Research Structure and Scope of the Study

The chapters in this thesis are organised along the notion of stages of conflicts. Such organisation is indicative of the fact that human rights considerations are important factors throughout the course of armed conflict, and every conflict can be depicted as passing through any number of different stages. For analytical purposes, Julie Mertus and Jeffrey Helsing¹⁵² identified three overlapping stages, which I adopt here:

• The conflict intensification stage: Communal conflicts turn violent; human rights violations are often a root cause of conflict, and the ability of perpetrators to act with impunity contributes to the intensification of conflict;

the failure to address human rights issues hinders conflict prevention efforts.

• The armed conflict stage: Armed conflict intensifies as competing factions take up arms; human rights abuses are both a common by-product of violence and a component of wartime strategy; international human rights norms inform standards for international intervention in conflicts, evaluation of the conduct of armed forces, and wartime protection of civilians.

• The postconflict/postcrisis stage: Armed conflict ceases, and efforts at rebuilding begin; human rights considerations play a role in peace agreements, the treatment of refugees, civil society-building efforts, human rights education campaigns, and the creation of truth commissions and other efforts to hold perpetrators of human rights abuse accountable. If patterns of destructive relationships are not transformed into healthier patterns of interaction, this third stage can lead to a new round of intensified conflict.

This study examines operational issues confronting conflict prevention and management mechanisms and human rights concerns in responding to each of these

152 See Mertus and Helsing, supra note 6 p. 10.

stages. The following outline seeks not to summarize each chapter, but rather to situate the chapters of the thesis within the context of the three stages.

An overview of the main features of the regional conflict as well as an inventory of existing regional mechanisms for conflict management is made in Chapter Two. In this chapter, I suggest that the main features and driving force for the conflicts in the region studied are colonial legacies and the role of the West in relation to the current trade and political relations with countries in the region, construction of ethnic identity and legitimacy, discrimination on the basis of ethnicity and human rights violations before, during and after the violence. The chapter helps to frame the historical relationship between the Africa’s Great Lakes conflicts and human rights violations. Towards the end of the chapter, we indicate that human rights violations by way of discrimination on the basis of ethnicity can be both the symptom and cause of conflict. As Ellen Lutz points out, human rights are often at the core of a conflict or war. Human rights or human security have often been cited in more recent examples of humanitarian intervention. Human rights have also been cited as one reason for armed intervention or pre-emptive war, including the military intervention by the U.S-led coalition in Iraq.¹⁵³ Lutz noted that the differences between human rights and conflict management approaches play out among the parties in actual conflict situations, as they have in Rwanda, Congo, Yugoslavia and many other places. There are many examples of human rights claims being manipulated by aggressive powers in order to justify intervention. But as many of the scholars emphasize, human rights are not only significant factors in the conduct of war or the justification for war, but also critical sources of conflicts that devolve into war. Often both sides of a conflict compete in proclaiming themselves victims of human rights violations.

Chapter Three is an overview of the approaches to conflict prevention and management. The various conventional mechanisms for the resolution of conflicts, both UN Charter based and non-Charter based mechanisms are reviewed. What is indicated at the end of the chapter is the main argument of this thesis, namely, contemporary conflict resolution mechanisms are limited and full of shortcomings.

The chapter evaluates the effectiveness of the current UN approaches to conflict

153 See Ibid, p. 11.

resolution in light of contemporary internal armed conflict situations. In view of the failure of the UN to effectively respond to the various conflicts with the resultant catastrophes, including genocide in both Rwanda and Bosnia, the chapter concludes with a proposal for the strengthening of a human rights approach as discussed throughout this study.

Chapter Four, on the Role of Peacekeeping in conflict prevention and management with a focus on the MONUC, attempts to show, in practice, how difficult the UN conflict resolution mechanisms have proved to be, in the absence of human rights components. The chapter sets to analyse UN Peacekeeping as one of the major conflict resolution methods applied in resolving the Africa’s Great Lakes conflicts, drawing from the MONUC in the DRC as a case study. The human rights components of UN peacekeeping and of the MONUC in particular is analysed in the light of acts of human rights atrocities taking place on the ground in the DRC, despite the deployment of the MONUC. The chapter concludes with challenges and limitations of the approach, and with a proposal to strengthen the African regional peacekeeping and that human rights component of peacekeeping operations is vital if the root cause of the conflicts is to be addressed.

Chapter Five presents yet another conflict resolution mechanism tested in resolving the Congo conflict. The chapter titled “International Adjudication and Resolution of Armed Conflicts in the DRC” discusses various efforts taken so far, in the form of international adjudication in resolving the Congo conflict. The role of the ICJ in armed conflict settlement is critically examined with a sober conclusion that both in the Case of Armed Activities in Territory of the Congo and in the parallel adjudication of the Bosnia-Herzegovina case, the ICJ does not prove itself to be a suitable forum for the resolution of internal armed conflicts. The chapter further examines the role of international criminal adjudication, in the light of individual criminal responsibility.

The role of both the International Criminal Tribunal for the Rwanda (ICTR) and the International Criminal Court (ICC) in addressing post conflict issues are well addressed. With proposals initially mounting pressures to the international community to establish an international criminal tribunal for the DRC, the role of the ICTR in addressing the Rwandan conflict is examined.

The role of the ICC in the Congo conflict is examined in the light of individual criminal responsibility, taking reference of the Lubanga case, which was still pending during the writing of this thesis. Although the importance of international adjudication in the development of international law is reiterated, the overall conclusion of the chapter is that, unless a number of shortcomings are addressed, the method may not suit internal armed conflict situations of such a nature as the DRC conflict.

Chapter Six constitutes the main thesis of this study. The chapter, titled “Systemic Integration of Human Rights and Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution,”

focuses on the relationship between the fields of human rights and conflict management as a means to prevent conflict.¹⁵⁴ As this chapter attests, the relationship between conflict management and resolution on the one hand, and human rights promotion and protection on the other is multifaceted, intricate and fluid, evolving in response not only to changes in the nature of contemporary armed conflicts, but also to the two camps’ growing experience in working as partners instead of competitors.

The chapter also makes it clear that to see the relationship as two-sided distorts reality, for there are in fact three camps involved: conflict resolution, human rights and international humanitarian law. The last of these--which seeks to regulate the conduct of war and to protect civilians during armed conflict, and which is championed not least by humanitarian relief agencies--can serve as a bridge between peace negotiations and human rights advocates because it is a human rights and legal tool that can strengthen a peace process or agreement by helping to reduce suffering and creating legitimacy for settlement. The richness of the interaction among these

154 Issues of human rights and conflict interact in multiple ways as discussed in Ramcharan, B. (2004).

‘Human Rights and Conflict Resolution’, in Human Rights Law Review, vol. 4, No. 1, pp. 1-18;

Summer, D. and Schnabel, A. (2003). Conflict Prevention: Path to Peace or Grand Illusion, Tokyo:

UNU; Thoolen, H. ‘Early Warning and Prevention,’ in Alfredsson et al. (eds), (2001). International Human Rights Monitoring Mechanisms: Essays in Honour of Jakob Th. Möller, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers., p. 301; Mahoney, L. (2003). ‘Unarmed Monitoring and Human Rights Field Presences: Civilian Protection and Conflict Protection,’ The Journal of Humanitarian Assistance, August 2003, available at <http://www.jha.ac/articles/a122.htm>. Last visited, September 8, 2009;

Lutz, E., et al., (2003). ‘Human Rights and Conflict Resolution from the Practitioners’ Perspective,’

The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs, 27(1) (Winter/Spring); Saunders, J. (2002). ‘Bridging Human Rights and Conflict Prevention: A Dialogue between Critical Communities,’ Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs, at <http//www.cceia.org/

viewMedia.php/prmTemplateID/1/prmID/161>. last visited, September 8, 2009.; O’Flaherty, M (2004). ‘Sierra Leone’s Peace Process: The Role of the Human Rights Community,’in Human Rights Quarterly, vol. 26, No. 4, pp. 983-1027; O’Flaherty, M. (2003). ‘Future Protection of Human Rights in Post-Conflict Societies: the Role of the United Nations,’ in Human Rights Law Review, vol. 3 No. 1, pp. 53-76.

approaches, the way in which they can reinforce and complement, and not just undercut one another’s efforts are discussed. I draw attention here to a point made several times in this thesis, that the relation between human rights and conflict resolution seems particularly important in efforts to create sustainable peace. In light of challenges presented by conflicts in such countries as the DRC, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq, and Somalia, substantial efforts must be devoted to the task of determining the critical components of a stable and sustainable peace. Many of the ideas in the chapter merit serious consideration in building sustainable settlements in societies emerging from conflicts.

The last chapter, chapter seven provides some concluding remarks. The chapter brings forth the discussions on the possibilities and challenges of the relevance of human rights in conflict prevention, management and resolution discussed in the whole study before making some recommendations and conclusions.