United Nations Security Council (CRISIS) BACKGROUND GUIDE

United Nations Security Council (CRISIS) BACKGROUND GUIDE

Responding to ISIS Director: Assistant Director: Mohammad Khattak Marcos Seef WHISMUN 2017 February 3-4 Brooklyn, NY

WHISMUN 2017 THE HIGH SCHOOL FOR ENTERPRISE, BUSINESS, AND TECHNOLOGY 1/10/17 secretariat@whismun.org http://www.whismun.org/ Tiffany Delgado Secretary-General Dimitri Mimy Conference Director Desiree Marmolejo Chief of External Relations Dimitri Mimy Under-Secretary-General Kevin Whiston John Heegle Faculty Advisers Chris Talamo Arpita Tashin EIM Program Managers

INTRODUCTION Under the Charter, the Security Council has the primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. It consists of 15 Members, and each Member has one vote. Under the Charter, all Member States are obligated to comply with Council decisions. The Security Council takes the lead in determining the existence of threats to the peace or act of aggression. It calls upon the parties to a dispute to settle it by peaceful means and recommends methods of adjustment or terms of settlement. In some cases, the Security Council can resort to imposing sanctions or even authorize the use of force to maintain or restore international peace and security. TOPIC HISTORY & CURRENT EVENTS In 2003, the United States and a coalition of allied nations invaded Iraq in order to remove Iraq s dictator, Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein had been the dictator of Iraq for several decades and had ruled the country with an iron fist. Hussein was captured soon after the invasion, and the nation witnessed a power vacuum as numerous groups within Iraq sought to expand their influence in the country. One such

group was Jamaat al-tawhid wa'l-jihad, which swore allegiance to Osama bin Laden and became Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). AQI was motivated to create a state which observed Islamic Sharia Law in Iraq and was willing to use any means necessary to do so. AQI split from Al Qaeda in 2006 in order to use more brutal techniques to achieve their goal and became ISIS. In 2013, ISIS was able to use the instability which existed within war-torn Syria to conquer territories within that country, establishing themselves as an international threat. ISIS objective is to conquer the world and create a Sunni Islamic State which adheres strictly to its narrow interpretation of Sharia law. ISIS has captured large swathes of territories within Iraq and Syria and have taken cities such as Fallujah, Ramadi, and Palmyra. In addition to taking territory, the group brutally murders anybody who disagrees with them, mostly by beheading them. To date, it is estimated over 170,000 people have been murdered by ISIS and other terrorist groups in Iraq alone. The brutality which ISIS operates cannot be overstated. One of the most troubling things about ISIS is the rate at which it has grown. As of the beginning of 2015, it was estimated there were over 100,000 ISIS fighters and that number doubled by the beginning of 2016. ISIS has successfully utilized modern social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) to spread its extremist message by posting photos, speeches, and video clips of beheadings and other violent acts. Thousands of angry people are flocking to

Iraq and Syria to join the fight; the movement is also spreading to other countries and has been identified in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Somalia, and Nigeria, among others. Countries which have been recognized in this context can only be removed if certain criteria are met. This is part of the reason why all 5 of these countries remain on the list despite the fact that only Syria and Iran are considered problematic by experts. Even Syria has improved compared to when it was initially recognized as a state sponsor in the 1980 s. In recent years, Yemen, Jordan, and Pakistan pose greater threats to global security through their participation in and support of terrorism and terrorist groups. This reality makes the challenge of combating the issue more difficult because it is not always clear which governments are explicitly supporting terrorist groups and which are struggling to recognize or eliminate the threat. Some of the countries previously identified, such as Pakistan, have active diplomatic relations with western powers, in which they traditionally exercise sanctions over and other pressures against hostile nations, creating a dilemma. Furthermore, difficult and complex circumstances, like the civil war in Syria, can break down traditional methods of dealing with state hostility.

Bloc Positions Turkey: Turkey, which is a key U.S. ally and the only NATO member that borders areas controlled by ISIS Jihadists in Syria and Iraq, is in the prime location to hit the ISIS group next door, but they refuse to do just that. Ankara, Turkey s capital, is seeking a low profile, almost to be invisible in the international alliance that Washington is building up against the Isis caliphate. The Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his government have refused to give the US any more support other than just a diplomatic/political support. They have also refused to allow America to attack from NATO air bases in Turkey and have refused Turkish troops to take part in combat operations. Turkey has refused to take any military actions in the attack against Isis but has officially joined the alliance against Isis. US Coalition: Under the leadership of the United States, an international coalition has grown around helping Iraq fight off ISIS. The coalition against ISIS is growing still today and the US is still putting up a military fight against ISIS through airstrikes, though not through a ground invasion. The countries involved in the coalition so far are the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Netherlands, Canada, Turkey, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, Iraqi Kurdistan and many smaller military forces from local Sunni tribes and trained Syrian rebels. However, although the coalition is broad, many

countries are looking to the US to provide most of the military support. For example, Marwan Muasher, the former Jordanian foreign minister has stated on CNN that The U.S. will have to take the lead in providing military strikes. Jordan s contribution to the coalition will instead be to provide intelligence to the West. Australia has also refused to participate in ground fighting. France is providing military equipment to the war effort, but is not piloting missions. Syria and Allies (Russia): Although no country has come out in support of ISIS, some countries are concerned about the US coalition, and worry about it targeting sites in Syria, since ISIS operates there as well. For many years, Russia has tried to keep other countries out of the Syrian Civil War, and they worry that the US may bomb places in Syria while they attack ISIS. Therefore, while Syria and its allies don t support ISIS and are in fact greatly threatened by ISIS, they want to make sure that the international response stays limited. Committee Mission The rise of ISIS should be clearly addressed by the global community. Western countries, meaning the United States and other NATO nations, are strictly opposed to the human rights abuses utilized by ISIS. Middle Eastern nations such as Turkey, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, also oppose ISIS because their own very existence and sovereignty is

threatened by ISIS. Even countries like China and Russia, who have traditionally been inactive in response to human rights abuses, have become alarmed at the amount of instability ISIS has created in the region, and how this instability has affected commerce. The goal of participant delegates is to discover areas of consensus with other delegations and to attempt to create a workable UN resolution that will benefit all parties. The purpose of Model UN, and of the United Nations itself, is to foster cooperation and compromise for the greater good. Therefore, it is critical for successful delegations to be proactive in making reasonable concessions in order to allow for a mutually beneficial outcome. All participants should remember, however, that Model UN is a simulation and that all delegations should represent their respective countries accurately. The ideological and intellectual differences between participants and their assigned nations is part of the challenge which makes Model UN worthwhile. Ultimately, the goal of the Counter-Terrorism Committee is to establish an actionable agreement among member nations to cripple or minimize the effectiveness of terrorism. Following an establishment of mutual understanding and willingness to cooperate, specific and actionable policies should be discussed and debated thoroughly.

Questions to Consider 1. How can the international community stop the bloodshed and prevent ISIS from exacting more carnage? 2. How can the international community improve its response to the refugee crisis stemming from ISIS advances? 3. How can the international community prevent radical groups, such as ISIS, from forming in the first place? Works Cited 1. Islamic State Fact Sheet. Clarion Project. http://www.clarionproject.org/sites/default/files/islamic-state-isisisil-factsheet- 1.pdf 2. Thompson, Nick, Richard A. Greene, and Inez Torre. "ISIS: Everything You Need to Know about the Rise of the Militant Group." CNN. Cable News Network, 25 September 2014. 3. Capelouto, Susanna. "U.S. Airstrikes Help Push ISIS Back in Kobani." CNN. Cable News Network, 17 Oct. 2014. Web. 4. "The Evolution of ISIS." Al-Monitor. Al-Monitor, 1 Nov. 2014. Web. 5. Gunter, Joel. "Iraq Crisis: What Is the Islamic State?" The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group, 20 Aug. 2014. Web. 6. Pollack, Kenneth M. "Iraq: Understanding the ISIS Offensive Against the Kurds." The Brookings Institution, 11 Aug. 2014. Web. 7. Reuters. "ISIS Executes Soldiers, Takes about Two Dozen Hostages at Syria Base." National Post. Postmedia Network Inc., 27 Aug. 2014. Web. 8. Slater, Andrew. "Iraq s Religious Minorities Are Being Slaughtered and ISIS Just Captured the Last Town Giving Them Shelter." The Daily Beast. The Daily Beast Company LLC, 4 Aug. 2014. Web. 9. Thompson, Nick, Richard A. Greene, and Inez Torre. "ISIS: Everything You Need to Know about the Rise of the Militant Group." CNN. Cable News Network, 25 Sept. 2014. Web.