Undermined by Consistency
Accountability on an international scale and geopolitical interests are, as much as we would prefer to gloss over the issue, inextricably linked.
Justice is said to be blind but it isn’t; it is, in terms of international application, blighted by the interests of governments, of economy and of political relationships.
Since the end of the second world war and the Nuremberg trials that followed, we have heard on countless occasions that victims of what we now refer to as international crimes will have accountability, that the world will not stand idle in the face of atrocities, and yet, we do.
How many times over the years has there been international outrage, statements of condemnation, commitments to address those wrongs.
Yet time, the ever constant certainty, ticks on, and nothing is done.
For despite the public condemnation successive governments across numerous countries appear content to adopt the position that words uttered previously are enough, action is too risky, politics is more important.
We will all recall the statements and condemnation that followed the 2017 forced deportation of a million Rohingya from Myanmar into Bangladesh, and yet nothing has actually been done.
Similarly, the statements and cries concerning Syria, yet the international community has, at a state level, been found wanting.
Sri Lanka and the last days of conflict, where is the tribunal that was promised?
Yemen, Zimbabwe, China, Afghanistan, the list goes on and history repeats itself with inaction.
On 14 August 2023 it will be 10 years, a decade, since the mass murder of over 900 protesters staging a sit-in at Rabaa Square, Egypt. Their crime: protesting the coup that led to the removal of Egypt’s first democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi, and his eventually replacement with its current President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi; Sisi having been in overall command of the security forces responsible for the massacre. It was a sign of what was to come, that the exercising of a democratic right, a fundamental freedom, was to be criminalised, and was to be met with violence and oppression.
President Morsi took office during what is now referred to as the Arab Spring, he was democratically elected, the people of Egypt had their first elected leader and there was cause for hope.
For some however, this couldn’t be allowed to stand, the internal power struggles as the old regime lost influence and feared removal is beyond the scope of this comment, as are the precise factors that led to the removal of Morsi, but what is clear, is that Egypt’s green shoots of democracy were pulled from the ground before being able to develop their roots, and replaced with more of the same, a military strong-man that was content to ignore the will of the people, the rights of the people, their freedoms, their lives, and those who challenged, who dissented, felt the wrath of a further oppressive regime.
Over 900 people lost their lives during the violent break-up of the anti-government protests and not a single person has been held responsible for what occurred ten years ago. Their families even greater in numbers, being further victims of an oppressive state and yet the state is content to ignore those that are responsible for what occurred and further that impunity.
The then British Prime Minister David Cameron condemned the violence at the time stating “We don’t support this violence, we condemn it completely, its not going to solve the problems”.
The then US Secretary of State John Kerry deplored the violence, amongst a wider call by the US urging restraint and stating that “the world is watching”.
Turkey’s Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan called on the U.N. Security Council and Arab League to take immediate steps to stop a ‘massacre’ in Egypt.
No steps were taken, and as much as the world might have been watching, that was all it did, it watched, and it continues to stand idly by seemingly content to ignore, or conveniently forget that which occurred, for just two years later, David Cameron invited President Sisi to the UK by way of State visit, all seemingly forgotten.
Have any steps been taken to address the massacre and that which followed over the intervening decade, no, just as no real steps have been taken to address the majority of the worlds atrocities previously or after it.
Dictators, oppressive leaders, war criminals, those that take part in crimes against humanity and the wholesale subjugation of peoples are only emboldened by the abject failure to act.
Words make headlines, words give rise to applause, but words do not achieve accountability on their own, there must be a reaction and there must be action, else we are doomed to continue to repeat that which has gone before and merely give hope to the innumerable victims only to have those hopes dashed time and time again.
As lawyers and human rights defenders we can ensure that matters are not forgotten. We stand by ready to assist, to investigate, and to prosecute cases, but we stand on our own, we stand without the support of the states.
We have to make sure that Rabba and similar are not forgotten, we have to hold our respective governments to account for their inaction. Otherwise we will remain consistent, but it is through that consistency that we are constantly undermined.
“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.”[1]
CARL BUCKLEY © 2023
BARRISTER
33 BEDFORD ROW CHAMBERS
NOTICE: This article is provided free of charge for information purposes only; it does not constitute legal advice and should not be relied on as such. No responsibility for the accuracy and/or correctness of the information and commentary set out in the article, or for any consequences of relying on it, is assumed or accepted by the author, any member of Chambers or by Chambers as a whole. No attempt has been made to provide an exhaustive review/account of the law in this area.
[1] Barak Obama 5 February 2008