Here we are
after the work of UN for half century and it’s attempts to fulfill it’s main
purpose to bring peace to the whole world but at the same time with it’s 15
current peace keeping operations, some of them unable to settle the situation
from 1960’s? Why after it’s 50 years experience all over the world – Korea,
Iraq, Haiti, Rwanda, Somalia, Croatia, Yugoslavia, Africa there are still so
many places were UN can’t bring the war to the end and find the solution for
both sides involved in sufferings? Why after Hague, San Francisco Conferences,
all the attempts made by presidents all over the world and peace agreements
constructed by them can’t bring long term peace in to our lives? Many reports have been written, different
attitudes presented by most experienced experts, different suggestions made
related to how improve the PKO. The latest most important report written in
this connection is the Brahimi report, were new suggestions are made as well as
propositions made earlier are one more time strengthened. Will they work and is
it real to carry them out in the real life, what is good and bad about these
changes proposed - that is what I will try to answer in my report.
The Brahimi report is
considered to be a serious step towards meaningful reform of UN PKO and
problems related to them, therefore to my mind it is valuable to look at this
report more closely .
The Brahimi report
suggests many structural changes and the first one is strengthening of
staff working there. I personally was shocked by facts that entire Kosovo
mission is supported just by 6 full time
headquarter staff, Sierra Leone is supported by only 5 people. DPKO’s capacity
probably is severely inadequate if they have only 400 staff – including professional
and general services- who have to oversee and manage 58,000 people serving in
15 different peace keeping operations over the world. These numbers speak for
themselves and I am sure that restructuring and strengthening of DPKO’s staff
must take place. Additional Assistant
Secretary – General, that was suggested by Brahimi report must be established,
as well as the Office of Operations must be strengthened and UN’s capacity for
policy planning, information analysis must be enhanced. Structural adjustments
are required also at Military and Civilian Police Division, which should be
reorganized in two separate divisions and public information planning also
needs strengthening. DPKO has now 15 Professional servings as the focal points
for 14 current and two potential new peace operations, what means that there
are even less than one officer per mission. The ones responsible for such big
missions as UNTAET at East Timor, UNMIK at Kososo have no back up. All the time
they have to be on 24 hour call, they can’t take a vocation and sometimes work more
than one shift – even those factors influence the quality of work done. The problem about the amount of staff
employed is connected to their quality and knowledge. As recent experience has
shown, for example in Sierra Leone, partly crises were caused because
contingents arrived ill-trained, ill-equipped, poorly prepared and provisioned.
11 officers in the Military Adviser’s office support the identification and
rotation of military units for all peace keeping operations, they are also
responsible for finding time to provide advice, draft guidelines, manuals and
train the ones who will be the military officers in the operations. It is
obvious that more people are needed to carry out this important and hard load
of work. The example from life to show that changes are needed could be drawn
from Sarajevo, where stationing UN headquarters there was ill-judged decision
made about the entire operation. The place where to establish headquarters were
chosen wrongly, that was the reason why communication problems appeared later
and headquarters had to be moved to Belgrade and then to Zagreb. All this
caused long delays in the deployment of forces, additional costs. The wrong
decision was made because staff at DPKO took no account of changes in
international situation and made the wrong estimation of the political and
military circumstances. Here I would like to assure that it is more useful to
invest some time, money in the working staff before they start doing their job
and later it will bring all of the invested money back, because they will be
able to make the right decision in the right time. Of course if we speak about
the quality and equipment provided for the troops that go directly in the war
regions it is more difficult. The question of commitment arises here. The
number of countries that have professional armies and who are willing to
contribute to PKOs are limited, very few developed countries want to put their
troops at risk. Other reason is that it
is very costly and expensive to train troops and UN doesn’t have money for
this.
The other issue, that
to my mind is one of the most important ones addresses in the Brahimi Report is
about the preventive action. Here we shall ask – is it easier to wait
until something terrible happens and only then open eyes and start thinking
about helping, or is it better to think ahead and act before the conflict have
erupted. Here the roots of the conflicts and the reasons why they most often
end in crises should be addressed.
Developed states should understand that there are several potential
trouble spots where if not now then later on wars will emerge for sure. May be
it is better for major players, parties try to minimize the effects of growing
tensions. If we look back in the history we can see that the conditions and situation
in states where wars took place and sources of conflict are quite similar.
Economics is one of the major problem areas, including corruption, distribution
of power, poverty. Environmental issues, such as access to safe water or
ethnicity issues can also serve as reasons for the starting point of war. As
for example Kosovo, where balkanism took place – state falling apart into
ethnic groups. Where in Yugoslavia ethnic division have been affirmed in the
Western peace proposals and even diplomats
make the boundaries of ethnic groups clear as speaking. None of the
peace proposals for Bosnia contained options for people who didn’t want to
identify as Muslims or Serbs.
As suggested by
Ambassador Lakhard Brahimi from Algeria “Investing in social and economic
development is one of the surest ways of building a solid foundation for the
long term peace, within and between societies”. This point of view is also defended in the
Millennium Report “every step taken towards reducing poverty and achieving
broad-based economic growth is a step toward conflict prevention’’. The Brahimi report puts implication for
preventive action as one of the key working areas of UN.
One of the key
recommendations made by the Brahimi Report for improving preventive action is
more often use of fact-finding missions in potential trouble areas. Only
by their effective work ( if states cooperate, if data is constantly updated,
monitored) UN will be able to know in advance where the conflicts take place,
where help is needed and be able to identify what type of preventive action
must exactly be used. The other
suggestion made is closer and more effective cooperation between the states,
the Security Council and other principal organs on conflict prevention
issues. The history has already proven
that without close cooperation it is very hard to achieve the wanted results.
For example Somalia, former Yugoslavia or Rwanda were states responsible for
negotiations nor those who took part in operations were provided with all
needed information about such important data, that was necessary for them to
succeed. As written down in the Brahimi
report there is very often gap between verbal postures and financial and
political support for prevention. When
all the leaders sit around the conference table they all can say that they will
try to protect peace, because that is what they want to see in today’s world
and how can they not help if that is one of the main UN missions and goals. But
unfortunately when it comes to carrying promises out in real life, things turn
out somewhat different. It should be a matter of honor and privilege for the
states to provide their forces for peace keeping missions (because otherwise
what is the purpose of military troops other than maintenance of international
peace and security). But why then in the real life troops delay and arrive
later in situations when their acting is needed so badly? Why States such as
England, that is one of the biggest economic and political players in
international arena send only 50 trucks when all world knows about the genocide
and something terribly needs to be done? Here is the problem that some states
view peace keeping operations as a way how win something and to increase their
relations with the great powers. There are really very few countries who take
part in PKO just because of the moral, ideological obligation and commitment to
the Charter (in this category Scandinavia and Canada could be mentioned). The
measures and numbers of how many troops should be provided by the member states
should be made clearer. Now 100 000 personnel is provided by 74 member states,
but the question here is whether those troops would be available immediately if
emergency arise? Won’t the decision about sending or not sending the troops be
dominated by political interests and domestic compulsions?
Next very important
part of the Brahimi Report is the question about the peacebuilding strategy
as it is integral to the success of peace keeping operations and needed for
achieving long lasting peaceful solutions to conflicts.
The Brahimi
Report points out several things that are needed for peace building to be
effective. Some of them are :
1 Active
engagement with the local parties.
Here “quick impact projects” are suggested. The main aim of such
projects would be to make real change and difference in lives of people who are
in mission area. The best feature of such projects would be that they would
establish a credibility in the new mission. A small percentage of a mission’s
first years budget should be made available for carrying them out. Several
examples can be provided here. Lets take Kosovo where as the winter approaches
and 50 000 people are camping outside adequate funding is simply needed to
avert further tragedy where people would die without food and roof over their
head. Major focus have to made on immediate needs. The civilians should be
given hope and assurance that something really can be done, what would be the
investment for the future peace. If
confidence in civilians can be acquired by limiting visible and
intimidating security force, creating amnesty, punishing those responsible for
previous abuses and destruction, peace could be acquired much more easier. Or let’s take South Africa where for example investment
in their educational system would serve as a key determinant of long run
economic performance and automatically would make the presence of peace more
likely. Balance of power between the national and local educational authorities
have to be made, new national standards of the governance of schools must take
place and on of their main tasks have to be assure equitable learning
opportunities for all.
2 Free and fair
elections. Here I can mention that one of the main roots of conflict was
also politics, therefore it is clear that problems such as tyranny and unequal
and unfair distribution of power will lead to protest group being unsatisfied,
that can lead to strong protest movements. People should learn to believe that
their rights will be respected and that the only way how to influence the
political outcome and decisions made will not be by killing, but through
discussion and just by expressing their views. Here I again can show the
example of South Africa where the first universal franchise election took place
on April 27,1994, what was big step towards democracy. Without political
stability in South Africa, economic growth and social cohesion would remain
elusive. Nelson Mandela has shown very strong leadership skills in the
transition process, assuring close interaction with large number of ngos,
educational and professional organizations, private foundations.
Here I can cite
Mikhail Gorbachev who said that “ strategic leadership paves society’s path to
the future…when the source feeding the old system are exhausted and new
activities, reforms or even revolution are needed”.
3. Wider functions
of civilian police. Their work should not end at solving the one particular
case with abusive or corrupt police officer. Their mission have to be to
address this problem more deeply – to educate local police in such a way, that
it would stay the same way even after peace builders go away. That can be done by teaching international
standards to them, reform and restructure local police forces in a more democratic
way, so that it would be harder for corruption to take place there. The
treatment of criminals according to laws and fair trial for them should be
assured. The report even proposes providing of international judicial experts,
penal experts and human rights specialists if needed. It is quite clear that South Africa for
example need help with their criminal situation. With the murder rate of 61 %
per 100,000, is more than 11 times the international average of 5.5% South
Africa is likely to be the most murderous society on the earth. Crime
prevention should be carried out by the state’s police in normal democracy, but
in South Africa 90 % of criminal convictions are gained from confessions that
are gotten by the “ choke and talk”. From this further we can develop the
question about the humans rights being violated, wrong techniques used by
police and how many innocent may be imprisoned just because they were made to
confess. Much should be done – police services should be made accountable to
the community, police must be freed from corruption and democratic empowerment
within police structure shall be changed. Advice and assistance in transforming
South Africa’s police is needed.
Here I would
once more like to talk about the importance of information gathering,
analyzing. Now information gathering agents tend to worry about day to day
issues. If the Secretariat won’t increase it’s analytical capacity and won’t
increase the amount of information available to them it won’t be able to see
far ahead and will remain only as a reactive body. But how to get the access to
the best information ? How to make it accessible to the right persona at right time? To make it
possible the Brahimi Report suggests new Secretariat to be created -
Information and Strategic Analysis Secretariat (EISAS), that would accumulate
knowledge about conflict situations, distribute that knowledge to a wider range
of people, formulate long term strategies and give analyses on policies. New working people would be needed to gather
information that is yet not available on CNN, BBC or maybe is never shown
there. In the report a head of staff, small team of military analysts, police
experts and qualified information system analysts would be necessary to get the
EISAS work. EISAS would include both
short term and long term values in itself. It would strengthen the daily
reporting function, by making sure that all sources on global events and
mission activities used are updated. After gathering so much information,
hiring the best working staff EISAS should be available to provide the best
expertise on particular cases and circumstances. After some time EISAS should
have such a data base that could replace the daily reports, daily news feeds,
copies of code cables.
At this
point we should also realize the importance of media, because it is one of the
greatest influences on what we decide, how we evaluate. In past years some
operations were rushed into without evaluating and preparing poorly just
because of the media’s pressure. The better public information system would
allow us better to resist it’s pressure and go without starting operations
without full preparations made. For example in Kosovo the Diplomatic Observer
Mission vehicle may not have hit a mine
if UN Mine Action Service would have searched the area and the UNHCR would have had information source
that would have told about this problem.
Regarding this issues
one question arises – the work of EISAS and it’s information gathering capacity
would better serve the Council. In the early drafts of the Brahimi Report the
stuff that worked on it asked the Secretariat to include the text to “ tell the
security Council what it needs to know, not what it wants to hear”. Even this
quote was put in the early draft of the report it was taken out from the final
version. One conclusion can be made – the Council also in the future wants to
be given only facts what it wishes to hear. This fact makes us to doubt the
efficiency of the new information gathering center as well.
The Brahimi Report
asks several questions about the work and efficiency of civilian police.
First of all it must decide if United Nations should carry out such operations
at all and should it then be as part of peace operations or be regulated by
other structure? It is very important that the civilian police is well educated
and institutionalized if we look what functions it has to carry out. Only
trained, eligible individuals with wide expertise and knowledge would be able
to undertake functions such as governmental assistance, political advice,
enforcing the law, attracting foreign investment, running of schools and
creating the banking system. Here as a
example I can mention Regulations made by UNMIK regarding Kosovo regarding
different levels of state structure – On appointment and removal from office of
judges and prosecutors (if such a situation appears UN promises to provide
three international experts so as the Commission could be composed), On the law
applicable in Kosovo (it is made clear that Kosovo must observe internationally
recognized human rights standards), On the bank licensing, supervision and
regulation.
The question of
transitional civil administration goes together with the question of
“applicable law”. Which legal system is the dominating one – UN’s or the local
one? The problem still lies in how mission’s justice team will be able to learn
the legal system and procedures well enough so as to work up to the needed
standards. Difference in culture, language, custom, understanding of life will
make this process more difficult. More time is used on learning easier it is
for local opponent parties to use this time period to get ready and set up
their own administrations, find the right persons to corrupt so as to influence
legal and criminal outcomes. One proposition made by the Brahimi Report is to
train the mission personnel in advance and then when the particular situation
comes up the questions about applicable law had to be worked out. Here we must
remember that international jurists and international standards can also be
used in cases such as murder, rape, arson, kidnapping.
It is nice to think
how nice the life would be if all these changes could be carried out in real
life. Here we meet with the problem of financing. The Support Account
funds 85 % of DPKO budget, that would be 40 million dollars annually. Another $
6 million comes from the regular biennium budget. The consistent and
predictable baseline of funding is needed to do more than keeping existing
missions afloat. DPKO shall have resources to plan six month to a year down the
road so as to help the mission to perform better in the future. The Brahimi
Report suggest the Secretary -General to approach the General Assembly with
request for an emergency supplemental increase to the Support Account to allow
immediate recruitment of additional personnel in DPKO. But here is very strong
argument made against improving PKO if it connected with additional expenses.
The question here is about the competing demands. Taking the decision to
save peace keeping can come at the expense of development needs. Money invested
in making additional posts in DPKO or improving the information gathering
system could be better invested in the poor countries. But if we look more
closely to this question we can see that peace keeping is essential for the
development (for example Mozambique, where effective peace keeping served as
bases for the high economic growth of the state). If we think about the
projects of preventive action where money will be invested in different
structures of life so as to improve the whole level of life, we see that there
is no reason to worry that the money invested in improving PKO will be taken to
absolutely different field. Sometimes at first you have to invest as to later
get much greater advantages.
The other thing said
against the Report, is that some states have no believe in the new information
center -EISAS that will be created, they rather think about it as a
place where UN spies will gather not as a place that will be a new
information gathering and analyzing entity. To my mind there is no logical
explanation and reasoning for such doubts. The Brahimi Report suggest closer
cooperation between the states and all the organizations. Now if one state
takes part in peace keeping operation and in the development program it doesn’t
need that they cooperate and exchange information, materials, what would make
all the process more transparent. There is no reason to address issues of
spying against EISAS if cooperation is one of the thing that the Brahimi Report
suggests.
Here are many more
things to be said about what is wrong and what should be done, because the PKO
is so controversial that the discussions about it will never end.
Since the first days
of peace-keeping operations, they have passed different stages of development.
At first (1948 –1956) PKO was in experimental phase, when international
observation and reporting system were introduced. During dormant period (1967 –1973) terms such
as “buffer zones”, “multi dimensional”, “interposition” was used for the first
time. Just the fact that to the end 1998 UN had organized 49 peace-keeping
operations and the annual budget for peace-keeping in 1998 was $ 230.4 million,
there were 11,121 military, police, civilian personnel deployed in United
nations, countries contributing contingents had
increased from 26 to 74 (annually down to 37) indicates that the world
can’t do without PKO and that they have made a very big difference in the
development of many states. Over all these years UN has succeeded in many
operations and of course questions about efficiency and quality of peace
keeping operations are being asked, but one may take a perspective and say that
we can never know where the states would be if nothing would be done in PKO’s
field. It is clear that operations for maintenance of international peace and
security will continue to be required and therefore must receive the attention
deserved.
The central
aim of the United Nations Charter was to “ maintain international peace and
security, and to that end, take collective measures for prevention and removal
of threats to peace, and for the suppression of
acts of aggression”. We must realize that there are many people out
there who rely on those words and who wait for themselves to be rescued and for
change to be brought in their lives. It is the duty of our community to carry
those promises out in real life and do everything we can to make peace keeping
operations as effective as we can. I am sure that the Brahimi Report is one of
the greatest steps taken lately to make society’s path to more peaceful future
more easier an even.
Resources used in
my Research:
1.
The Full
Brahimi Report available on http://www.un.org/peace/reports/peace
operations/
3.
Security
Council responding to Brahimi Report – http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/200/2001113.sc6948.doc.html
4.
The
discussion of 17 speakers in connection to the Brahimi Report – http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2000/20001109.gaspd200.doc.html
5.
Inducement
of peace : Annan : Peace Operations and the UN; Preparation for the next century.
6.
Christian
Harleman “Civilian Peace-Keepers – A Future Challenge”, published by ACCORD in
1998.
7.
Information
about South Africa – http://www.ccpdc.org/pubs/house/3.html
8.
UNinServiceandPeace
– http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/dpko/home_bottom.html
9.
Map from http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/en/maps/unmdv49
10.
Information
about balkanism – http://abcnews.go.com/section/world/balkans_content/
11.
Fields,
Jason, Historical Perspective : Yugoslavia, a Legacy of Ethnic Hatred – http://wire.ap.org/Apnews/center_package.html?
12.
Report of
UN Secretary – General on Kosovo (to resolutions 1160 (1998) of the Security
Council).
13.
Pensilvania
Press 1998, “Human Rights of Refugees”.
14.
The
journal of Human rights, published by the Law institution of University of
Latvia in 1996.
15.
J. Bojars
“ International Conventions”, 1998.
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