón F., Humanitarian Intervention: An Inquiry into Law and Morality 1997; Verwey D., Humanitarian Intervention, in Cassese A., (ed.), The Current Legal Regulation of the Use of Force, Martinus Nijhoff, Dordrecht 1986. 8 See UN Press Release SG/SM/7136, Sept. 20, 1999. 9 Res. of SC 687(1991) with regard to Iraq (after the Gulf War); res. 808 (1993) regarding former Yugoslavia and res. 995 (1994) regarding Rwanda; res. 837(1993) concerning Somalia. 10 ILC Yearbook 1966, Vol. II, p. 247.

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