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 Harnessing Southern Perspectives for Peace and Human Development

South-South Network (SSN) for Non-State Armed Group Engagement is a newArmed Groups and Human Security Efforts in the Philippines region-anchored initiative from the global South (Asia, Africa and Latin America) which seeks to develop more effective approaches, instruments and intellectual resources for the constructive engagement of non-state armed groups (NSAGs).

SSN adopts a Southern perspective in its approach to NSAG engagement as well as in its organizational configuration and organizational culture as a loose but dynamic inter-regional and intra-regional network of mainly people’s and non-governmental organizations and field practitioners as well as academic, research and policy institutions and workers.

 Non-State Armed Groups

Non-State Armed Groups (NSAGs) – here refer mainly to rebel or insurgent groups, i.e. groups that are armed, use force to achieve their political/quasi-political objectives, and are autonomous from the state. As used here, NSAGs do not refer to state-controlled militias or paramilitaries, civil defense units, mercenaries, private military and security companies, proxy armed forces and the like.

Current rationale and difficulties for engaging NSAGs - The latter affect the lives of people for better or for worse, especially in situations of armed conflict and insurgent transitions (e.g. from war to peace, from authoritarianism to democracy).

NSAGs have become the dominant face of modern warfare and now have a central role in contemporary armed conflict. Some of them have already emerged as global actors and they are increasingly becoming subjects of international law. The greater the threat of NSAGs to human security of innocent civilians, the greater also the need for humanitarian among other forms of engagement of these NSAGs.

The current post-9/11 environment is such that it is particularly difficult to engage with NSAGs at a time when there is a desperate need to do so. Whatever the illegitimacy of NSAGs should not detract from the legitimacy of efforts to engage them constructively in the interest of human security.

Yet, in the overall scheme of things there is understandably not as much understanding, analytical tools, frameworks, approaches and mechanisms for dealing with and influencing NSAGs as there is/are for states in the state-oriented global order, even as there is a new world disorder.

 Engagement

This is the process of seeking to positively influence NSAGs in so far as their operations affect the lives of people and communities. This process entails direct and deliberate contact with NSAGs and encompasses the spectrum of communicating activities. However, SSN itself as a network will be less involved in direct engagement and more involved in working with intermediaries to help build capacities as well as learning from such intermediaries. Engagements will be characterized by the following:

* inclusive, participatory, dialogical and persuasive, rather than coercive and repressive

* not military engagement, law enforcement, criminal prosecution, economic sanctions and other “hard” policy instruments/measures against NSAGs but SSN studies the implications of these on the overall effort of constructive engagement of NSAGs, including their legal accountability for HR and IHL violations. SSN certainly does not engage in counter-insurgency, nor uses this as a framework.

* focuses on the whole question of NSAG engagement, with the following priority areas or levels of engagement:

1. human rights (HR), esp. fundamental rights against torture, disappearances and displacement; international humanitarian law (IHL), esp. basic protection from grave breaches; and accountability, both in its legal and non-legal/non-judicial forms

2. peace processes, ceasefires, and other (human) security aspects, inc. disarmament, demobilization, reintegration and rehabilitation (DDRR) of combatants as well as their repatriation and resettlement and aspects of healing and reconciliation

3. rehabilitation, reconstruction and development of conflict-affected areas, with priority to protection of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs)

4. political democracy, inc. political and electoral reforms that would allow the viable transformation of NSAGs into political parties in a fair political system, and also good governance as applied to proto-state formations and post-conflict transition

5. internal democracy (openness and tolerance, basic political and civil liberties) and other internal reforms, including dealing with the corrupting influences of power and with the gender question

 Southern Perspective

One from the Southern regions of internal/intra-state armed conflicts in Africa, Asia and Latin America which necessarily situates such conflicts in their respective political, economic, social, cultural, religious and ideological contexts and also in a history of colonialism and post-colonialism.

* considers NSAG engagement in the wider context of peace and conflict.

* emanates from the need to address the root causes of the conflict as part of political dialogue and to bring in civil society voices

* strongly committed to neglected political values which could be the foundation of a real vision for peace

* takes on the perspectives of affected local communities crucial for providing insights for strategies of engagement

The Southern perspective is a purposive counterfoil to the hegemonic Northern, esp. Euro- and American-centric, perspective in the analysis of and approaches to internal armed conflicts and NSAGs.

* seeks to secure relations of equality and co-responsibility in the true spirit and relations of internationalism

* consciously avoids Northern hegemonic practices in NGOs, e.g. the exploitation of overseas country problems for internal fundraising purposes and the co-optation and satellization of Southern partners for the sake of Northern prestige and growth

* consciously avoids such paradigms as dependence on funding from big business and governments, government-NGO uncritical collaboration and sell-out, an elitist “civil society” paradigm, and lack of transparency

 Our Affliates

Southeast Asia Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, Bangkok, Thailand

Nonviolence International Southeast Asia, Bangkok, Thailand

Philippine Campaign to Ban Landmines, Quezon City, Metro Manila

Convergent International, Nairobi, Kenya

Sudan Peace and Reconciliation Commission, Southern Sudan

SSN’s Composition, Constituency & Configuration

Practitioners (e.g. campaigners, advocates, activists and field workers in local and international organizations) who actually engage NSAGs as part of their work on an issue, in a social sector or in a geographical area where NSAGs are among the key players.

Academics (mainly researchers but also educators)

Policy-makers (inc. their think-tanks and strategists).

SSN privileges local practitioners, communities, people’s organizations, NGOs, academics, universities and research institutes in and from the South. The more the disciplines represented, the better to achieve a multi-disciplinary approach to and understanding of NSAGs.

* excludes policy-makers, think-tanks and strategists, whether governmental or private, who are engaged in a counter-insurgency framework, without prejudice to the necessary policy dialogue with them

* configured on a regional basis, where networks are relatively loose around regional focal points. The center(s) of gravity are conflict-region focal points in the South, initially Manila/Philippines and Bangkok/Thailand in Asia; Nairobi/Kenya in Africa; and Bogota/Colombia in Latin America. Autonomous regional centers are guided by the overall concept and regularly exchange notes regarding developments at their respective ends (thus, South-South)

Founding Group & Regional Focal/Advisory Points

Some founding core group members of SSN were co-founders and/or co-chairs of the Non-State Actor Working Group of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

They had contributed to the theory and practice of various instruments for NSAG adherence to a landmine ban but applicable too to other humanitarian norms: unilateral declarations, bilateral agreements, memoranda of understanding, multilateral undertakings, and mine-free (or peace) zones.

Among these core group members also are those who conceptualized, drafted and developed the pioneering Deed of Commitment under Geneva Call for Adherence to a Total Ban on Anti-Personnel Mines and for Cooperation in Mine Action as a standard instrument for NSAGs in 2000/2002, and were directly responsible for or involved in securing the adherences of 21 out of the 25 NSAG signatories to the Deed of Commitment by the end of 2003.

SSN hopes to build on and move on from such work of NSAG engagement but to do so now well beyond the landmines campaign.

 Contact Us

Atty. Soliman M. Santos, Jr. (Regional Focal Point 1 for Asia)
Vice-Chair for NGOs, Philippine National Red Cross IHL National Committee
Coordinator, Philippine Campaign to Ban Landmines
18 Mariposa St., Cubao, 1109 Quezon City, PHILIPPINECristina Atieno
Peace building Consultant, Nairobi, Kenya
Mob. (+254) 734828403 cristina_atieno@ yahoo.comS
Telefax (+632) 7252153, Mob. (+63920) 2903602
gavroche23@ gmail.com, PhilCBL@ gmail.com

Prof. Miriam Coronel-Ferrer
Associate Professor, Department of Political Science
University of the Philippines, Diliman, 1101 Quezon City, PHILIPPINES
Telefax (+632) 9244875, Mob. (+63918) 9138046
mcf178@ yahoo.com

Alfredo F. Lubang (Regional Focal Point 2 for Asia)
Regional Representative, Nonviolence International Southeast Asia, Bangkok, Thailand
104/20 Soi 124 Latprao, Wangtonglang, 10310 Bangkok, THAILAND
Telefax (+66) 2934 3289
fred_lubang@ yahoo.com
fred@ nonviolenceinternational.net

Lare Okungu (Regional Focal Point for Africa)
Executive Director, Convergent International, Nairobi, Kenya
P.O. Box 53029-00200, City Square, Nairobi, KENYA
Mob. (+254) 733937968
larok2001@ yahoo.com

Cristina Atieno
Peace building Consultant, Nairobi, Kenya
Mob. (+254) 734828403 cristina_atieno@ yahoo.com

Eduardo Marino (Regional Advisory Point for Latin America)
Field consultant & campaigner, Bogota, Colombia
(P.O. Box) AA 80034, Bogota, COLOMBIA
Mob. (+57 311) 2628020
edmarino55@ yahoo.com

Atty. Cecilia Jimenez (Regional Focal Point for Europe)
Human rights lawyer, consultant & trainor, Geneva, Switzerland
24 ch. Mont Rose, 1294 Genthod, SWITZERLAND
Telefax (+4122) 7741281, Tel. (+4122) 7743611
Fax (+4122) 7743169, Mob. (+4179) 7782510
cjimenez@ bluewin.ch
cejimenez@ hotmail.com

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