U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres arrived at the BRICS summit in the Russian city of Kazan on Oct. 22, despite criticism from Ukraine, Voice of America reported.

The BRICS group, a bloc of countries that includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates, is convening in Kazan for a three-day summit from Oct. 22-24. According to Moscow, 36 world leaders are participating in the conference.

Guterres is expected to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of the event on Oct. 24, according to Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry criticized the U.N. secretary general’s visit.

MBFC
Archive

  • @DarthJon@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    -21 month ago

    Oh come on, there are well-established doctrines of internal law related to war - you know, the same “international law” that anti-Zionists love to accuse Israel of violating all the time.

    ‘Strike’ is the word I chose and may not be the word that actually appears in the documents that outline international law on the matter, but you get the point. This is a silly discussion.

    • @CanadaPlus
      link
      English
      1
      edit-2
      1 month ago

      I assure you, I don’t know what exact rules you mean, and suspect they don’t exist. (No shade on you, though)

      As far as I know, proportionality is vague, but applies on every scale, in every situation. The actual lawyers for Israel have argued that their overall response has been proportional. (Because Hamas is hiding in the Gaza strip, and so it’s all a legitimate target to vapourise. By that standard, they’re right, and they’ve actually been generous, but it’s a dumb standard)

      • @DarthJon@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        -21 month ago

        Have you heard of the Geneva Conventions? How can you accuse Israel of waging war that is disproportionate and then turn around and say it’s a vague term and international laws of war don’t exist?

        • @CanadaPlus
          link
          English
          1
          edit-2
          1 month ago

          Vague insofar as it’s totally left to courts and individuals to interpret what the exact threshold of disproportional is. That’s why there’s a cottage industry in dissecting the ethics of every individual thing the US did in it’s recent wars. Damage and casualties are extremely lopsided here, though, even if you argue the lopsidedness is justified somehow.

          I was trying to include the nuances to be fair to you, but apparently that was just confusing.

          Have you heard of the Geneva Conventions?

          The main mention is Article 57, called Precautions in Attack, and it has this nice little section:

          1. No provision of this Article may be construed as authorizing any attacks against the civilian population, civilians or civilian objects.

          From a Westpoint academy article I just stumbled on, on proportionality:

          The rule of proportionality requires that the anticipated incidental loss of human life and damage to civilian objects should not be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage expected from the destruction of a military objective.

          The military objective here being a few Hamas fighters sprinkled around, and civilians and civilian objects being all of Gaza. I’m now pretty certain there isn’t a loophole based on what you’re doing or thinking at the time, like you seem to be suggesting.

          • @DarthJon@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            -21 month ago

            You can’t cherry-pick one statement out of Article 57 and ignore everything else. Read the entire section. The whole point is to prohibit intentional attacks on civilians but to provide justification for attacks that harm civilians. Even attacks directly on civilians are justified under international law if those civilians are directly involved in hostilities. Here’s a brief article that summarizes these concepts: https://hhi.harvard.edu/files/humanitarianinitiative/files/conduct_of_military_operations_in_urban_areas.pdf?m=1615497739

            • @CanadaPlus
              link
              English
              1
              edit-2
              1 month ago

              I did read the entire thing - it’s not long. Yes, you can unintentionally harm civilians, proportionately.

              It’s not intrinsic to urban warfare to do it this way, either. Compare any of the American operations of this millennium.

              • @DarthJon@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                -11 month ago

                US operations have killed a lot of civilians. But there is no theater of war quite like Gaza, which is what makes the numbers that much more impressive.

                • @CanadaPlus
                  link
                  English
                  11 month ago

                  Gaza is denser than a typical Arab area (gee, I wonder why) but the construction and customs are pretty much the same. Nothing about it morally, legally or tactically justifies flattening it any more than Fallujah or Kandahar.

                  • @DarthJon@lemmy.world
                    link
                    fedilink
                    English
                    -11 month ago

                    The entire area is a giant terrorist base. There are 500km of tunnels underneath Gaza used to transport weapons and conduct terror attacks. Hamas was integrated into the civilian infrastructure.

                    The impact on civilians is devastating but this is the only way to end the cycle of violence. Groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda still exist but they have no power because they have no territory. Israel has now done the same to Hamas.