The International Affairs Association

Yet again, the United States is battling the UN over human rights issues. This time, the concern is the use of drones on the Afghan border.

Human rights watchdog Phillip Alston has been investigating drone attacks and has found evidence that the United States is not taking proper precautions to avoid civilian casualties. Although the drone attacks themselves are legal, Alston says that the actual deployment of the drones needs to be examined further.

Alston writes “…you have the really problematic bottom line, which is that the CIA is running a program that is killing significant numbers of people and there is absolutely no accountability in terms of the relevant international laws.

Again we have come to an important impasse between the UN and the country that provides most of its financial backing. So what is the likely outcome? Does the UN stand a chance to make an impact on this issue?

I would say in all likelihood no. Quite frankly, this is far too important an issue for the United States. These drone strikes are a central piece of the United States’ foreign policy strategy in the Middle East; and I would argue that the UN has about the same chance of impacting this as it did stopping Bush from going to war on Iraq.

Don’t get me wrong, I think the Obama Administration is much more serious about complying with UN regulations than previous governments. But I don’t think they will be willing to change a major policy goal at this point in time.

Maybe I’ll be proven wrong. I hope I am. At this point we’ll just have to wait and see.