CYIL 2014

VERONIKA BÍLKOVÁ

CYIL 5 ȍ2014Ȏ

One of the states taking a critical stance towards the Operation United Protector

was Brazil.

Sceptical about Responsibility to Protect since the endorsement in the

Outcome Document, seeing in it

“droit d’ingerénce /.../ in new clothes”,

Brazil took

the Libya events as a confirmation of the inadequacy of the concept and of the need

to further clarify its content. In order to contribute to this aim, Brazil put forward the

concept of

Responsibility while Protecting.

The concept was introduced for the first

time, albeit under a somewhat different title, by the President of Brazil, Mrs Dilma

Rousseff, during the opening of the General Debate of the 66th General Assembly in

2011. While commenting upon the events of the Arab Spring and expressing general

support to the related activities by the United Nations, Mrs Rousseff claimed:

“Much is

said about the responsibility to protect; yet we hear little about responsibility in protecting.

These are concepts that we must develop together

(emphasis original)

.”

The concept of

“responsibility in protecting” is not explained any further. In fact, the reference to it

is followed by a call for a substantive reform of the UN Security Council, with Mrs

Rousseff stressing the readiness of Brazil

“to shoulder its responsibilities as a permanent

member of the Council”

Mrs Roussef spoke about “responsibility in protecting”. Yet, as this expression

would translate into a somewhat unfortunate abbreviation in English (RIP), Brazil

decided almost immediately to replace it with a more elegant and largely synonymous

“responsibility while protecting” (RwP).

This new expression appeared in the

Concept Paper that Brazil published in November 2011.

The Concept Paper, entitled

Responsibility while protecting: elements for the further development and promotion

of a concept,

draws attention to certain shortcomings of R2P, especially the lack

of adequate criteria of and sufficient control over the use of force under Pillar

Three of R2P. As a remedy to these shortcomings, Brazil suggests that

“as it exercises

its responsibility to protect, the international community must show a great deal of

responsibility while protecting”

(par. 11). The Concept Paper then enumerates a set of

steps to be taken in this context which will be analysed in the next section.

In February 2012 Brazil held an informal debate about the concept of RwP

in New York. In the course of the debate, the concept of RwP, further refined

See also Paula Wojcikiewicz Almeida, Brazilian View Of Responsibility To Protect. From ‘Non-

Indifference’ To ‘Responsibility While Protecting’,

Global Responsibility to Protect,

Vol. 6, No. 1, 2014,

pp. 29-63.

Celso Amorim,

Conceitos de Segurança e Defesa—implicações para a ação interna e externa do governo,

J. R. de Almeida Pinto, A. J. Ramalho da Rocha, R. Doring Pinho da Silva (eds),

Reflexões Sobre Defesa

e Segurança: uma Estratégia para o Brasil,

Brasilia: Ministry of Defense, Brasilia, 2004, p. 140. Cit. in

Matyas Spektor, Humanitarian Interventionism Brazilian Style?,

Americas Quarterly,

Summer 2012.

Brazil,

Statement by H. E. Dilma Rousseff, President of the Federative Republic of Brazil, at the Opening of the

General Debate of the 66th Session if the United Nations General Assembly,

New York, 21 September 2011.

Ibid.

The difference exists only in the English translation, the original Portuguese term is the same

(responsabilidade ao proteger).

UN Doc. A/66/51-S/2011/701,

Letter dated 9 November 2011 from the Permanent Representative of

Brazil to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary General,

11 November 2011