Humanitarian intervention to protect vulnerable populations under contemporary international law

Abstract

The inability of the United Nations Charter’s laws to accomplish equilibrium and to keep up with international developments, the continuation of armed conflicts, the emergence of humanity as the essence of international law- the United Nations Charter comes up with miscellaneous new laws to overcome these changes. The prevailing ancient laws have led to dividing the world into two sections: The first section includes first world countries that have found it advantageous to interfere in other “weaker” nations’ affairs while the other section involves those “inferior” or “vulnerable” nations which found themselves victimized by the existence of armed conflicts in their countries. Therefore, one of the UN Charter’s laws calls for a “collective responsibility towards international protection” as a legal as well as an ethical commitment towards those victimized nations.

This paper attempts to answer the following questions: Has this new law, the “collective responsibility towards international protection,” contributed to narrow the gap of the legitimate military force for humanitarian protection? Also, have some dialectical concepts, that attempt to be in harmony with the goals of the United Nations, been effectively developed politically and legally.