- ABGESAGT - Ukraine: Protection of Civilians in Conflict Zones

Ever since the large-scale atrocities committed in Rwanda, Srebrenica and various conflict zones since the 1990s, the United Nations, core member states (including Germany) as well as the European Union and NATO advanced a wide range of military, diplomatic and humanitarian approaches aimed at protecting civilians from severe harm. Yet, Russia’s war on Ukraine has once again exposed the difficulty and often incapacity of those organizations and Western states of preventing or stopping atrocities against civilians. This lecture explores the core challenges of military and civilian approaches to the Protection of Civilians (POC) and examines urgent policy options that could and should be advanced by Europeans, NATO Allies and - in the long-run - the OSCE and United Nations. It also examines Germany’s own role and its POC capacities as well as potential bilateral and multilateral policy options in the pressing context of Russia’s war against Ukraine and its civilian population.