Responsibility to Protect (R2P): International Military Intervention as an Appropriate Response? The Threshold for Considering Humanitarian Intervention as an Act of Aggression

ISA/APSA/IPSA Conference - Protecting Human Rights: Duties and Responsibilities of States and Non‐State Actors, June 2012

10 Pages Posted: 26 Dec 2012

Date Written: 2012

Abstract

R2P implies responsibility to react, not only for the State concerned but for the international community as a whole. Events should cover certain characteristics to justify a military intervention: the crime must be of significant magnitude, it may occur in times of war or peace, and may be either international or internal; it must be identifiable in conventional international criminal law; its execution must have been led by a ruling or otherwise powerful elite in society and the law applicable has to render individuals criminally responsible for the commission of such crime. It should be an atrocity crime as described by Scheffer. Likewise, military intervention has to comply with certain principles too: restrain itself to cause threshold; follow precautionary principles and be authorized by the right authority (the Security Council). The questions to be discussed are: when can we really identify a situation as described before? What if we can and there is no action taken by the Security Council? If the latter’s authorization exists, where could we identify the threshold of such intervention? How can we differentiate a “humanitarian intervention” from an act of aggression? The intervention in Libya, e.g., really covers the before-mentioned requirements?

Suggested Citation

Borjas Monroy, Alma C., Responsibility to Protect (R2P): International Military Intervention as an Appropriate Response? The Threshold for Considering Humanitarian Intervention as an Act of Aggression (2012). ISA/APSA/IPSA Conference - Protecting Human Rights: Duties and Responsibilities of States and Non‐State Actors, June 2012, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2193968

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