Amal Clooney hits out at international response to sexual violence in conflict zones

In a powerful speech to the United Nations, star human rights lawyer Amal Clooney has hit out about an issue that is close to her heart.

Star human rights lawyer Amal Clooney has taken aim at the weak international response to sexual violence in conflict zones.

In a powerful speech, the 41-year-old said the United Nations was facing its “Nuremberg moment” as she addressed a Security Council meeting at the international organisation’s headquarters in New York overnight.

She accused the United States and Russia of opposing a judicial system to hold the perpetrators of these crimes to account, as has been done for past horrors committed in Bosnia, Cambodia, Sierra Leone and Rwanda or at the infamous Nuremberg trials.

“If we don’t act now, it will be too late,” Mrs Clooney said, pointing to the thousands of Islamic State group militants currently being held.

Amal Clooney said the UN was facing its ‘Nuremberg moment’. Picture: AP Photo/Seth Wenig

“I agree that we are facing an epidemic of sexual violence. And I believe that justice is the antidote.”

Representing victims from the Yazidi — a tiny minority that has faced relentless persecution at the hands of Islamic extremists in the Middle East — she advocated setting up a special tribunal to adjudicate on Islamic State atrocities against women.

Yazidi women have been enslaved and trafficked by IS throughout their so-called caliphate — which at one point reigned over eight million people — after being taken prisoner in northern Iraq and Syria.

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad — a survivor of sexual enslavement by the Islamic State jihadists — also lashed out at the international community’s failure to act.

“Not a single person has been charged for sexual slavery,” said Ms Murad, speaking at the United Nations about massacres of her Yazidi community by the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria.

The Yazidi community has been relentlessly targeted by Islamic extremists. Picture: Safin Hamed / AFP

“The hopes of an entire generation have been destroyed,” the Iraqi human rights activist added, speaking of the “collective failure” of the international community to intervene.

“We give speeches at the UN but no real measures have been taken (in terms of obtaining justice), and nothing has been done.”

Denis Mukwege, a Congolese doctor who like Ms Murad was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018, asked: “What is the international community waiting for to give justice for the victims?” He also called for the establishment of national and international courts to try the perpetrators of sexual violence in conflicts.

It comes after the UN Security Council approved a watered-down resolution on sexual violence in conflict zones that was largely stripped of substance by the United States and Russia.

The vote on the German-drafted resolution was held after intense last-minute negotiations and additional changes in wording. Thirteen countries voted in favour, while Russia and China abstained.

Nadia Murad, public advocate for the Yazidi community in Iraq and survivor of sexual enslavement by the Islamic State jihadists, lashed out at the international response. Picture: AFP

Both those countries said they opposed sexual violence in conflicts but denounced “lax interpretations” in the text and a “manipulated” struggle to create new UN structures and “override” mandates already approved.

France vehemently criticised the United States for threatening to use its veto over a reference in the text to reproductive rights, seen by Washington as an encouragement of abortion.

The German text initially sought to establish a formal working group, set up a mechanism to help bring to justice those responsible and develop victims’ protection by giving formal recognition to their sexual and reproductive rights.

China, Russia and the United States opposed the mechanism, the working group was scrapped and Washington threatened a veto if the text spoke of reproductive rights.

After the vote, France’s ambassador to the United Nations, Francois Delattre, expressed dismay “that a state has demanded the removal of a reference to sexual and reproductive health, which has been approved” in previous resolutions.

Nobel Peace laureate Dr Denis Mukwege asked: ‘What is the international community waiting for to give justice for the victims?’ Picture: AFP

“We deplore that the veto threats were brandished by permanent members of the council to challenge 25 years of gains in favour of women’s rights in situations of armed conflict,” he said.

A diplomat said the resolution had been “reduced so much that it’s now inadequate, and there isn’t much left”

Another added: “The Americans have taken negotiations hostage based on their own ideology. It’s scandalous.”

— with wires