ktlight
22nd July 2011, 07:24
FYI:
uly 20, 2011
This article previously appeared in Asia Times.
"NATO's military command draws its legitimacy in Libya from UN resolution 1973, which it obviously interprets as it sees fit."
Western self-regard was on full display in a United States headline describing the Libya Contact Group confab in Istanbul over the weekend. It read: World leaders open Libya talks in Turkey. [1]
Well, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was there. Much-diminished leaders of 19th-century world powers Britain and France - and first millennium world power Italy - were there, too.
But attendance from the BRICS countries was patchy: Nobody was there from Russia, which boycotted the talks. China declined to send a representative. Brazil and India only sent observers, which meant they had no vote in the proceedings. South Africa didn't attend, and blasted the outcome of the meeting. [2]
It is an indication of the altogether ghastly reporting on Libya that there has been little effort to determine the Libya Contact Group's constituting authority, its decision-making processes, or even its membership, let alone the legitimacy of its pretensions to set international policy on Libya.
The LCG was formed in London on March 29 under the auspices of the United Kingdom, at a conference attended by 40 foreign ministers and a smattering of international organizations. Its declared mission was be to "support and be a focal point of contact with the Libyan people, coordinate international policy and be a forum for discussion of humanitarian and post-conflict support". [3]
Since then, the group has met three times and its attendance seems to have stabilized around a core of 20 or 30 countries, mostly drawn from members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), conservative oil-rich states in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and GCC cadets Jordan, Lebanon and Morocco. Dutiful ally Japan has also tagged along.
The unambiguous American template for Libya - and the LCG - is Kosovo, another humanitarian bombing campaign cum regime change exercise conducted by NATO in disregard of the United Nations.
United States Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg invoked the Kosovo precedent - and a prolonged diplomatic and sanctions campaign that grew out of a "humanitarian military action" - in testimony before the US Congress on Libya:
"Our approach is one that has succeeded before. In Kosovo, we built an international coalition around a narrow civilian protection mission. Even after Milosevic withdrew his forces and the bombing stopped, the political and economic pressure continued. Within two years, Milosevic was thrown out of office and turned over to The Hague." [4]
NATO decision-making is a rather fraught exercise in consensus-building, especially when it involves political as well as military issues. NATO's military command draws its legitimacy in Libya from UN resolution 1973 (the infamous no-fly + protect civilians undertaking), which it obviously interprets as it sees fit. Political undertakings like the LCG appear to be adjuncts to the military operation, a state of affairs that has not served NATO particularly well in Afghanistan.
"There has been little effort to determine the Libya Contact Group's constituting authority, its decision-making processes, or even its membership."
NATO's political policy on Libya is in the hands of the "North Atlantic Council" or NAC; for obvious reasons this crusaderish piece of nomenclature is not often invoked in the Libyan situation.
source to read more
http://uruknet.info/?p=m79781&hd=&size=1&l=e
uly 20, 2011
This article previously appeared in Asia Times.
"NATO's military command draws its legitimacy in Libya from UN resolution 1973, which it obviously interprets as it sees fit."
Western self-regard was on full display in a United States headline describing the Libya Contact Group confab in Istanbul over the weekend. It read: World leaders open Libya talks in Turkey. [1]
Well, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was there. Much-diminished leaders of 19th-century world powers Britain and France - and first millennium world power Italy - were there, too.
But attendance from the BRICS countries was patchy: Nobody was there from Russia, which boycotted the talks. China declined to send a representative. Brazil and India only sent observers, which meant they had no vote in the proceedings. South Africa didn't attend, and blasted the outcome of the meeting. [2]
It is an indication of the altogether ghastly reporting on Libya that there has been little effort to determine the Libya Contact Group's constituting authority, its decision-making processes, or even its membership, let alone the legitimacy of its pretensions to set international policy on Libya.
The LCG was formed in London on March 29 under the auspices of the United Kingdom, at a conference attended by 40 foreign ministers and a smattering of international organizations. Its declared mission was be to "support and be a focal point of contact with the Libyan people, coordinate international policy and be a forum for discussion of humanitarian and post-conflict support". [3]
Since then, the group has met three times and its attendance seems to have stabilized around a core of 20 or 30 countries, mostly drawn from members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), conservative oil-rich states in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and GCC cadets Jordan, Lebanon and Morocco. Dutiful ally Japan has also tagged along.
The unambiguous American template for Libya - and the LCG - is Kosovo, another humanitarian bombing campaign cum regime change exercise conducted by NATO in disregard of the United Nations.
United States Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg invoked the Kosovo precedent - and a prolonged diplomatic and sanctions campaign that grew out of a "humanitarian military action" - in testimony before the US Congress on Libya:
"Our approach is one that has succeeded before. In Kosovo, we built an international coalition around a narrow civilian protection mission. Even after Milosevic withdrew his forces and the bombing stopped, the political and economic pressure continued. Within two years, Milosevic was thrown out of office and turned over to The Hague." [4]
NATO decision-making is a rather fraught exercise in consensus-building, especially when it involves political as well as military issues. NATO's military command draws its legitimacy in Libya from UN resolution 1973 (the infamous no-fly + protect civilians undertaking), which it obviously interprets as it sees fit. Political undertakings like the LCG appear to be adjuncts to the military operation, a state of affairs that has not served NATO particularly well in Afghanistan.
"There has been little effort to determine the Libya Contact Group's constituting authority, its decision-making processes, or even its membership."
NATO's political policy on Libya is in the hands of the "North Atlantic Council" or NAC; for obvious reasons this crusaderish piece of nomenclature is not often invoked in the Libyan situation.
source to read more
http://uruknet.info/?p=m79781&hd=&size=1&l=e