ABSTRACT
The United Nations Security Council has evolved considerably over time in relation to human rights. One of the six “principal organs” of the United Nations, the Security Council consists of five permanent members (China, France, Russia (formerly the Soviet Union), the United Kingdom and the United States (“P-5”)) and 10 other members elected by the General Assembly for revolving two-year terms. The mandate of the Council has always been to safeguard international peace and security, but its interpretation of the nature of this mandate and the means necessary to carry it out have changed over the decades. While other UN organs such as the General Assembly and the Eco-
nomic and Social Council were expressly empowered in their original mandates to deal with human rights and fundamental freedoms, the Security Council was not. Rather, the Security Council was left free to interpret what it meant to promote international peace and security. In the early years and throughout much of the Cold War, the Security Council sought to isolate itself from human rights concerns and to close its decision-making processes to non-governmental organizations that might push human rights and humanitarian matters into international attention. The Security Council did its best to sidestep the few human rights issues that fell under its purview. Cloistered within intergovernmental machinery and Secretariat bureaucracy, the human rights agenda was designed to remain at a safe distance from the Council from the start.1 Over time, however, this distance proved to be both impossible and unwise as the connection between ongoing human rights abuses and threats to international peace and security became increasingly clear. The demands for UN involvement in peace-keeping and peace-building
efforts in states torn by civil strife increased, and this work was intrinsically linked with human rights. To fulfill its mandate of safeguarding peace and security, the Security Council found it necessary to address the human at all stages of conflict. stage,
human rights abuses are part of the root cause of conflicts turning violent. In the hot conflict stage, human rights abuses are integral to the strategy of warring factions or where they occur as a by-product of violence. In efforts to reach peace agreements, the Security Council found that it is essential that human rights are addressed so as to pacify and stabilize conflict areas, and in the post-agreement stages, human rights abuses must be incorporated so as to bring perpetrators to justice and to build institutions capable of handling conflict civilly. The agenda of the Council was suddenly full of human rights concerns. This chapter is divided into five parts. First, it begins with the historical
debate on the authority and political will of the Security Council to address human rights, with special attention given to the role of the Secretary-General. The second section turns to an exploration of Security Council measures to promote human rights, examining in particular humanitarian intervention and the concept of a “responsibility to protect.” The third section discusses the responsibility of the UN for its own human rights violations. The fourth section introduces the most relevant debates over Security Council reform, and finally, the last section concludes with an illustration of the role of NGOs in human rights advocacy before the Security Council.
