UN aid mission needs to be given teeth

The despatch of 12 British Army officers to advise the rebel command in Benghazi seems a sensible if minimalist move. It's almost the least David Cameron could do.

But it doesn't solve anything in the short term. The civilian populations of the areas opposed to Gaddafi, and even some of those in areas under his regime's control, are still in great danger.

The images from Misrata these past 10 days raise the possibility of another round of slaughter with the outside world, the UN in the lead, incapable of doing anything about it.

We are beginning to witness scenes similar to those from Srebrenica, Mogadishu and Kigali in the Nineties. The UN was in Bosnia, Somalia, and Rwanda, yet a combination of its convoluted doctrine and theology, and malicious internal politics, saw it flee or stand by with its hands in its pockets.

So in 2005 the UN approved its convention on the "Responsibility to Protect" (R2P) which obliged but didn't compel UN members to protect civilians against aggression and genocide. Now we have UN Security Council Resolution 1973 to protect the civilians of Libya against bombardment and destruction by Gaddafi's men. It has turned out to be an Alice in Wonderland concoction. The people are to be protected, sure, but with no help from ground forces - for that would smack of invasion and occupation.

What is needed is a robust humanitarian mission, with real teeth and realistic rules of engagement, which the UN missions of the Nineties never had.

Some old Whitehall hands argue that by their precipitous action President Sarkozy and Prime Minister Cameron have put Nato and the security pillar of the EU under intolerable strain, and both are now cracking.

To which some might reply that both have been so abysmal over a crisis on the shores of Europe, they probably won't have much of a future anyway.