Nordic R2P call gets it right

On Wednesday, five humanitarian groups based in Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland and Sweden pooled their resources and have agreed to work together with a ‘Joint Nordic call for protection’, to lobby their governments to fulfill their “responsibility to protect”.

Not only is this vital advocacy, their focus and messaging is near perfect:

All five organisations have committed themselves to presenting a series of demands to their respective governments, covering fields related to all the three aspects of the Responsibility to Protect, such as that they:

- Strongly condemn and never tolerate the deliberate targeting of civilians or any acts of violence and abuses committed against civilians in situations of armed conflict

- Foster prevention as the only reliable means of protection and strengthen their own capabilities in preventive strategies

- Ensure that if prevention fails, the international community will respond collectively to stop genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity and to protect vulnerable populations.

Time for us here in Canada and the US to get our act together.