ACTORS IN ETHNIC

CONFLICTS
Who fights in ethnic conflicts, why and how?

The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

AMEER ABDULLAH KHAN

DEPARTMENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
FACULTY OF CONTEMPORARY STUDIES
NATIONAL DEFENCE UNIVERSITY PAKISTAN
PROLOGUE
Why to Study the Actors?
• Systematic and accurate account of factors causing, or facilitating, the outbreak of ethnic conflict and their
specific role.
• Enables to make more precise and potentially effective policy recommendations for the management,
settlement, and prevention of ethnic conflicts.
• Allows us to be more specific about why people at times make particular decisions that have predictably grave
consequences
• Important to know every actor’s:
- Interests
- Goals
- Strategies Agents Agendas Tactics
- Justification for violence
- Demands

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

WHO FIGHTS IN ETHNIC CONFLICTS?
Identifying Actors
• Usually fought within the borders of existing states.
• But not always the case.
• Also, the parties active in them are not only domestic agents.
• Assimilation, diffusion, escalation can also happen.
• Ethnic groups are not the only actors in an ethnic conflict.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

WHO FIGHTS IN ETHNIC CONFLICTS?
Identifying Actors
• As a result of the threat to international security and stability, international organizations, neighbouring
states, and regional & world powers may all have their own interests in particular conflict.

- Kashmir is a global concern, Sudan, Yugoslavia threatened security of the whole regions.

• Stateless groups such as the Kurds or Tamils often have members of their own ethnic group living in
neighbouring states or have a diaspora of economically better-off brethren elsewhere in the world willing and
able to support their struggle with money, arms, and political lobbying.
• As ethnic conflicts create zones of instability and insecurity beyond the reach, and occasionally beyond the
grasp, of law enforcement agencies, they are also a favourite ‘playground’ for common criminals and
increasingly become operating bases for terrorists with an international agenda as well.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

WHO FIGHTS IN ETHNIC CONFLICTS?
Identifying Actors
Ethnic Groups
State Armies/Militias
Neighbouring States The complex of
Stateless Groups domestic and
Terrorist Groups international as
Global Powers well as state and
Regional Powers non state actors is
Criminal Groups
a salient feature
of ethnic
IOs
conflicts.
Diaspora
NGOs

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

CLASSIFYING THE CONFLICTS

• An easy way to understand agents and their agendas and tactics in ethnic conflicts is to begin by mapping out
different types of ethnic conflict according to which conflict parties are involved.

Inter-Ethnic State-Ethnic
Groups Conflicts Group Conflicts

Ethnic
Conflicts

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

LETS RECALL THE DEFINITION OF ETHNIC CONFLICT

• A conflict that involves at least one party believing that the causes, fault-lines and potential solutions to a
conflict involve ethnic divide.
• Thus, these conflicts do not include:
- Turf Wars
- Ideological wars
- Class conflicts
- Civil/ Political unrest turned into violence etc.

Can we completely isolate ethnic conflicts from the above mentioned conflicts?
No. Ethnic conflicts at times overlap with other forms of violent conflict and some conflict
parties occasionally depend on their ability to continue the conflict by ‘branching out’ into
other forms of violence, for example, to finance their war effort

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

INDIVIDUALS
Victims of Modern Conflicts
• Genocide and large-scale ethnic cleansing etc not the rule in most ethnic conflicts.
• Yet, even in its less extreme forms, the groups and gangs fighting in violent ethnic conflicts are responsible for
the deaths of tens if not hundreds of thousands of people every year.
• In most cases, the overwhelming majority of these victims are civilians.
• Ethnic conflicts are fought among, and sometimes against, civilian populations.
- One reason for this is also that distinctions between combatants and non-combatants become difficult in
the streets and squares of cities and villages where rival factions and insurgents do not always, if ever,
identify themselves as fighters.
- Another reason is that strategy and tactics in ethnic conflicts in many ways deliberately target civilians—to
exact revenge, intimidate their opponents, and displace or destroy whole enemy populations defined on
the basis of ethnic criteria. This means that civilians are increasingly no longer accidental victims caught in
cross-fire

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

INDIVIDUALS
Victims of Modern Conflicts

Time Period Civilian Casualties

At the dawn of 20th century Around 10%

After WW-I Over 50%

After WW-II Over 66%

Beginning of the 21st century Over 90&

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

GROUPS

• Perceive threats and opportunities based on ethnic lines. To develop,

preserve, express
• Threats to group survival generally occur when states or other ethnic groups
deny an ethnic group access to the resources that the latter deems essential their distinct
for its survival as a distinct group. identities.
• Threats can also become manifest in policies of forced assimilation, in
This emanates
discrimination, and in deprivation.
from ethnic
• At their most extreme, they take the form of ethnic cleansing and genocide. Security dilemma

▪ To achieve conditions where its members can survive they need to acquire and retain power, defeat threats and
seize opportunities.
▪ This gives birth to the desire to gain political power.
▪ This in turn leads to the rise of Ethnonationalism.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

GROUPS
Aspirations
• These groups and states fighting against them come up with identical strategies, yet these are too diverse to
come up with generalization.

Inter-Group States-Ethnic Group

• Claims to identical • Specific cultural rights

stretches of territory • Self-rule
• To destroy other group • Autonomy
• To deny their existence • Resource
• To eradicate cultural • Recognition as a group
heritage • Liberties
• Secure survival as a group • Against suppression
• Assimilate a group • Succession

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

STATE ACTORS
• For states, what is at stake is primarily their territorial integrity and ability to enforce law and order.
• One or more groups monopolize the institutions of state and use them to commit gross human rights violations.
• The most obvious example of this kind is the Holocaust.
• In other recent cases of ethnic cleansing, such as in the Balkans and the Darfur region of western Sudan, and
genocide, such as in Rwanda, states either partially relied on or backed allied ethnic groups to do their dirty work.
• Using irregular militias—the Janjaweed in western Sudan and Arkan’s Tigers and Vojislav Seselj’s Chetniks in Bosnia
and Herzegovina spring to mind—states are, or at least think they are, able to keep their hands clean of war
crimes while still achieving their aims in the conflict.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

HOW DIFFERENT ACTORS ENGAGE IN A CONFLICT?
Case Studies

• Balkan – Kosovo
Individual

• Rwanda Groups
• Darfur
States
• Burundi

• Macedonia Regional
• Bosnia-Herzegovina
International

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

1. ACTORS IN KOSOVO CONFLICT
• Intergroup Situation
- Kosovo Albanians (Suppressed minority vs. Serbs (Privileged minority)
- Under old Yugoslavian constitution Albanians had enjoyed privilege in 1970s & 80s
- Struggle for power and interrelated privileges: Albanians motivation from Croatia and Bosnia Herzegovina

• Intra Group Situation - Albanians

- Both Serbs and Albanians were not homogenous
- Albanians’ consensus on getting freedom from Serbs but on nothing else
- Some wanted peaceful campaign of civil disobedience
- Some wanted a violent movement
- Radicals wanted to expel all the Serbs from historical territories of Kosovo
- Others wanted a united state of all the Albanians in Yugoslavia
- Some were aiming for greater Albanian state in the Balkans (Macedonia, South Serbia and Montenegro)

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

1. ACTORS IN KOSOVO CONFLICT
• Intra Group Situation - Serbs
- Some favoured accommodation with Albanians
- Serb refugees from Croatia and Bosnia were hardcore
- Even ready to kill or expel all the Albanians
- Militant faction got support from Belgrade

• Role of Diaspora
- Supported militant Albanians from Western Europe and USA
- Formulated Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

1. ACTORS IN KOSOVO CONFLICT
• Role of Milosevic
- His last stand to power after losses in Bosnia and Croatia
- Was left with no options to compromise
- No practical opposition to him in Belgrade
- Romantic myths among Serbs about Kosovo being their part
- Miscalculations about NATO’s response

• Regional and International Dynamics

- Disappearance of Russian umbrella
- Embarrassment of NATO over Bosnia
- Loss of western faith in Milosevic as guarantee of peace in the Balkans
- Risk of spill over to Macedonia
- Test for liberal resolve in immediate post-cold war era
- Search for NATO’s new role
Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)
2. ACTORS IN RWANDAN GENOCIDE
• Belgian colonial rule and dominance of Tutsi minority
• Liberation from Belgium in 1959 and dominance of Hutu majority
• Feelings of vengeance and discriminatory policies of Hutus against Tutsi
• Population of Tutsi halved (reduced from 20% to 10%) in thirty years
• 20000 killed in 1960 riots, 0.25 million exiled
• This discrimination radicalised Tutsis in neighbouring Uganda
• Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) launched from Uganda in 1990
• Rwandan president Habariyamana instrumentalised the RPF threat to consolidate his power
• Policy of “True Rwandans” – Hutus who support Tutsi or oppose the presidents were considered enemies.
• Every Rwandan had to register his/her identity. Physical appearances were already different.
• RPF grew in power and forced Habariyamana to share power with Tutsi
• Habariyamana looked for an opportunity to create a perception of security dilemma among Hutus
• Hutu Power movement emerged in reaction to growing power of RPF.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

2. ACTORS IN RWANDAN GENOCIDE
• Tutsi soldiers killed first democratically elected Hutu President in neighbouring Burundi.
• Further strengthened Hutu Power Movement.
• Young, militarily trained Hutus armed with machetes specially imported for genocide purpose.
• April 1994, Habariyaman’s plan was shot down by Tutsi soldiers in a coup like scenario. Burundi’s Hutu president
Cyprien Ntaryamira on board was also killed in the incident.
• Habariyamana’s Presidential Guards and troops seized the opportunity to complete their control over the
government and silent all the dissenting voices.
• Incentives given to the Hutus participating in killings.
• Killings started by the police and military. Later the masses joined.
• By the time RPF advanced, and militarily weakened the organisers of genocide it was too late.
• Over a million Tutsis killed in three months.
• International community was very slow to act.
• Hutu population also turned against the government.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

3. SUDAN CONFLICT
• An old conflict between predominantly Arab north and Christian South
• Dispute over the share or oil wealth generated from oil rich South Alan Kuperman’s View
• In 2003, Sudan Liberation Movement / Army (SLM/A) emerged in West Sudan
International intervention
• A month later another group Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) emerged. creates a moral hazard.
• Both claimed underdevelopment as its main grievance & continued International community,
insurgency against Khartoum. spurred by the reports of
• Meanwhile negotiations between South and North were nearing a gross human rights violations
breakthrough. intervenes to support the
weak. But this gives the
• Arab’s militia Janjaweed also carried out its activities. weaker groups an incentive
• SLA attacked an airport killing 70 soldiers of Sudanese army to trigger the powerful group.
• Started a conflict where the government forces along with Janjaweed Same happened in Sudan and
unleashed tremendous violence. Kosovo.
• International community’s retrained response – Delayed for two years.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

4. MACEDONIA CONFLICT
• The only former Yugoslavian republic to secede peacefully.
• Macedonia was on radar of international community since early 1990s.
• Albanians were 25% of the total population living in regions neighbouring Albania and Kosovo.
• A small UN mission prevented spill over of conflict from Kosovo to Macedonia.
• Partly triggered by the lack of recognition of their national identity & language in public life, particularly in
education and partly inspired by their brethren in Kosovo.
• Albanians formed National Liberation Army (NLA) and began to attack the government.
• Initially lowkey violence escalated with insurgents started shelling the airports.
• Macedonian forces launched counter offense against the NLA.
• Intense pressure from EU and NATO.
• Kosovo Albanians also pressurised for peace. Violence erupted but a full scale war averted.
• EU and Albanian political parties in Kosovo mediated talks between Macedonian Albanians and the government.
• The Orhird Agreement led to the swift end of violence and led to Cease Fire Monitoring Mission by EU.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

4. BURUNDI CONFLICT
• Stakes were higher in Burundi due to an imminent genocide.
• Political & economic competition between Tutsi and Hutu since independence in 1966.
• 14% Tutsi controlled the government and military while Hutu were limited to providing labour.
• Legitimate grievances of Hutu but Tutsi not willing to give up the privileges.
• A ailed Hutu rebellion in 1972 led to the killing of over 150000 Hutu while another 150000 died in 1988.
• Displaced Hutus fleeing to neighbouring states particularly Tanzania.
• Hutu militias in Tanzania started attacking Tutsi government and civilians in Burundi.
• In reprisal killing by army, more Hutus were killed and displaces.
• In 1993, first time election were won where the Hutu leader Melchio Ndadaye was elected president.
• Four months later Ndadaye was assassinated by Tutsi elements in army.
• It resulted in a full fledged civil war in which Tusi became target of Hutu violence.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

4. BURUNDI CONFLICT
• In 1994, newly elected Hutu president Ntayamira was also killed in shooting down of Habyarimana’s plane.
• Acute perception of a serious security dilemma was developed in the Hutus of Burundi.
• A massacre of Hutu refugees fleeing from Rwanda further exacerbated the situation in 1995.
• In the following year there was a successful Tutsi Coup.
• The UN established a mission.
• UN approached was changed from country to regional specific.
• A representative of UN was appointed for the region.
• Boutros Boutros Ghali’s proposal to send UN troops ander Chapter-VII failed.
• The OAU also acted in case of Burundi and started Arusha peace process.
• Nelson Mandela appointed as Chief Mediator in 1998.
• Rome based NGO, Community of Sant’Egidio facilitated secret negotiations.
• A failed coup attempt in 2001 and sporadic but intense violence continued till 2004.

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)

THANK YOU

Ameer Abdullah Khan - The Politics of Ethnic Conflict (IR-456)