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461. Inherent Governmental Functions and Areas of Further Security Privatization in the Czech Republic

Author:
Oldřich Bureš
Publication Date:
06-2013
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Obrana a strategie (Defence & Strategy)
Institution:
University of Defence
Abstract:
This study analyzes the limits and further areas of possible privatization of security in the Czech Republic in the context of a growing number of private security companies (PSCs). With reference to the recent foreign studies of security privatization and interviews conducted with the owners and/or managers of PSCs operating in the Czech Republic, this study shows that the process of security privatization is not taking place somewhere outside the structures of the Czech state because the very (in)activity of its components in providing security, along with the understandable efforts of PSCs to maximize their profits by offering new services, or extending the range of the existing ones, represents one of its key determinants. By outlining possible further areas as well as limits of security privatization in the Czech Republic, this study has the ambition to be the basis for not only an academic, but also a political debate about the ways of ensuring the safety of the citizens of the Czech Republic in the foreseeable future.
Topic:
Security, NATO, and United Nations
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Europe, Iran, Middle East, Asia, France, and Arabia

462. The role of French private military companies in the security privatization sector: Specific features of the French approach and a comparison with Anglo-Saxon private military companies

Author:
Zdeněk Ludvík
Publication Date:
06-2013
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Obrana a strategie (Defence & Strategy)
Institution:
University of Defence
Abstract:
The realm of privatization of security and the consequent existence of private military companies is an important constitutive element of security with regard to international relations. This phenomenon is most strongly developed in the Anglo-Saxon world. However, in the case of the French Republic, we can observe significant developmental and functional disparities. This paper examines externalization processes in the context of the French approach to the legitimacy, legality and territoriality of the privatization of security functions of the state and explains the different causes of their development. It discusses the main aspects of externalization, defines the typical activities of French private military companies, describes their strengths and weaknesses and outlines the problems and possible solutions that lie before the French, which cannot be ignored in the future. Finally, this paper describes the most important French private military companies and their characteristics.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, NATO, and United Nations
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Europe, Iran, Middle East, Asia, France, and Arabia

463. Strategy of Deterrence and Terrorism: Challenges and Opportunities

Author:
Linda Janků and Petr Suchý
Publication Date:
06-2013
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Obrana a strategie (Defence & Strategy)
Institution:
University of Defence
Abstract:
The article deals with deterrence of terrorism. The aim is to assess validity of a proposition that it is possible to deter terrorist groups, but there are some specifics in comparison to the deterrence of states. First, we determine deterrence threats which can be applied in relation to terrorist groups and discuss possible restraints of their application in practice. This is followed by an analysis of whether deterrence can be applied against all types of terrorist groups without distinction, where we develop a model of classification of terrorist groups according to the goals which they pursue. So far, the topic of deterrence of terrorism has not been discussed in detail in the Czech academic texts. This article thus seeks to fill this lacuna and highlight the benefits of applying deterrence strategy to the terrorist groups.
Topic:
NATO, Terrorism, and United Nations
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Europe, Iran, Middle East, Asia, France, and Arabia

464. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and Its Relevance for the Global Security

Author:
Daša Adašková and Tomáš Ludík
Publication Date:
06-2013
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Obrana a strategie (Defence & Strategy)
Institution:
University of Defence
Abstract:
The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) is one of important international nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament measures. One of its pillars is the verification mechanism that has been built as an international system of nuclear testing detection to enable the control of observance of the obligations anchored in the CTBT. Despite the great relevance to the global non-proliferation and disarmament efforts, the CTBT is still not in force. The main aim of the article is to summarize the importance of the CTBT and its entry into force not only from the international relations perspective but also from the perspective of the technical implementation of the monitoring system.
Topic:
Security, NATO, International Law, United Nations, and International Affairs
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, China, Iran, Middle East, India, Asia, France, and Arabia

465. Security Cooperation in SADC: SADC on the Way to Security Community?

Author:
Linda Piknerová
Publication Date:
06-2013
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Obrana a strategie (Defence & Strategy)
Institution:
University of Defence
Abstract:
This text aims to analyze security cooperation in the Southern African Development Community. The article is based on two theoretical approaches, the first one is a concept of security community, the second one is a human security. Both theories have become widely accepted in the early 1990s because of their ability to cover wider international changes. The Southern African Development Community is seen as a regional integration plan which aspires to become a security community in Karl Deutsch's sense. Beside the both mentioned theories, the text deals with the history of security cooperation in the south of Africa and its changes. The main discussed question is wheher the SADC could be understood as a newly emerging security community.
Topic:
Security, NATO, and United Nations
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Africa, Iran, Middle East, Asia, France, and Arabia

466. The UN Security Council and Iraq

Author:
David M. Malone and Poorvi Chitalkar
Publication Date:
11-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
The UN Security Council, largely handicapped by the Cold War until the late 1980s, has become considerably more proactive over the last twenty-five years. The results are mixed. One constant for the Council since 1980 is that it has been at grips with conflicts involving Iraq — conflicts with Iraq's neighbours and also internal strife prior to and particularly since 2003. Every instrument at the Council's disposal, including all the coercive ones, have been invoked at one time or another against authorities in Iraq or to assist them. After a promising beginning in helping to end the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88), and in mandating the expulsion of Iraqi forces from Kuwait, which Baghdad had sought to annex in 1990, the Council's silent tolerance of intrusive international humanitarian activities in Iraq's Kurdish provinces as of 1991 was ground-breaking. Nevertheless, the Council's post-war strategy for Iraq outlined in Resolution 687 of 1991 wound up over-reaching, involved serious unintended consequences arising from an overzealous sanctions regime (and a related humanitarian program the UN did not possess the administrative machinery to oversee effectively), and eventually sundered relations among the Permanent Five (P-5) members of the Council through a series of fractious episodes from 1988 to 2003. This working paper outlines a three-decade span of Security Council resolutions, actions and impasses on Iraq, investigating closely the period of diplomatic confrontation in 2002–2003 culminating in unilateral military action to remove Saddam Hussein from power by the US, the UK and a very few others without a mandate from the Council to do so. The UN was subsequently mostly side-lined in and on Iraq. The paper considers damage to perceptions of the Council legitimacy stemming from the events of 2002–2003 and assesses its evolving approach to international security in Iraq and beyond since then.
Topic:
Security, Cold War, Humanitarian Aid, and United Nations
Political Geography:
Iraq

467. Historical Examples of Unauthorized Humanitarian Intervention

Author:
Julia Brower, Ryan Liss, Tina Thomas, and Jacob Victor
Publication Date:
08-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Legal Challenges, Yale Law School
Abstract:
In December 1971, India sent troops into what was at the time known as East Pakistan. For the preceding months, Pakistani forces had been engaged in a violent conflict with a Bangladeshi separatist group.1 The Indo-Pakistani conflict was sparked by the Bangladesh Liberation War, a conflict between the West Pakistanis and the East Pakistanis, who were mainly of Bengali ethnicity.2 In the 1970 Pakistani election, the East Pakistani Awami League secured a simple majority in the Parliament of Pakistan.3 The West Pakistani leadership, however, stalled in relinquishing power.4 The Awami League declared the independence of East Pakistan as Bangla Desh on April 10, 1971.5 West Pakistani forces engaged in violent attempts to end the insurrection, committing widespread atrocities against the Bengali population of East Pakistan.6 Over a million Bengalis were killed.7 And, an estimated 8 million refugees fled to India.8 In December 1971, fighting broke out between India and Pakistan when India sent armed troops into East Pakistan.9 U.N. debates over the conflict took on a distinctly Cold War tone, stalling any action on the part of the United Nations.10 The military conflict between India and Pakistan lasted only thirteen days before Pakistani forces in East Pakistan surrendered.11 By January 4, 1972, the Secretary-General was able to report that the cease-fire between the two states “appeared relatively stable.”12 As a result of India’s intervention, East Pakistan ultimately achieved independence and became modern-day Bangladesh.13 In justifying its unauthorized intervention, India framed the issue as mainly one of self-defense and regional security. Citing the millions of refugees flowing from East Pakistan into India, the Prime Minister of India wrote to the U.N. Secretary General that Pakistan’s actions “pose a serious threat to our security” and that the resulting military action taken against Pakistan was “entirely defensive.”14 The Indian Ambassador to the Security Council argued that Pakistan had committed a crime of “refugee aggression,” that is, its aggression came from the strain its actions placed on India’s social structure and finances.15 India also argued that it had a right to intervene in light of the humanitarian catastrophe engulfing East Pakistan. The Indian Ambassador to the U.N. claimed that India had “absolutely nothing but the purest of . . . intentions: to rescue the people of East Bengal from what they are suffering.”16 India also maintained that its authority to intervene to end the humanitarian catastrophe was based in part on the consent of Bangladeshi people, even though Bangladesh was not yet an independent state.17 In making this argument, India argued that the rule of self-determination might be applied to the Bengali people.18
Topic:
United Nations, Military Strategy, Legal Theory, and Humanitarian Intervention
Political Geography:
Pakistan, India, and Asia

468. Ugly Truths: Saddam Hussein and Other Insiders on Iraq’s Covert Bioweapons

Author:
Amy Smithson
Publication Date:
04-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:
Although the inspections of the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM), which operated from April 1991 to October 1998, unmasked Iraq’s biological weapons program and revealed a considerable amount of detail about its planning, organization, and execution, various factors about the program remain unclear. These gaps in information persisted through the activities and reporting of both the United Nations Monitoring, Verification, and Inspections Commission, which existed from December 1999 until the outbreak of the second Gulf War in March 2003, and the Iraq Survey Group, which reported on the remnants of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction capabilities after the 2003 Gulf War.1 To deepen understanding about Iraq’s biological weapons program, a team of analysts from the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) identified a number of research questions that, if answered, would provide a more comprehensive account of Iraq’s biological and chemical weapons programs. The twenty research questions ran the gamut of relevant topics. Specifically with regard to the bioweapons program, the research questions sought to clarify the reasons behind Iraq’s choice of biowarfare agents and delivery systems, the timeline and technical specifics for certain activities, possible interaction with governments and biowarfare experts outside of Iraq, the management of the program, and the details of how Iraq disposed of its biological munitions and bulk biowarfare agent. In an effort to answer some or all of these questions, CNS’s staff turned to the records of the Conflict Records Research Center (CRRC) database. In mid-July 2011, the time in which CNS’s staff reviewed the CRRC records for information pertinent to Iraq’s biological weapons program, it should be noted that a relatively small fraction of the documents in the possession of the CRRC had been translated into English and made available in the CRRC database. Accordingly, the review of the database did not turn up a tremendous number of documents providing insights about Iraq’s biological weapons program. Nonetheless, the review uncovered several documents that shed light largely on the political management of Iraq’s bioweapons program and how Iraq’s leaders tried to cope with UNSCOM’s inspections. This report, which begins with a brief review of the search methodology, otherwise presents the research findings in rough but not exact chronological order. To help the reader quickly grasp the relevance of the research findings in a history that is complicated and sometimes full of technical detail, the research findings are interlaced with background derived largely from Germ Gambits: The Bioweapons Dilemma, Iraq and Beyond (Stanford University Press, 2011). Germ Gambits, which tells the tale of UNSCOM’s bioweapons inspections in Iraq, is based primarily on interviews with UNSCOM inspectors, buttressed by UNSCOM documents and secondary materials. Therefore, any citation to Germ Gambits is based on numerous authoritative sources. Because this report provides the unadulterated Iraqi view on certain topics, in a certain sense it is like seeing the other side of the coin that Germ Gambits presents. CNS Senior fellow Amy E. Smithson, PhD, wrote Germ Gambits and was the principal researcher reviewing the biological weapons-related documents in the CRRC database.
Topic:
United Nations, Weapons of Mass Destruction, Nonproliferation, Conflict, and Biological Weapons
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, North America, and United States of America

469. The Durban Platform Negotiations: Goals and Options

Author:
Daniel Bodansky
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
In December 2011, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) adopted the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action, which launched a new round of negotiations aimed at developing "a protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force" for the post-2020 period. The Durban Platform negotiations got underway this year and are scheduled to conclude in 2015. This Viewpoint analyzes the elements of the Durban Platform and the possible role that a new instrument might play.
Topic:
Climate Change, Energy Policy, Treaties and Agreements, and United Nations

470. Economies of violence and peacebuilding: towards policy coherence

Author:
Mark B. Taylor
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Norwegian Centre for Conflict Resolution
Abstract:
International responses to conflict have highlighted the role of natural resources and other forms of wealth in helping to sustain “self-financing wars”. For over a decade there have been sporadic attempts to come to grips with the international dimensions of the economies of conflict, but concrete efforts to grapple with the problem have been sporadic and incoherent. However, in 2011 developments at the UN and OECD have laid the foundations for a more coherent approach, one that seeks to control the irregular war economies in part by excluding the results of unacceptable activities from global value chains. This is a step in the right direction. However, as this policy brief argues, the effectiveness and legitimacy of this approach relies on the conscious development of a strategy that defines clear norms as the basis for exclusion, builds the capacity in the public and private sector for managing the process of exclusion, and mitigates any unintended harms resulting from exclusion to vulnerable people in conflict-affected areas.
Topic:
Development, Economics, United Nations, War, and Natural Resources