On 29th May 2013, three gunmen and a suicide bomber attacked the ICRC office at Jalalabad in Afghanistan killing an Afghan guard on duty. Two days after the attack on the world’s most respected humanitarian organisation’s office, Taliban denied any role in the attack. Taliban spokesperson said that the group never targets those who truly serve the people (Reuters, The Express Tribune, May 31, 2013). This attack sent shockwaves across the humanitarian community, not because that ICRC was never attacked anywhere in the world but because the attack was the first of its kind on ICRC since it started working in Afghanistan in 1987. The attack on the ICRC office in Jalalabad was not a stand alone incident in the region, many humanitarian organisation personals were attacked and their assets were destroyed since the US led Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. The attacks have to be seen in the larger context of issues around neutrality and blurring of lines between military and humanitarian actors on ground. Normally the groups like Taliban happily own the responsibility of any attack which has been carried out by it as a shot in the arm. The denial in the ICRC office attack points towards two things- either they didn’t attack or they feared that owning up of responsibility of the attacks on world’s most respected humanitarian organisation will do more harm than good. The crucial point of analysis here is not whether Taliban was responsible or not; but the larger humanitarian scenario of interaction between military and international/local non governmental organisation (I/NGOs) in Afghanistan. This point of analysis is not only relevant for Afghanistan but for all the humanitarian operations around the world. Afghanistan’s situation is of a complex emergency one. World Health Organisation (WHO) defines complex emergencies as situation of disputed livelihood and threats to life produced by warfare, civil strife disturbances and large scale movement of people, in which any emergency response has to be conducted in a difficult political and security environment (WHO, 2002). These situations are often worsened by natural disasters. Polman (2010) argues that complex emergencies are those situations where actually no one is sure what is going on. Not focusing much on the semantics of the term complex emergency, the research aims at understanding the complex issues that are embedded in these situations. Complex emergencies, like in Afghanistan, Haiti (2010 Earthquake) always witness two dialectical components- military and humanitarian organisation, coming together at one platform.
Her memoir starts off in Darfur in 2005, where in her late 20’s, she hits rock bottom while managing a refugee camp for 24,000 civilians. It backtracks to her internship in Rwanda, while moving forward to her challenges in Darfur, in addition to her experiences in post- tsunami Indonesia, and post-quake in Haiti. By sharing her story, Alexander gives readers an opportunity to go behind-the-scenes into the devastations that are censored on media outlets. She stresses that these are often the problems that individuals claim they are educated on, but rarely make it their priority to solve. However, that is not the case for Jessica Alexander as she has over 12 years of experience working with different NGO’s and UN operations. As a result, Alexander earns the credibility to critique the multi-billion-dollar humanitarian aid industry. From her painful yet rewarding work experience, Alexander gives an honest and empathetic view of humanitarian aid as an establishment and a
Jalali, Ali Ahmad, and Lester W. Grau. Afghan Guerrilla Warfare - In the Words of the Mujahideen Fighters. St. Paul: MBI Publishing Company, 2001.
Afghanistan since its beginning has been a place of conflict, despair, and at times lost hope. It has been taken advantage of and lost its sense of identity, which has had a direct effect on its people, and there own sense of what justice truly is.
...h Muslim “clerics” (Ottaway) unaware of modern diplomacy and skeptical of the Western world, and they were unsuccessful in taking the advantage of cracks in the Taliban governance. A former CIA station chief said that the CIA did not hear anything the Taliban Representative said. The US Government wanted Osama Bin-Laden from them and they were asking for the help to give him up; two different tone of language- meaning it was hard for both representatives to understand each other’s wants and needs. The conferences took place in many different places like Kandahar, Islamabad, Tashkent, Bonn, Washington and New York. There were satellite conversations that took about 40-minute between State Department officials and the Taliban's top leader, Mohammad Omar. There was also a surprise visit to Washington, made by a Taliban representative giving a carpet to President Bush.
In 1996, the Taliban took control of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan. A report by the U.S. Department of State describes that this takeover was done in a very brutal and violent manner and the Taliban left the proof of their victory hanging in the streets of the city for over a week (par. 2). In Jan Goodwin’s article, Buried Alive, it is written that the men who are in charge of enforcing the laws of the Taliban are called the Department of the Propagation of Virtue and the Suppression of Vice; these men also punish citizens who disobey the laws. The majority of this group is made up of fifteen year old boys carrying machine guns, but also consists of men arme...
The U.S. Marines were conducting one of the first modern peacekeeping missions in the war torn city of Beirut, Lebanon from 1982-1984. It ended up costing the United States a combined total of 241 Marines, Sailors, and Army warriors and was the highest death toll from a single terrorist act until the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York, Washington and a field in Pennsylvania. To understand the full context in which the Marine and Navy commanders found themselves, we must understand the mission statement and the context in which their senior political and military leadership provided it. We must also consider the operational environment the Multinational Peacekeeping force had to implement their mission. The outside influence of Syria and Iran would also play a role in the bombing from both a military and political element and would signal a new dynamic of terrorism in the whole world, as we know it. The tragic Marine peacekeepers barracks bombing in Beirut, Lebanon during the 1983 Multinational Peacekeeping Mission resulted from an ill-defined mission statement. Today’s contemporary peacekeeping missions necessitate clarity and flexibility in their mission statements
On September 11, 2001, the most disastrous terrorist attack in U.S. history left a countless number of innocent Americans both dead and missing. The Taliban’s assault on the Pentagon and annihilation of New York’s World Trade Center caused the entire country to wonder what was going on in the rest of the world to cause so much animosity toward our great nation. Little did many American citizens know that this shocking catastrophe was the result of years of unrest and chaos in the Middle East. The tragic events of September 11th occurred as a result of the recent, political history of Afghanistan, the development of the radical Islamic group, the Taliban, and the monetary and military support that the Taliban has received.
Without any outside involvement, the Taliban will continue to dominate and spread fear. Canada’s involvement engages the people to take a stand against an oppressed regime. Without any dialogue, the status quo will remain unless there is external involvement from the international community.
Kent, Randolph and Mackinlay, John. May/June 1997. “International Responses to Complex Emergencies: Why a new approach is needed?” NATO Review, 27-29.
A core military doctrine, fighting, is no longer a priority when dealing with 21st century conflict. The American military contends that a legitimate government, in addition to protecting the people, must be established to combat insurgency-generating instability. The military’s ability to “establish local governance, conduct information operations, build economies, service infrastructure, and provide security” now takes precedence over combat abilities (Gentile 27). The Army’s experience with this new core objective of nation building in Iraq and Afghanistan has revealed not only the military’s limited ability to reform governments and societies, but also the significant amount of resources the process requires. For example, the Karzai administration in Afghanistan “neither funds nor delivers the key public services offered in the country” and is void of an incentive “to improve his state’s effectiveness or accountability” (Eikenberry 6). This motivation to resist rule-bound Afghan institutions indicates a failure by the American military to establish government legitimacy and regional stability. By the end of 2014 Afghan forces will take on the responsibility for Afghanistan’s security from US combat troops. According to current projections, a stalemate between the Taliban and the
The books Humanitarian Intervention: Ethical, Legal, and Political Dilemmas, by Robert Keohane and J.L. Holzgrefe, and Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in International Society by Nicholas J. Wheeler contain value information and analyses on the subject of unauthorized interventions. Humanitarian Intervention is a set of essays chosen by Keohane and H...
The role of the ICRC since its inception has gradually shifted from just being a body tasked with providing relief in times of humanitarian strife to one of a body of immense si...
The complex issue of humanitarian intervention is widely argued and inherently controversial. Humanitarian intervention involves the coercive action of states intervening in areas for the sole purpose of preventing or halting the killing or suffering of the people there. (1, 9, 5) It is an issue argued fervently amongst restrictionists and counter-restrictionists, who debate over whether humanitarian intervention is a breach of international law or a moral requirement. (10) Restrictionists argue that Articles 2 (7) and 2 (4) of the United Nations (UN) Charter render forcible humanitarian intervention illegal. The only legitimate exception to this, they claim, is the right to self defence, as enshrined in Article 51 of the UN Charter. (1-472) This position is contested by counter-restrictionists, who insist that any and all nations have the right, and the responsibility, to prevent humanitarian disasters. (8-5) Despite the declaration of a ‘new world order’, the post-Cold war world has not been a more peaceful one: regional and ethnic conflicts have, in fact, proliferated. Between 1989 and 1993, for example, thirteen new peacekeeping operations were launched by th...
Recently Afghanistan has grown significantly in terms of its ability to care for itself. A national army and a developing police force are becomi...
In the past ten years the Afghan Government has been dealing with a number of issues that have caused problems for the country, problems such as illegal drug trade, terrorism and violence. But nowadays they are fighting a problem that has long existed between people, and quite recently has taken a whole new aspect to it. Ethnic conflict is the destructive factor that has caused problems between people for generations, often leading to fights, outbreak of violence and grudge between different ethnicities.