Second session of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly – Speech by M. Bernard Kouchner, Minister of Foreign and European Affairs (excerpts)

Strasbourg, 17 April 2008

HUMAN RIGHTS/COUNCIL OF EUROPE

(…) I am passionate about and obsessed with the subject which brings us together today: peace and human rights, human rights and peace, peace through human rights. (…) As you know, it has been extremely important to me for a long time: it’s said that "human rights means peace"; this is almost always true, but not always.

This conviction was the founding commitment of the Council of Europe’s member States. For them all, the matter at issue was the "acceptance of the principles of the rule of law and of the enjoyment by all persons within its jurisdiction of human rights and fundamental freedoms". 60 years ago this was an act of faith: has it become a verifiable fact? Not always. The progressive arrival of new member States in the Council of Europe, then the wave of accessions following the watershed of the 1990s, have brought the whole European continent together within the Council around shared objectives and values. This is tremendous progress.

This progress and a degree of satisfaction must not prevent us doing more. Let us be wary of affirming hasty identities and soothing simplistic views. Everything is better, but it isn’t enough. Human rights are a permanent battle. Peace isn’t achieved by standing still. Defending peace isn’t always peaceful, quite the reverse. Loving and demanding peace isn’t enough to bring it. Europe, which has seen so many periods of hope followed by so much disillusionment, has experience of this, in the flesh. Kant’s Perpetual Peace preceded by barely a few years the Napoleon massacres; the Briand-Kellog Pact preceded the greatest massacres in our history. Human rights achievements, even though growing, must not leave us at ease. (…)

To those who, even within our democracies, doubt the feasibility of a policy based on human rights, we have to reaffirm what underpins the specific nature of human rights, what makes their universality not only possible but also necessary. This justifies our, your persistence.

(…) I can tell you today that our battle goes on. It’s a permanent, eternal and uncertain battle. (…) A tough battle above all against immobility, against the temptation to stick to what we’ve got and its reassuring share of sham peaces. I say this forcefully: let’s not be naïve, human rights aren’t the be-all and end-all of a foreign policy. They colour it, inspire it, and support it. They could not possibly be its be-all and end-all, that would be too good to be true.

I have been France’s Minister of Foreign and European Affairs for nearly a year and have had ample time to see for myself the tenacity of these arguments and their capacity to feed on themselves. And I have tried to stay what I am deep down, a human rights activist. Once you’re a minister, and particularly foreign minister, it has to be said that every one of your acts lays you open to the possibility of criticism – this is legitimate, normal, expected and enriching – and that our complex world has seen none of these absolute, radical successes, this immediate perfection which would so reassure our minds assailed by doubts.

Yes, we have doubts. Yes, I have doubts. I have doubts about the success of my initiatives when I see the slowness and complexity of any large-scale action. I believe I originated what’s been called "the duty of interference", then the "right of interference" and finally the responsibility to protect. I am aware of the progress.

DARFUR

I think about Darfur, of course, where for the past year the setting up of EUFOR on the Chadian side – the largest European operation to protect not only human rights, but also the displaced persons on their own territory – has proved so complex. Similarly, the establishment of UNAMID, which is supporting EUFOR, (…) is encountering even more obstacles.

I know how difficult it is to coordinate a policy decided by 27 States, I am aware of the UN legitimacy crisis and human rights problem: in Darfur we have come up against all the complications, all the delays, all the inconsistencies of a still imperfect multilateralism. And at the same time, I welcome the rapid development of the African Union, which is an imitation of the European Union, but which has, in a way, paralysed our efforts – joint efforts alongside the United Nations. In short, for nearly three years, we have been outraged by the Darfur situation; the interventions are so slow that we can sometimes lose hope.

Yet we are making headway; we have already made substantial progress on the path we have set ourselves: to protect hundreds of thousands of civilians threatened by violence, exodus and hunger, the refugee camps. Is there a clearer way of defending human rights where they are the most directly threatened? Of course there has to be prevention, of course there have to be political solutions: but we also have to keep our promises! And we are keeping them, although doing so too slowly!

AFGHANISTAN

I also have doubts when I think about Afghanistan where I was four days ago. Are we on the right road? We have to fight terrorists, but without forgetting the Afghans. We mustn’t forget the essential differences we call "cultural". Yes, there is progress: millions of young girls now go to school, inconceivable ten years ago and millions of women voted in 2004, equally inconceivable ten years ago; yes, we have made it possible to glimpse the paths of freedom – clinics, roads. But it isn’t enough.

There won’t be a military solution, even though we have to strengthen security. We have to plan our action in the global framework of a genuine Afghan project. This means first of all addressing the essential need for reconstruction, security – I repeat –, and development. It also means encouraging the Afghans themselves genuinely to take ownership of these objectives, involving them in our projects, not confusing peace with a certain short-term vision of pacifism or the temptation to stick to the status quo with the aspiration for balance. In Afghanistan as elsewhere, we can’t build peace for the long term without relentlessly seeking to improve human rights. Having travelled that country for so many years, I can assure you that I’m convinced that the improvement of human rights, improvement of daily living conditions for all Afghans, and particularly farmers, could do more for peace than all the forces we are deploying there. You can’t, of course, have one without the other.

TIBET

I have doubts, finally, when I see Tibet’s problems. Here, interference, we’re told, is beyond the bounds, I understand this. But I’m not sure. These rapid arguments, based on artificial simplistic impressions of what is going on, aren’t giving us sufficient pause for thought, let alone improving the situation of those who suffering. On the contrary, I think that, despite the uncertainties generated by the difficulty of reaching a consensus between democracies, the opening-up of China must bolster us and encourage us to take resolute realistic action on the only possible path as far as Tibet is concerned: dialogue between the Chinese authorities and the Dalai Lama who, I remind you – and I often talk to him – isn’t asking for Tibet’s independence. Here too, we are too slow.

EUROPE

In the face of the doubts, I believe that we aren’t helpless since we have Europe, the European model which everyone envies us. This doesn’t mean Europe is exemplary. We know the situations in our 47 member States aren’t all the same and that none of our countries has achieved perfection – if indeed that were possible. Democracy is a fragile value; it is based on institutions and counter powers. Those who run them sometimes lose sight of the values underpinning them.

HUMAN RIGHTS/ECHR/PROTOCOL 14

We must bolster still further the rule of law. While we have all accepted it, have we genuinely implemented all the means and procedures flowing from our commitments to it in order to ensure the independence and efficiency of the courts, our citizens’ confidence in our judicial systems and unhindered recourse to the appeal processes? Can we assert that on our continent we have definitively put an end to arbitrary decisions and attacks on freedom of expression, particularly for human rights defenders and journalists? (…)

The continuous flood of individual appeals before the European Court of Human Rights concerns every one of us, every State which you and I represent. In its noble task of protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms, the Court isn’t, alas, as is often said, the victim of its success, but rather the victim of our States’ failures and mistakes. As we all know, the effective improvement of our domestic appeal mechanisms is part of the solution. We also know that the full implementation of the Court’s decisions, which every State Party has agreed are, without exception, mandatory, will help resolve the problem of the Court getting clogged up. But it’s the only court in the world which considers individual cases. It’s more than valuable, it’s irreplaceable. It’s your uniqueness, your success and your raison-d’être.

The key lies in improving the legislative and regulatory corpus of each of our countries and, to a greater extent, in its effective implementation in every member State. Yet this, as you know better than anyone else, means using a number of essential instruments. How can the European Court of Human Rights claim to go on playing its role if it doesn’t have the necessary resources? So long as Protocol 14 hasn’t entered into force, the Court will not be able to work properly, it will be unable to address properly the expectations of the citizens who appeal to it. I want here to make a solemn appeal to the Russian Federation Parliament to ratify Protocol 14 which will enhance the Court’s efficiency. (…)

KOSOVO

If it wants to promote its values, the European continent is once again duty bound to set the example. If I may, I should like to come back to the situation in the Balkans and particularly in Kosovo, which I know well, and underline the essential role which the Council of Europe has played and must still play there. As this Assembly has stressed, Kosovo must be a land where the Council of Europe’s instruments, such as the European Convention on Human Rights, European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities are fully applicable and their respective control mechanisms fully in force.

Kosovo must be a State where all parties honour the commitment they have made to safeguard peace and dialogue under all circumstances, to refrain from any incitement to violence and unreservedly conform to the Council of Europe’s standards with respect to human rights, the rule of law, rights of national minorities and treatment of refugees, displaced persons and stateless persons.

For this, our organization, which differs from the European Union in both its mission and size, is playing an irreplaceable role. Moreover, I welcome the calm climate based on the mutual respect now characteristic of relations between our two organizations. You may rest assured that the French European Union presidency, starting on 1 July 2008, will be careful to maintain it. The European Union, as you know, has taken the decision to accede to the European Convention on Human Rights – a fine decision, made possible by the Lisbon Treaty. I should like this accession to become a reality as soon as possible, since it will strengthen still further the link between the two organizations, enabling them to defend together their common values. Let us give the Council of Europe the means to go on fulfilling its role, while urging it to pursue its rationalization, working together with its member States, which are facing genuine budget constraints. (…)

Europe, human rights and peace: clearly in the interface between these three ambitions there is the same dream: to give our fellow citizens and offer the whole world a model of development and prosperity founded on dialogue, the law and negotiation. For this the Council can count on France being ready and willing to do all she can./.