i love Konata Izumi!!!

instructions of killing : do it with care!!

Amused at the title? I bet!!

But if one studies the subject Humanitarian Law, then one would not be as amused. Example : Me.

Humanitarian Law goes as far back to our good friend, Henry Dunant. Who's he? Dude, you definitely need to know a little more about a peace society, because this guy is the guy who propagated such a concept.

Dunant loved peace so much that he even promoted it in times of war! :D So one day he went to this place in the middle of a raging war. As what I have no idea, nor do I have the abilities to rationalize why one would deliberately go to a battle field if one was not a soldier. Someone with a deathwish maybe.. :p

Anyhoo, Dunant went and witnessed the Battle of Solferino. This epic epic battle happened at around 1860s, a time when you and me wasn't even a drop of sperm yet ^^ So in this battle, Dunant saw the major heinousness that one man could inflict to another man, and that it was unbearable that he ran from the battle to look for his mommy, his bottle of milk, and his snuggly teddy bear..

Alrite that's a lie, but he did survive the battle enough to change the world for years to come..

Dunant decided that wars should change.. Even at that time he knew that wars were inevitable (not like those tree huggin hippies who promoted peace in the 60s and 70s. Read : John Lennon) , but he did see a chance that wars could be more human. So this was the birth of the Geneva agreements (NOT the Geneva Conventions, which was in 1945, this happened in 1880s). At the time he thought :

1) That human rights and humanity should be preserved in any condition but especially for countries waging war
2) There should be an organization that aims to induce these principles

Ladies and gentlemen, members of the house (loh!!??) this is how the Red Cross was established. What?? Yes! Dunant is that guy who founded the Red Cross.. Now does this ring bells for you?

Preceding the Geneva agreement in 1880s, the world adopted one of the first treaties that mattered; The Hague Conventions.. Enacted approximately in the 1890s, The Hague Conventions pretty much covered the idealism that Dunant brought to the world; that we would HUMANIZE wars.. Imagine that!

But you know what, as much as it looks nice on paper, that Hague (not Hag) conventions had its weaknesses. It got trumped by the SI OMNES PRINCIPLE.. What is this principle, I hear you ask.. It basically means that this convention only applies to the countries who ratified it! Right, I don't mean to be rude, but if at that time the US decided to (for God knows whatever reason) occupy Indonesia, all we can do is fart, take a shit, and die! There would be no sanctions.. Why? Becaue Indonesia did not ratify the convention.. I mean how could we, we weren't even independent by then! :p

Which is why the world made up another nice agreement; ladies and gents I present to you the Geneva Conventions! Adopted in 1945, The Geneva Conventions have 4 conventions under it (protection to civillians, protection to wounded, protection to shipwrecked, and protection to prisoners of war), then came along with 3-4 additional protocols within the next 20 years or so.

Great thing about Geneva Convention is that it became customary law! Come again? It means that it doesnt care whether you ratified or not, this convention UNIVERSALLY applies..

So this is the development of what is called HUMANITARIAN LAW.. Which is why be careful when someone talks about HUMANITARIAN AID, with HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION, that, my friends, is 2 different things!!!!

But as we all know, as much as it looks nice, its called International Law.. Austin the great legal figure argued that its not really a law.. He means -> NO ENFORCEMENT.. we've seen cases where the Geneva Conventions was violated over and over again.. Who's to sanction? Are you really suggesting countries like Fiji would ever stand a chance in suing the UK for their aid in the Iraqi War? I dont think so..

So, a pea's a pea but a bean is a relief, eh?

a guy named Omar

first of all, let me acknowledge the economist for the pictures. ahh they might not care that a snobby college student is copy pasting their pictures and writing a n00b article on Sudan..

but oh well..

so there's this guy named Omar, he's currently the dictating leader of Sudan. Heard of Sudan? No? Well not much happened there, like only genocide!

Sudan has always been a multi racial nation, consisting of tribal africans and nomadic arabians, at that time. Friction started as early as when the nomadic arabs moved all the time throughout the whole year in search of water supplies (you can see why this is a problem in Africa :D). Sometimes these people, the Arabs, don't really care who's land they're trodding, so aggression sometimes is resolute to happen.

This social construction was preserved up until the level of governmency. The Sudanese government is an entity powered by the Arabian people. Especially Omar, since he was a dictator and all, that led him to believe that he was able to push people around. The friction between rebel groups to the Darfur administration led to many deaths systematically. This is why Sudan crisis is classified as tragedies of humanity.

Has the security council try to alleviate problems? Oh yes they have had special plennary council meetings to debate about economical sanction. Oh oh but a veto happened. From who? The United States??? Now let's not be prejudice people, it's not all the time they stir problems, as much of an angry state with evergreen thirst for world dominance, it wasnt them. So who? Chinaaaaaaaa!!

China? yes. Hu? Yes,sir. What, Yasser? I thought he was a Palestinian!

Anyhoo, China vetoed the resolution to sanction Sudan through embargos since they have oil investments in parts of the Sudanese territory. Actually most of their oil refineries are located in the neighbouring Chad, but I suppose some of their pipelines go through Sudan. So an economic embargo would also mean loss of Dollars for China. So there goes "UNSC to the rescue!!!" down the loo..

Now you know what it means by a "politicized right" in the security council :)

So, what next? Early 2009, the toothless tiger; ICC suddenly decided not to just dawdle and played with the magna charta for toilet wipes and stood up to take iniciatives. They imposed an allegation to someone!!!

Okay, so that you know. ICC have never allegated someone just for the sake of it. Milosevic in his Former Yugoslavian Tribunal was under the pressures of NATO countries. The Arusha Tribunals probably had been orchestrated by Belgium to prosecute the Rwandan dictators. Even with Pinochet, as weird as that proceeding was, it was the Spanish Supreme Court that released the Arrest Warrant for the aging General as he was having his medical checkups in London.

So, this became a controversy. What next? In international law enforcement, you cant just go barging into other states and nick their dictator. Usually there's this small obstacle called sovereignity. This small thing is what hinders the world from having a supernational body and legal system. Now, states who have agreed to surrender their sovereignity to the International Criminal Court (ICC) must sign the Roma Statute, which came into activation in the mid of 1998 after 50 states ratfied its initial protocols. But some countries chose not to sign this, among them United States, Indonesia, etc. Sudan included.

So the train of thought goes like this; is the values of humanity paramount? if there were any other value higher than human rights itself, what are they? but if human rights shall be the sole goal of a state, what can happen to a state that has violated the very thing that they should aim to protect in the first place. Let alone protecting, what happens when a state IS the perpetrator of crimes against humanity?

Would you think ICC have rights to undermine Darfur to apprehend Omar? Or shall Omar have the last dance hiding behind Head of State Immunity act?

This issue is something to monitor. Why? If this allegation is passed, ICC will then have the power to bring George W. Bush down into trials to demand his accountability for Iraq (including Abu Ghraib etc).. so, interesting, eh?

Surabaya oh Surabaya

Just came back from Surabaya this noon. I attended the 13th annual Java Overland Varsities English Debating championship.. It's held in Universitas Airlangga.. Surabaya is one of Indonesia's bustling metropolis-es (i think 2nd or 3rd most populated), so it was quite a thrill to be able to visit :)

I took the early train to Surabaya, at like 3 am in the morning @.@

Since I'm one of those people who would be better off not to sleep than to just get 1-2 hours of sleep, before going I decided to just continue with my Sims3-a-thon, which is quite fun.. I noticed that after sitting in front of you computer screen for quite long hours you tend to develop butt cramps.. this i know because the moment i stood up because the taxi's honking its horn up front of the house (i have a neighbour that throws rocks in response to noisy people at night, so you can imagine my immediate reaction) i dont think i can feel my butt as if it fell off.. haha apologies for the pun :D

Anyhoo this is the second time in like 1 week that I took the excecutive train ride to Surabaya, and I personally think it is pretty fine! It's seatings is wide, comfy, much from what you'd get from a budget class plane, but with more legroom and no bumpy turbulence that makes you vomit.. oh and some actually have flat panel screens on them.. You'd probably be raising your eyebrows at my keen appraisal in this, but you must understand I usually prefer not taking trains in Indonesia due to many many cases of unfortunate incidents, and just an uneducated prejudice due to never having travel by trains before.. but point proven wrong! ^^ for those intending to take the bold step like me (first timer in train travelling), do it! From jogja to surabaya is about IDR 75.000 (which is like USD 7 so you can imagine how ridiculously cheap that is :D)

JOVED was fun, competition was pretty good. I'd prefer the food they had in the competition before though, had better composition. Albeit due to my recent eating habbits, it really doesnt matter much what they serve for food, I cant enjoy it as much anyways..

For some who usually judge a competition and receive the title of breaking adjudicators (those who get like in the top 20 marks in the adjudication accreditation), not getting "breaking judge" would be distressing.. But not me hahaha.. This was the first ever competition in which I judges but didnt manage to get into the breaking judge.. I think its fine though, you dont always get to maintain a good rythm of things right? maybe I didnt do so good in the tests, oh well :)

As I'm writing the competition is still running, so no reports on the results yet.. But I am now back in Jogja since I have many work to do, mostly taking care of the online trainings for Team Indonesia *sigh, it will never end*

But overall, another tiring yet pretty satisying weekend in Surabaya.. (above pic is the people representing many different universities from Jogja chanting the usual "Jogja! Jogja! Jogja!" yell before each match - magical group of people)

Hope you've had good travelling opportunities as of late, share them! :D