UNITED NATIONS -- U.N. sanctions are often ignored, but when they do strike home, it's often innocents who are hurt and not the rogue regimes they targeted, according to the first case-by-case report card on their effectiveness.
The report highlights a dilemma Secretary-General Kofi Annan has raised repeatedly with regard to Iraq, and comes after a decade in which the United Nations imposed more sanctions than at any other time."The Sanctions Decade: Assessing U.N. Strategies in the 1990s," is expected to generate a lengthy debate when it is presented to the Security Council on Monday, when it takes up the issue of reforming sanctions.
For the most part, the 274-page report backs "smart sanctions" that target regimes with specific measures and not broad-based trade embargoes that often hurt innocent civilians.
It cites a ban on Angolan rebels' diamond exports as a good way to starve the rebels' ability to finance their military campaign -- but notes that the ban was never enforced and was only imposed after the rebels had earned nearly $4 billion from gem sales.
The book examines the Angola ban and 10 other U.N. embargoes imposed in the last 10 years. It rates their success and offers concrete recommendations for how embargoes can work better in the future.
Among its findings: Sanctions against Iraq fared well initially because they helped disarm Baghdad, but they have outlived their usefulness and now sully the U.N. reputation.
A key reason, the study says, is that the Security Council failed early on to reward Iraqi compliance with an easing of the embargo that would have encouraged future cooperation.
An arms embargo on Rwanda had no impact whatsoever because it was imposed too late to stop the 1994 genocide and resoundingly ignored, the report said.
Overall, the Security Council would have greatly improved its one-third success rate if it had chosen to enforce sanctions rather than rely on the goodwill of U.N. member states to abide by them, the study said.
"Getting sanctions right has often been a less compelling goal than getting sanctions adopted," Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy said in a foreword.
The report urged the council to put more money into monitoring embargoes and assessing their impact, and make clear in resolutions how sanctions can be eased so targeted states have an incentive to comply.
Similar suggestions have been made in the past in academic and U.N. studies, but "The Sanctions Decade" is the first comprehensive look at U.N. sanctions, and its recommendations come at a critical time, said David Malone, president of the International Peace Academy, the independent New York think-tank that compiled the report.
On Monday, the council is expected to appoint a working group to recommend guidelines for improving sanctions' effectiveness while sparing civilians. Whether the recommendations are implemented is another question. The United States has been reluctant to even discuss sanction reform, primarily out of fear it would lead to criticism of its Iraq policy, Malone said.
Deputy U.S. Ambassador James Cunningham said the United States was interested in finding ways to make sanctions work better.
"But in having this discussion, we also need to keep focused that the object . . . is compliance, and that's across the board," he said in an interview. "We're not pursuing sanctions just for sanctions' sake."
Canada, which has taken a lead in pressing for sanction reforms, helped fund the study. Prior to 1990, sanctions had been imposed on only two countries: Rhodesia and South Africa.
Sanctions are most effective if they are used as a tool to bargain with targeted regimes, not as a blunt form of punishment, the report said.
It cited the sanctions against Yugoslavia, where the embargo against Belgrade was used as a bargaining chip in negotiations leading to the Dayton peace accords. The measures were eased after Belgrade made some concessions.
"The most effective approach appears to be one that combines sticks and carrots," said Andrew Mack, director of Kofi Annan's strategic planning unit.
That requires a willingness to ease the measures to reward good behavior and encourage further concessions -- a position the United States has rejected for Iraq, the report notes.
Washington, however, has recently seen that a little flexibility can work to its advantage, it said. Once the United States and Britain agreed to a longtime Libyan offer to prosecute the suspects in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing in a neutral, third country, Libya delivered the men for trial.
The U.N. air embargo was immediately suspended -- one of the few successes the United Nations can count.