{"id":14506,"date":"2011-09-19T12:00:33","date_gmt":"2011-09-19T11:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=14506"},"modified":"2011-09-19T02:01:45","modified_gmt":"2011-09-19T01:01:45","slug":"u-s-%e2%80%98not-encouraged%e2%80%99-by-india-south-africa-brazil-at-un","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2011\/09\/u-s-%e2%80%98not-encouraged%e2%80%99-by-india-south-africa-brazil-at-un\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. \u2018Not Encouraged\u2019 by India, South Africa, Brazil at UN"},"content":{"rendered":"

The U.S. has not been encouraged by the performance of India<\/a>, Brazil and South Africa<\/a> during their temporary tenure on the UN Security Council, Ambassador Susan Rice<\/a> said yesterday [12 Sep 2011].<\/p>\n

Splits between the so-called IBSA group of countries and the U.S. arose as protest movements swept the Middle East<\/a>. India and Brazil, along with Russia, China and Germany<\/a>, abstained from a UN resolution that formed the legal basis for military intervention in Libya.<\/p>\n

As Syria sent troops out to suppress protesters, Brazil, India and South Africa blocked UN moves to pressure the Assad regime and sent diplomats to Damascus last month to engage leaders there. All three countries are serving two-year temporary terms on the Security Council and aspire to permanent seats, a goal the U.S. may block.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a very interesting opportunity to see how they respond to the issues of the day, how they relate to us and others, how they do or don\u2019t act consistent with their own democratic institutions and stated values,\u201d Rice said at a briefing with reporters. \u201cLet me just say, we\u2019ve learned a lot and, frankly, not all of it encouraging.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rice said that issues related to the protection of human rights, democracy and the protection of civilians raised U.S. concerns about the IBSA group.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhether in the context of Libya<\/a>, or Cote d\u2019Ivoire or Sudan<\/a> even,\u201d Rice said, the countries have taken positions \u201cthat one might not have anticipated, given that each of them come out of strong and proud democratic traditions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Post-Colonial Viewpoints<\/strong><\/p>\n

That criticism is simplistic, said Fabienne Hara, the vice president of multilateral affairs at the International Crisis Group<\/a>. Hara, who recently returned from meetings in Brazil and consults widely with other diplomats, said the IBSA countries approached the Libya situation with their own set of concerns.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were all quite surprised that this turned into a NATO-led operation with a bombing campaign, with a variety of targets including Tripoli,\u201d Hara said.<\/p>\n

For countries with colonial histories that now champion non-interference, as India and Brazil<\/a> do, the NATO action had ugly historical echoes, said Mark Quarterman, director of the program on Crisis, Conflict and Cooperation at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s almost a third-world sense, a post-colonial sense, that they were meddled in, in ways that didn\u2019t redound to their benefit, and now the same countries are claiming humanitarian reasons for meddling,\u201d Quarterman said.<\/p>\n

Embargoes<\/strong><\/p>\n

The IBSA countries have pointed out that while there was an arms embargo and a call for a cease-fire, it applied to Qaddafi\u2019s forces, while France<\/a> sent arms to the Libyan rebels.<\/p>\n

An oil embargo was put in place against Qaddafi and his officials, while Qatar helped the rebels sell oil with the NATO- led coalition\u2019s awareness.<\/p>\n

All this led to concern about what the UN would do when Syrians began taking to the streets. \u201cThe reason why there is no resolution on Syria<\/a> now is because of Libya,\u201d Hara said, \u201cthe aftermath of this very bitter debate that members of the Security Council had after the Libya bombing.<\/p>\n

\u2018\u2018They were extremely reluctant to authorize any kind of resolution that could be the first step to\u2019\u2019 another Western intervention, Hara said.<\/p>\n

Brett Schaefer, an analyst at the Heritage Foundation<\/a>, said that political positions of South Africa, India and Brazil should not come as any surprise.<\/p>\n

\u2018Not Democratic\u2019 Alliances<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2018\u2018Most often, they\u2019ve chosen to ally themselves with countries that are not democratic, are not politically free and are not economically free, and at times have shown themselves to be hostile to promoting those very values in the United Nations<\/a>,\u2019\u2019 Schaefer said in a telephone interview.<\/p>\n

Schaeffer said that the IBSA countries\u2019 performance serves as a counterargument for those who say the Security Council<\/a> is not representative of the world.<\/p>\n

Expanding the Council \u2018\u2018doesn\u2019t mean it would be more effective or responsive to the world\u2019s problems, nor possess the will or inclination to act than the current council as it stands,\u201d Schaeffer said. \u201cThere\u2019s a great deal of evidence to indicate the opposite: That a larger security council would be more paralyzed, less likely to act to address political crises around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

________________________<\/p>\n

To contact the reporter on this story: Nicole Gaouette in Washington at ngaouette@bloomberg.net<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva at msilva34@bloomberg.net<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 bloomberg.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Splits between the so-called IBSA group of countries and the U.S. arose as protest movements swept the Middle East. India and Brazil, along with Russia, China and Germany, abstained from a UN resolution that formed the legal basis for military intervention in Libya.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[180],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14506\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}