Opinion:

Albright ignored Rwanda genocide, but repeats ‘fiction’ on Lanka

by Daya Gamage

Influential cabinet member, Secretary of State and United States’ Ambassador to the United Nations - from 1993 to 2000 - during Bill Clinton's presidency, Madeleine K. Albright turned a blind eye or totally ignored the open genocide and carnage in Rwanda in 1994 and subsequently sidestepped taking ‘global action’ against the Rwandan perpetrators led by current president Paul Kagame.

In a report released on July 22 in Washington, authored by her - The United States And R2P: From Word To Action - commissioned by the US Holocaust Museum, the US Institute of Peace and the Brookings Institution - Albright had the audacity and nakedness to use the ‘interpretations’, ‘fabrications’ and ‘diabolical falsehood’ provided by the separatist elements of the Tamil Diaspora in labelling Sri Lanka as a ‘genocidal state’, a term the activists within the Tamil Diaspora continually use to depict this South Asian nation before the international community.

Madeleine Albright is the last person who could brand Sri Lanka's regime of ‘genocidal actions’ during its war against terrorist-separatist-ruthless Tamil Tigers when, as Clinton's Ambassador to the UN (93-97), she got the US administration to ignore the open genocide (1994) in Rwanda and failed as the American envoy to the world body to initiate action to stop the killings witnessed by the entire world.

She further failed to take steps as the US Secretary of State (1997-2000) in the Clinton administration to get Paul Kagame, who grabbed political power through the genocide, to face the consequences, but let him run the country.

It is this Albright, in the July 22 report, who paints Sri Lanka as a genocide state, Sri Lanka which fought 26 years of separatism-terrorism to reclaim one third of the nation's north-eastern area against the ruthless Tamil Tigers (LTTE), to free the captive minority Tamil population in those areas and safeguard the territorial integrity, sovereignty and the democratic governance to bring peace and economic development.

This report by Madeleine K. Albright and Richard S. Williamson examines the responsibility to protect (R2P), the emerging political norm that aims to protect civilians from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, by preventing them from taking place or taking remedial action when necessary. R2P is based on three mutually reinforcing pillars:

The duty of every state to protect its people from these crimes, a commitment of the international community to help states fulfil their responsibilities, and the preparedness of countries to take collective action under the UN Charter when a state manifestly fails to protect its populations.

Genocide in Rwanda

Let's find out what happened in Rwanda when Albright was a leading and influential cabinet member in the Clinton administration.

The genocide in Rwanda was based on two ethnic groups, the Hutu and the Tutsi. The population in 1994 was seven million people. Eighty five percent was Hutu, 14 percent was Tutsi, and one percent was Twa. The Hutus feared the minority and the Tutsi rule because of the population's increase in social, political and economic pressures. President Habyarimana increased divisions between the Tutsis and Hutus in 1992.

In 1994, the Hutu extremists released their plots to vanquish the Tutsi population, violence struck immediately after President Habyarimana, a moderate Hutu, was shot down in a plane on April 6. It is estimated that about 800,000 - three quarters of the Tutsi population in Rwanda - were killed in the genocide.

Anyone suspected of being a Tutsi was killed while fleeing the roadblocks and leaving the country. Hutus opposing the genocide were also killed, being proclaimed traitors. The Hutu extremists, called the Interahamwe were successful in their genocide. The outcome was Paul Kagame, the leader of the RPF, the Rwanda Patriotic Front that invaded the country, becoming the president of Rwanda.

The UN and peacekeeping forces stationed there were largely ineffective at suppressing the genocide and eventually all were ordered to leave before the genocide's end, even though many peacekeepers were providing protection to the Tutsis that sought refuge.

In the US, President Bill Clinton and US Ambassador to the UN Madeleine Albright repeatedly refused to take action. US government documents declassified in 2004 indicate that the Clinton administration knew Rwanda was being engulfed by genocide in April 1994, but buried the information to justify its inaction.

Senior US officials privately used the word ‘genocide’ within 16 days of the start of the killings, but chose not to do so publicly because Clinton had already decided not to intervene.From the very start, the United States resisted intervention in Rwanda because of national interests, higher priorities, and domestic and bureaucratic politics. Moreover, during the three months of killings, the US blocked several opportunities, short of intervention, that could have diminished the slaughter.

Michael Sheehan, Peacekeeping Adviser to Albright said: “And I can tell you, having remembered very clearly, there was no one within the United States political spectrum in that period that was calling for an American-led intervention - no one in the Congress, no one in the executive branch, no one in the military, no one in the press. There was almost a silence on that issue at the time. It was only later, mid-May and later, as the horrors came into full view, that there was a rush of people, volunteering that [the] Americans should have guided an operation in there.

But I can tell you, in late April and early May, in terms of the serious political leadership within the executive branch or in the Congress, there were no big advocates for taking US forces that were basically steaming out of the port of Mogadishu at that same time and reinserting them into central Africa in a very, very unstable situation”. Faced with criticism of inaction Albright later said: “The tragedy in Rwanda was so quick, that I am not sure there was time for a major voice in it. Also, again, I think what's important is to see it within the context of the other things that were happening.

“Somalia, and watching Americans be dragged through the streets of Mogadishu, was a searing event. Trying to figure out how to deal with the results of that, the lessons learned, and then the lessons don't apply exactly to another situation - I think it was a very troubling time, in terms of decision making generally.

“But the thing that I think one has to keep in mind is that the decisions being made were not being made because people weren't interested or were cold-blooded or brutal or didn't care. It's that the information wasn't there, and the wherewithal wasn't there to do it. For those people to judge what happened on the basis of what we know now, versus what we knew then, I think is not fair”.

Not sufficient information

Despite Albright's interpretation of ‘not sufficient information’, The Guardian of March 31, 2004 gave this account:(Text) President Bill Clinton's administration knew Rwanda was being engulfed by genocide in April 1994, but buried the information to justify its inaction, according to classified documents made available for the first time. Senior officials privately used the word genocide within 16 days of the start of the killings, but chose not to do so publicly because the president had already decided not to intervene.

Intelligence reports obtained using the US Freedom of Information Act show the cabinet and almost certainly the president had been told of a planned “final solution to eliminate all Tutsis” before the slaughter reached its peak. It took Hutu death squads three months from April 6 to murder an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus and at each stage, accurate, detailed reports were reaching Washington's top policymakers. The documents undermine claims by Mr Clinton and his senior officials that they did not fully appreciate the scale and speed of the killings.

“It's powerful proof that they knew,” said Alison des Forges, a Human Rights Watch researcher and authority on the genocide. The National Security Archive, an independent non-governmental research institute based in Washington DC, went to court to obtain the material. (End Text)

The report co-authored by Albright and former Presidential Special Envoy to Sudan Richard S. Williamson concludes that the United States ought to work to strengthen implementation of the doctrine of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) to better protect civilians from genocide and other forms of mass atrocity.

LTTE territory

And it is this same Albright who talks about Sri Lanka in this report this way:

(Excerpts) “For over 25 years, the conflict in Sri Lanka pitted the army against the separatist insurgency of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). However, levels of violence escalated rapidly as the government pursued a strategy of military victory and advanced into LTTE-held territory between January and May 2009.

During this period, the civilian population suffered significant casualties and were unable to escape the conflict zone due to LTTE threats and the Sri Lankan military’s prohibitions on movement.

The United Nations estimates that up to 40,000 civilians were killed and hundreds of thousands were displaced during the final phase, which ended with the defeat of the LTTE and the deaths of its senior leaders.

Despite the high number of civilian casualties, the international community did little beyond issuing statements of concern. The UN Security Council, Rights, and General Assembly held no formal sessions on Sri Lanka during this period. In Sri Lanka, both the government and the rebels can be faulted for failing to protect civilians.

However, the international community also neglected its responsibility to take timely action when it was apparent that violations of humanitarian law were taking place.

The case of Sri Lanka exemplifies a challenge for implementing R2P when sovereign governments confront an internal threat from a group that is designated as a terrorist organisation. Since the end of the conflict, the government has steadfastly denied that the mass killing of civilians and war crimes took place. While launching its own inquiry into the military’s actions, the government has obstructed crimes and crimes against humanity.

Critics question the independence and balance of the government commission’s report.

If a recurrence of conflict in Sri Lanka is to be prevented, the international community should help the government respond to the needs of all communities in the country, while undertaking a national reconciliation process that addresses wounds inflicted during nearly three decades.”(End Excerpts)

Dr. Albright was the 64th Secretary of State of the United States. In 1997, she was named the first female Secretary of State and became, at that time, the highest-ranking woman in the history of the US government. From 1993 to 1997, Dr. Albright served as the US Permanent Representative to the United Nations and was a member of the President’s cabinet. In 2012, she was chosen by President Obama to receive the nation’s highest civilian honour, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in recognition of her contributions to international peace and democracy.

Dr. Albright, as both Secretary of State and Ambassador to the UN, who turned a blind eye on the genocidal events in Rwanda in 1994 in fact failed to contribute to international peace and democracy. She, in her Sri Lanka section of the report, makes these observations that the foreign policy handlers in Sri Lanka need to take note:

* The civilian population suffered significant casualties and were unable to escape the zone due to LTTE threats and the Sri Lankan military’s prohibitions on movement

* UN General Assembly held no formal sessions on Sri Lanka during this period
* Both the government and the rebels can be faulted for failing to protect civilians

UNHRC in Geneva

The above statement need to be challenged before the ‘Albright Report’ becomes part of the next round at the UNHRC in Geneva. And, it is important to challenge the credibility of the author of this report who has no standing to accuse Sri Lanka, using the fabricated and false propaganda tools the separatist elements of the Tamil Diaspora readily use to influence the Western policy and lawmakers, who failed to address the naked genocide in Rwanda when she was in a position to do so.

With that, Sri Lanka needs to use its impressive record of rehabilitating and releasing the 12,000 combatants who either surrendered or were captured at the end of terrorism in May 2009 while using the dismal situation in the US detention facility in Guantanamo, Cuba that has incarcerated 166 without charges and prosecution for 10 long years.

Undoubtedly, this ‘Albright Report’ will be a major part of the separatist elements of the Tamil Diaspora in the next round when Sri Lanka will be hauled to Geneva if the foreign policy handlers do not take effective and far-reaching steps with the use of public diplomacy and strategic communication.

Dr. Albright is taken very seriously by the Obama White House, its new National Security Advisor Susan Rice, the new US Ambassador to UN Samantha Power and the just-appointed Assistant Secretary for South Asia Bureau in the State Department.

It is in this background that the ‘Albright Report’ will be taken seriously by the United States to ‘question’ Sri Lanka at the next session of the UNHRC.

And, the separatist elements of the Tamil Diaspora will see that such a situation develops.

Courtesy: Asian Tribune