Thread by @althecat

Has anyone heard of this organisation “responsibility to protect” which has a speaker in this?

Another appallingly one-sided and narrow report on this unfolding catastrophe from @CBSNews @PamelaFalk

https://twitter.com/CBSThisMorning/status/1421431292646809602

It seems to be this. globalr2p.org

Named after a “global political commitment” agree under the auspices of the United Nations.

They have issued an “Atrocity Alert” recently which mentioned Eritrean refugees in Tigray, which talks about Eritrea in very disparaging terms . But there is nothing on their website about this.

They don’t seem to know that the concerns about refugees relate to TPLF treatment.

. @GCR2P is there twitter handle and here’s their latest alert.

A closer look at their twitter account shows minimal interest in Tigray or Ethiopia directly by @GCR2P, but when searching “@GCR2P Tigray” numerous tweets alleging genocide against Amhara forces, many of them identical.

So “Responsibility to Protect” the organisation was founded in 2008, and Harvard Alumni, Australian Simon Adams linkedin.com/in/simon-adams… became executive director in August 2011.

Ethiopia has been mentioned in several “Atrocity Alerts”, but Adams has only commented to media on the subject of Tigray a small number of times (based on Google News searches.

1. Jan 9th report from Cara Anna @AP
2. From Relief Web publication of Atrocity Alert 13th Jan.
3 &4 Today’s remarks to @CBSNews

All of these quotes directly address Ethiopia PM @AbiyAhmedAli’s role in the Tigray war. And from SAHAN’s Abdi and Bryden and @CrisisGroup’s Davison, as well as the TPLF we know that there is a push to get Abiy to step down in favour of a new “interim” administration.

The purpose of all this was to see if Simon Adams was in anyway attached to any of the organised communications activity being run in support of the TPLF. And it seems not. In addition it seems as if they have tried rather hard to enlist him.

Eventually though, CBS succeeded.

"Responsibility to Protect" appears to be becoming a key policy concept in the debate over Tigray, which may explain @BilleneSeyoum's use of the term at the end of her on the record statement from the Govt. this week, wrt GoE responsibility to protect it's people from the TPLF.

"The UK Government should bear in mind its obligations to take appropriate action in line with the UN Genocide Convention should the Ethiopian Government fail to take the actions it needs to take to protect its people."
reliefweb.int/report/ethiopi…

And this passage from a UK House of Commons Committee report may in turn explain the discussion we have seen from both the UK and US government about air-dropping aid directly into Tigray, against the explicit wishes of the GoE.

And that in turn may also explain the Ethopian Govt. closing the airspace over Tigray recently.

There are wheels within wheels here. I expect @PowerUSAID will use the words "Responsibility to Protect" during her visit, possibly repeatedly.

"... as well as the obligation to prevent and punish genocide.... The ICJ has also concluded that the obligation has extraterritorial scope... States have a duty to employ all means reasonably available to them to prevent
genocide." >> un.org/en/genocidepre…