Australia and the United Nations

Australia and the United Nations

Adil Hilman, Jakarta

By all accounts, Australia can be proud to be a model
international state that in the past has pulled its weight in
international affairs by playing an important role in the United
Nations for more than five decades. It participated in the
drafting of the UN Charter, and was keen to ensure that the
interests of medium and small powers were taken into account.

At the insistence of the then Australian external affairs
minister, H.V. Evatt of the Labor Party and the representatives
of other medium and small states, Articles 10 and 12 were
inserted in the UN Charter authorizing the UN General Assembly to
discuss any matter and make recommendations to the Security
Council. This gave medium and small powers an opportunity to
debate security issues.

Evatt was elected president of the UN General Assembly in 1948
when the UN adopted the Universal Declaration on Human Rights
which is generally regarded as the source of subsequent human
rights instruments, such as the 1996 International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Australia went on to play
high profile roles in promoting human rights, environmental
initiatives, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the Cambodian
peace process, among other things.

When the Labor government under Prime Minister Chifley was
defeated in the 1949 general elections, Robert Menzies of the
Liberal Party became prime minister. His foreign policy was
firmly grounded in realism and hence his view on the function of
the UN and international organizations in general, sharply
contrasted with those of Evatt. He thought that reliance on
morality and justice to prevent international disputes from
erupting into war, could not be effective in international
politics.

After World War II, there was a widespread feeling against a
repetition of the League's failure and a desire to find some
effective instrument to maintain international peace. To that
effect, the UN Charter was given teeth by the insertion of
Article 43 which calls on its members to make available to the
Security Council the armed forces necessary for the purpose of
maintaining international peace and security. Menzies, however,
believed that Article 43 could not serve its purpose.

First, the extensive membership of the UN would militate
against an effective application of that article in a crisis
situation.

Second, the interpretation by UN members of the obligation
imposed upon them by the Charter would vary from country to
country. In other words, it is the behavior of states reflecting
a nationalist state of mind and not any defect of the Charter
which makes enforcement of international action impossible.

The differences in the views of Evatt and Menzies on the
function of the UN were revealed during the Suez crisis in 1956.
Menzies' position was that Australia should not decide its stance
in terms of whether the UN condemned or approved the British-
French action. Australia should support Britain, according to
Menzies because it was in its own interests to do so, in spite of
the fact that such a decision would be against the expressed
opinion of the UN. Evatt, on the other hand, maintained that
enforcement action by Britain and France should not be taken
without the UN's approval.

Several decades later, Menzies' views on the function of the
UN were in large measure adopted by the present Liberal
government under Prime Minister John Howard. From his accession
to power in early 1996, Howard has shown little interest in the
UN. He believed that the previous Labor government under Paul
Keating had paid too much attention to UN peacekeeping and other
multilateral issues at the expense of bilateral relations.

On the other hand, the Howard government's record on human
rights, the environment and refugees has been criticized by the
relevant UN agencies. The Australian government's long-term
vision on foreign policy can be discerned from its position on
specific issues which is reflected in the White Papers of 1997
and 2003 related to international affairs both firmly grounded in
realism, based on the belief that war is essentially a matter of
power, self-interest, and necessity, largely making moral
analysis irrelevant. From the titles alone -- In the National
Interest (1997) and Advancing the National Interest (2003) -- one
can assume that the UN is of little significance except in the
pursuit of national interests.

This implies that if going to war with Iraq was in Australia's
national interests, then the government should have used its
resources to ensure that it was a member of the Security Council
to provide the vote the U.S. and the UK needed.

The legal basis provided by international law for going to war
with Iraq has been debated among members of the UN. The U.S., the
UK, Australia, and several other countries have argued that the
war was legal on the basis of Security Council Resolutions: 678,
687, and 141. It is their interpretation of Resolution 1441 of
Nov., 8, 2002, in particular, which reveals the basic weakness of
their arguments. This resolution gives Iraq one final chance to
disarm and warns of severe consequences should it fail to co-
operate and to fully comply fully and immediately with the terms
of the resolution.

Whatever the differing interpretations of Resolution 1441,
which clearly needed the Security Council approval of any action
taken, the resolution did not give any country the right to wage
war outside the UN framework. It says that the Security Council
would "convene immediately upon receipt of a report" on weapons
inspections" in order to secure international peace and
security".

Australia's support of American unilateralism will hurt rather
than advance Australia's national interests. Without vast
military and economic resources, it would benefit more from an
international order based on respect for international law, norms
and institutions, than on one predicated on the military
preponderance of one super power. The violation of international
law and support for preemptive actions are not in Australia's
interests.

The writer is an observer of international affairs.