Just 2 days ago.
http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/opinions_77…
“Q: Yes, there’s been recently criticism of NATO, especially at the United Nations and the UN
Security Council members, that NATO has
overstepped its mandate because of the fact that in this current
situation where the pro-Qadhafi forces are obviously on the
defensive, NATO is still striking… mounting
air strikes against them, although they’re only aiming their fire
at the attacking forces, at the attacking rebel forces. They’re not
endangering or threatening civilians.
And that’s why several countries have expressed unease with this
continuing attack, which they say is biased in the sense that it’s
helping the rebels and working against the forces which are on the
defence. Can you comment on that? (Laughs). Forgot the
question.
Colonel Roland Lavoie: Is it for me, or Carmen, do you want to
take it, or I take it?
Carmen Romero: Well, I can start by saying that NATO is not overstepping its mandate, and the mandate
given to the Alliance was a mandate approved by all members… I
mean, by the United Nations Security Council. And if you see the
latest comments by the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, he
praised actually the role, the military role that NATO is playing and what we are doing is basically
implementing the United Nations Security Council mandate.
I’m sure that Roland would like to add something to this.
Colonel Roland Lavoie: Well, just that it is clear we take a
side… it’s to take the side of the people of Libya. This is
essential to understand that when we strike at a tank it’s because
we have an understanding that this does represent a threat to the
local population. Same thing for ammunition depots. You will have
noticed very lately, in the last few days, we have struck a lot of
field… advanced field command-and-control nodes in locations where
troops were gathered in suburbs of cities. You don’t do that if you
don’t intend to do an attack. And these are the targets we
engage.
Every time we engage a target this is the mental test that is in
our mind, like is it a target that presents a threat to the
civilian population, and if the answer is yes we will engage this
threat.”