op 18 front pages-converted - The Watson Institute for International ...

here than in any previous conflict—and yet was still regularly
denied the levels of access and cooperation it sought. Senior
officials of UNHCR, whose criticism was relentless and outspoken,
even to the discomfort of other U.N. humanitarian
agencies and UNPROFOR itself, did not believe that its activities
or relationships were impaired as a result.
Differing views also emerged about when to apply the
ultimate sanction: suspending or terminating humanitarian
operations. Following the death of an ICRC delegate in an
attack on a Red Cross convoy carrying emergency medical
supplies to the Sarajevo hospital in May 1992, the ICRC suspended
its activities in eastern Bosnia, resuming them in July.
UNHCR, which helped fill the gap left by ICRC’s departure,
also suspended programs in eastern Bosnia in February 1993
to protest abuse by Serbs, Croats, and Muslim forces. It reinstated
activities three days later when its conditions were met.
U.N. aid convoys in Bosnia were again suspended following
the death of a Danish driver in October, and reinstated following
fresh promises by the belligerents in November.
While practitioners of both schools suspended operations,
the ICRC demonstrated a greater willingness to do so. U.N.
officials found the views of donor governments, particularly
the importance attached to maintaining humanitarian operations
in this crisis, a deterrent to suspending U.N. activities.
While the ICRC’s major contributors were also governments,
its traditions allowed it to strike a tougher balance between
humanitarian principle and continued humanitarian work.
How did the two schools approach the related matter of
withholding relief supplies as a means of extracting commitments
from the belligerents? The ICRC was opposed in principle;
the U.N. was opposed in practice. The fact that withholding
aid was a two-edged sword discouraged its frequent
exercise by either group. In negotiating with Bosnian Serb
authorities for access to the Muslim enclaves, U.N. officials
generally avoided threatening to withhold relief supplies. If
they did and Serbs remained intransigent, they either would
have had to suspend programs or cave in. Suspension would
penalize those most in need, helping the Serbs to achieve their
own objectives; retreating from a threat once made would undermine
their own authority and confirm their relative impotence.
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