UN Legal Counsel: Saving Civilians Means 'Taking Action'<br />American Society of International Law - The Fairmount Hotel<br />The U.N. Security Council authorization of international military intervention in Libya reflects the complex relationship between current uses of force and international law related to peace. Responsibility to protect, a concept developed to shield populations from atrocities and the ravages of armed conflict, expressly was invoked with regard to Libya. A non-U.N. entity, NATO, was given the assignment of actual intervention. But there was no Security Council consensus to apply the responsibility to protect to other conflict-ridden regions. This panel explores the current tensions within the collective security structure established after World War and of the contours of the law of -- or right to -- peace.
