Sanctions and human rightsthe role of sanction in international security, peace building and the protection of civilian's rights and well-being: case studies of Iran and Zimbabwe

Resumen

Sanctions have been referred to by the United Nations as a “tool for all seasons.” They are often seen as alternative to the use of military force, aimed to control the excesses of an offender, which is usually a State government, an individual or group. Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter gives the Security Council the power to determine an action deemed to be a threat to international peace and security, while Article 39 through 43 empowers the Security Council to take either military or non-military action, in order to restore international peace and security. In view of the above provisions of the United Nations Charter, a broad and continuously growing range of situations have been determined by the Security Council as threatening or breaching international peace and security, thereby favouring the use of sanctions. The Security Council, while occasionally authorizing the use of military force has changed its strategy to employ non-military measures in order to enforce compliance with its decisions. This development facilitated the imposition of sanctions as deterrence or a tool of behaviour modification with less humanitarian consequences compared to warfare. The thesis therefore examines this erroneous assumption that sanctions particularly economic sanctions are a humane alternative to the use of military force. The main objective of the thesis is to examine how regime related economic sanctions affects the core human rights and well-being of the civilian population of a targeted State. In doing this, the thesis investigates the impact of sanctions on the rights and well-being of Zimbabweans and Iranians. In 2001, the United States Congress passed the Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act (ZIDERA), imposing so called targeted sanctions on select Zimbabwean States functionaries including the President Robert Mugabe, while in 2003 the EU imposed similar sanctions, which it referred to as Restrictive Measures on Zimbabwe citing lack of transparency in the election process and lack of respect for human rights and the rule of law. Also Iran has been under stringent economic sanctions for the past 2 decades by the US, the EU and the UN for a series of issues including its nuclear program. Latest sanctions against Iran were imposed to force Tehran to forgo it nuclear program, which Western countries believe is aimed at producing weapons of mass destruction. Although the reasons cited for imposing sanctions on both Zimbabwe and Iran makes a lot of sense in that if the goals of the sanctions are achieved, the citizens of these countries and the international community will benefit from them. In the case of Zimbabwe, the citizens will be relieved from an oppressive regime, while in the case of Iran the international community will be saved from a potential nuclear threat. However, against these salient reasons presented by the sanctioning parties, the thesis argues that economic sanctions are not a feasible conflict transformation tool owing to their humanitarian consequences. Instead of achieving their goals, they often miss the intended target and severely affect the human rights and well-being of the civilian population. Consequently, this thesis calls for substitution of the use of economic sanctions with selfless-diplomacy and the application of the moral imagination of peace when addressing international conflicts and disagreements. Keywords: Sanctions, human rights, well-being, diplomacy, civilian population, conflict transformation