THE UNITED NATIONS SECURITY COUNCIL AND INTERNATIONAL CONFLICT RESOLUTION: A CASE STUDY OF THE UN SECURITY COUNCIL WEAPON INSPECTION IN IRAQ

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY: The United Nations Organization was formed in 1945; it was to be a universal single purpose organization that would promote world peace and security. In order to ensure prompt and effective action by the United Nations, its members confer on the Security Council the primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security and agree that in carrying out its duties under this responsibility the Security Council acts on their behalf.

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is the organ of the United Nations charged with maintaining international peace and security among nations. While other organs of UN only make recommendations to member governments, the Security Council has the power to make decisions which member governments must carry out under Article 25 of the United Nations Charter, which reads “the members of the United Nations agree to accept and carry out the decisions of the Security Council in accordance with the president charter. The decisions of the Council are known as UNSC Resolutions. The Council is made up of 15 Member States, consisting of five permanent seats and ten temporary seats. The five permanent seats are China, France, Russia, The United Kingdom and the United States. These big five hold veto power over substantive but not procedural resolutions. The ten temporary seats voted in by the UN General Assembly on a regional basis. The presidency of the Security Council is rotated alphabetically each month.

The Security Council performs these functions on the basis of a universal phenomenon that has come to be known as collective security. This is a system in which aggression against a state is taken to be aggression against all that are parties to the treaty; consequently, a collective action is to be taken by other states to counter such an aggression. A good example was in 1991, when the United States led a coalition force of about 23 countries in a battle code- named “Operation Desert Storm” on Iraq for the formers invasion and annexation of Kuwait on August 2, 1990.

Resolution 687, adopted in 3 April 1991 set out terms of cease fire which demanded respect of inviolability of Iraq- Kuwait border, as well as inspection and destruction of Iraq’s weapon which range greater than 150 kilometres, together with related items paragraph 9 of the Resolution provided for the creation of the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) with the mandate to implement immediate on- site inspections of Iraq’s chemical, biological and missile Capabilities, on the basis both of Iraq’s own declarations and of the designation of the special Commission itself. Iraq was equally obliged to declare its nuclear material, equipment and sub-systems to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

A major reason given by the Bush administration for waging war on Iraq was that she possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) as well as had links with al-Qaeda (Osama Bin laden and Saddam Hussein). This led to the adumbration of a doctrine of “pre-emption” by the Bush administration; in Blair’s words, “it is a matter of time unless we act and take a stand before terrorism and weapons of mass destruction come together, and I regard them as two sides of the same coin”.

1.12 STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

In the period before the war, when it became apparent that a specific UN Security Council authorization was unlikely, States and international lawyers criticized the proposed US-led military action in Iraq as unlawful since this action was not a case of self- defence. To the extent that the invasion was based on a claim of anticipatory self- defence, Article 51 has been stretched beyond endurance. Secondly, to the extent that the invasion was based on claims of threats to international peace and security sufficient under Chapter vii to justify Security Council authorization, but with those claims poorly argued and the council eventually by passed, the credibility of the whole Charter system has again been frontally challenged. And thirdly, to the extent that the invasion was based on Saddam Hussein’s record of tyranny over his people- but again, poorly and inconsistently argued, and with the council by passed – we have almost choked at birth what many were hoping was an emerging new norm justifying intervention on the basis of the principle of “responsibility to protect”.

Finally, this work would analyse the war on Iraq and its implications for international law. The law is clear, no amount of weapons a state has whether chemical, biological, and nuclear, laser and blinding weapons can be conceived as an attack by the possessor state against another state. Such possession may however be styled by the UN as constituting a threat to peace. A threat to National Security is not a recognized basis for use of force. President Bush, in giving the President of Iraq Saddam Hussein, a 48 hours ultimatum to leave Baghdad said: “the United State of America has the Sovereign authority to use force in assuring its own national security”. It becomes the task of this thesis to ascertain whether every state can launch a pre-emptive war against any state, she regards as a threat to her national security, which implies that international law no longer exists for nations to obey or that international law only entitled the right of pre-emptive war on the United State of America. Nevertheless, the study will be guided by the following research questions.