International Authority and the Responsibility to Protect: Review essay

Abstract

Rwanda’s three-month 1994 genocide that killed 800,000 people was not prevented due to a failure of political will, not lack of military capacity. Then in Kosovo in 1999, NATO did take forceful action in the name of humanitarian intervention, but without UN authorization. Both incidents triggered legal and political controversies, as a consequence of which Secretary-General (SG) Kofi Annan pushed for a new doctrine which would allow the international community to take timely and effective action against humanitarian atrocities.