From the Christian position of the just war, the United Nations' withdrawal of troops from Rwanda in 1994 was unethical. Just war doctrine, according to Augustine of Hipo and others including Hugo Grotius, requires that Christians avoid initiating wars of aggression but that they respond when human rights are violated, when aggression has targeted them, and when a failure to respond would lead to further violence and loss of innocent life (Ahearn and Gathie, 177). In the case of Rwanda, where one ethnic group ran amuck and slaughtered hundreds of thousands of a rival ethnic group, the United Nations failed to retain a presence no the ground for enough time to stave off more murder.
As J. Milburn Thompson (116 - 117) has commented, while nonviolence is most likely to be associated with peace, there are tragically times when a violent response to violence is called for; in the case of the Hutu slaughter of Tutsis in Rwanda, international forces were desperately required to restore order and to prevent the violence from escalating as it did. The removal of U.N. troops and the failure of the international community to intervene in a timely and effective manner meant that more innocent victims of genocide died. As a Christian ethicist, this early U.N. withdrawal was unethical and partially responsible for facilitating ongoing violence.
Ahearn, David O., and Gathie, Peter R. Editors.
Doing Right and Being Good. Collegeville, Mn.:
Thompson, J. Milburn. Justice and Peace. New York: Orbis.
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