During the plenary session of the United Nations General Assembly on item 132: "The responsibility to protect and the prevention of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity", the Chargé d'Affaires, a.i. of Cuba to the UN, Ambassador Yuri Ariel Gala López, stated that it is a serious conceptual error to treat the "Responsibility to Protect" as a principle of International Law, since it lacks recognized legal status.
The Cuban diplomat recalled that this notion has an undefined scope, non-consensual application mechanisms, and arbitrary evaluation criteria that have not yet been validated by Member States.
He added that it is inappropriate to promote its implementation without resolving the substantial ambiguities surrounding it. He also expressed concern about the selective application of certain tags to classify situations as “new protection challenges”, without the unanimous endorsement of the UN General Assembly.
Ambassador Gala López highlighted that the Responsibility to Protect raises serious concerns within an international system characterized by power imbalances. He expressed alarm at the lack of mechanisms to guarantee the prior consent of the relevant state or prevent the establishment of a supposed “right to intervene”. He recalled emblematic cases that demonstrate how the Responsibility to Protect is used to justify interference, promote regime change, and undermine sovereign states.
He reaffirmed that effective prevention requires addressing structural issues such as the unjust international economic order, endemic poverty, and social exclusion. He stressed that those who promote this concept paradoxically fail to address the root causes of conflict.
The ambassador concluded his speech by stating that the international community has an inalienable duty to act in the face of atrocious crimes, but never by means of non-consensual concepts that violate the United Nations Charter.
Permanent Mission of Cuba to the United Nations