The Responsibility to Protect was initiated by the International Committee on Intervention and State Sovereignty and adopted by the United Nations World Summit in 2005. The UN Summit was the largest gathering of Heads of State and governments in history.
Responsibility to Protect, or R2P, as it is often referred to, is an international standard that seeks to ensure that the international community should never fail to prevent and respond to the mass atrocity crimes of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity.
R2P stands on three pillars:
– Every state has the responsibility to protect its population from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity.
– The international community has the responsibility to encourage and assist individual states in meeting the responsibility to protect their citizens from atrocity crimes.
– If a state fails in its responsibility to its population, the international community must be prepared to take appropriate collective action, in a timely and decisive manner in accordance with the UN Charter.
Since its implementation, the Responsibility to Protect has been cited in more than 80 UN Security Council Resolutions. R2P has been cited in resolutions regarding the prevention of genocide and armed conflict and has been invoked in 50 UN Human Rights Council Resolutions, and in 13 UN General Assembly Resolutions.
The Responsibility to Protect is a shared responsibility by all Member States – not only a select few. Under the UN Charter, Member States are required to act, regardless of whether that includes diplomatic, humanitarian, or other means necessary to protect populations from atrocity crimes.