ABSTRACT
This chapter examines India's response to a humanitarian crisis while it sat on the Security Council in 2011 and 2012. It bears mentioning at the outset that Indian commentators paid relatively little attention to the Cote d'Ivoire crisis, meaning there is substantially less source material to draw upon compared to the Indian commentary on the Libyan and Syrian crises. Nevertheless, India did vote for several Security Council resolutions which effectively authorised a humanitarian intervention – indeed, a regime change – in Cote d'Ivoire, so this crisis cannot be ignored. Cote d'Ivoire had experienced unrest for over a decade before 2011. In the late 1990s the then-President Henri Konan Bedie had promoted 'Ivoirite to effectively deny citizenship and voting rights to about one quarter of the population. The relative silence about Cote d'Ivoire amongst Indian policy-shapers continues in those sources which might have provided evidence for why India voted for Resolution 1975.
