FLASH
Shkruar nga Mattia Feltri
It is not correct to say that we have passed from the force of law to the law of force. When has the planet ever been ruled by law? History tells us that it has always been ruled by weapons. The difference today is that this is no longer hidden: any act of piracy is declared legal and, therefore, defeated.
There are two main differences between Vladimir Putin in Ukraine and Donald Trump in Venezuela. The former failed to eliminate Volodymyr Zelensky after 4 years of war, while the latter
The second one only needed 4 hours to overthrow Nicolas Maduro from power.
The other difference is that Putin aimed to destroy a fragile democracy, in the process of Westernization, while Trump eliminated one of the most loathsome dictators of our time, for geopolitical, economic, energy, and national security reasons, including drug trafficking and immigration.
From here, the differences disappear and the similarities remain, starting with the common hypocrisy that both use to maintain a kind of facade. For Putin, what he is conducting against Ukraine is not a war, but a "special military operation."
Even for Trump, it is not a war, but “the implementation of an American judicial order,” as Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared. So practically a police operation. The surrealism reaches its peak when Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, theoretically a champion of liberalism, calls Trump’s intervention a “special operation,” using Putin’s terminology.
The fact that Trump overthrew a dictator - an election rigger, a torturer of opponents, a drug trafficker, a man who starved his own people - makes the "special operation" morally more acceptable, but not legally justified.
It is not clear what jurisdiction the United States has over Venezuela, or what section of the code allows Americans to remain in Caracas to manage the transition of power. If a judgment on a regime is enough to legitimize entering a country, arresting the head of state, and installing another in power, then anyone can do as they please.
Some analysts have drawn parallels with 1945, when the US remained in Europe to oversee the rise of democracies after fascist dictatorships. But at that time the United States had just won a war in which it had been involved after the Japanese attack on the Pearl Harbor base.
The statements of European and international leaders - Ursula Von der Leyen promising support for the Venezuelan people; António Guterres warning of a "dangerous precedent"; Emmanuel Macron talking about liberation; Gjorge Meloni not seeing any problem; Friedrich Merz calling the issue legal and very complex; Keir Starmer seeking to talk to Trump - show that the problem is not simply the violation of international law, but the fact that this violation is being relativized, minimized or justified.
The expression has long been used that we no longer live under the rule of law, but under the law of force. It sounds nice, but it is meaningless. And when has the world ever been ruled by jurisprudence?
After World War II, it was hoped that this would be the case, with Nuremberg and the founding of the UN. But only third-party figures have ended up in international courts, while the world order has continued to rely on wars: from the Cold War, Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan, the invasions of Budapest and Prague, Noriega, and after the terrorist attacks of September 11, Afghanistan again and then Iraq.
Iraq in 2003 illustrates this failure very clearly. Colin Powell lied to the UN with the famous test tube to justify the invasion of that country, trying to support it within a framework of rules.
Trump doesn't have this problem: like Putin, he no longer knows the rules. The only hypocrisy he has left is not calling war a "war." Soon it will be Xi Jinping's turn in Taiwan, but for him it will not be a war either.
He has said it many times: it is an internal matter, like Hong Kong was, with parties, newspapers and democracy eliminated. The great hypocrisy based on the belief that the world was governed by the rule of law, maintained at least the facade, imposed minimal justifications and created the impression that not everything could be done.
Since Saturday, this idea has fallen: now anything can be done, because it has become the norm. As Von der Leyen, Macron, Meloni, Merck and others show with their reactions, the great powers have always aimed to divide the world among themselves. Today, this is what organized crime does./ Adapted Pamphlet from “Huffington Post Italia”
Lini një Përgjigje