Terror's victims and the UN

An International Congress on Victims of Terrorism took place last week in Valencia. It was sponsored by Spain's San Pablo CEU University:

Organizers of the two-day conference... say their goal is to let victims meet each other and to draw the attention of governments and society.

The summit was attended by survivors and relatives of those killed in the attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, in the 2004 Beslan school seizure in Russia, in last July's London transit bombings and in bombings and assaults in Colombia, Spain and elsewhere.

There is also a report here. Arnold Roth, whose daughter was killed by a suicide bombing in Jerusalem, delivered a speech to the conference. This is part of what he said:

[I]t is not beautiful to be a victim of terror. It is not romantic. It is not transcendental and it is not heroic. It is not like the movies. It is a nightmare and the deepest, most painful tragedy that most people will ever experience in their lives.

The Madrid Declaration of 2004 states the matter in a clear way:

"Terrorism is never justifiable... Whatever its form, terrorism is always an unjust and unjustified, cruel, abominable and repulsive crime. It is an affront to the most basic rights of individuals and communities."

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I would like to look at how the most important global organization in the world is dealing with terrorism. I am speaking of the United Nations.

A committee of the United Nations has been trying for the past nine years to write a convention against terrorism. For ordinary people like us, this does not sound like the most difficult thing for lawyers and diplomats to do. We know that terrorism means the deliberate targeting of civilians for injury and death. But there is an international association of states... comprising some 57 countries, nearly 30% of the 191 member states of the United Nations. For nine years, this association has frustrated the writing of the United Nations anti-terror convention by insisting that terrorism must be defined not by the nature of the act but by its purpose. If an act is done in the cause of "national liberation" then this important group of states believes the act is not terrorism.

Their definition is not at all interested in how barbaric that act may be. Or how random. Or how defenseless and innocent the victims.
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[I]n its entire history the United Nations has failed time and time again to express an unequivocal condemnation of terrorism.
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Five months ago, the UN picked up the issue one more time. A special UN committee with the grand title of "High Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change" formulated this definition:

"Any action constitutes terrorism if it is intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or noncombatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act."

Five months ago, it was reasonable to expect that lessons had been learned from the attacks of the terrorists in Bali, Madrid, Beslan, London, Baghdad, Jerusalem and so many other places... Mr Annan must have been confident when he included it among the proposals he sent to the major summit of United Nations member states in September 2005.

But it failed...

To dismiss this depressing chain of events by calling it a difference of opinion over definitions is to miss the point. There is an actual, practical life-and-death question here which we, assembled here in this hall, are uniquely placed to answer: Is it ever legitimate to target women, children and other noncombatants? For nations comprising some 30 per cent of the United Nations, the answer - tragically, astonishingly - is yes.

What this means, to put things otherwise, is that the organization which, since the end of the Second World War, has been seen by many as standing at the centre of a strengthened system of international law, seems unable to find its way to a clear condemnation of what is, under that very law, a crime against humanity. Roth also has some apt observations on media usages in this matter.