Nottingham connected
Arts & Culture
23
We can honour UN peacekeepers by preventing conflicts
More time and money should be spent on averting crises rather than responding
to them. - BY Annette Leijenaar & Gustavo De Carvalho
29 May is International Day of United Nations
(UN) Peacekeepers. It honours the memory of UN
peacekeepers who have lost their lives and pays
tribute to all peacekeepers who have served UN
peacekeeping operations. Since 1948, the year the first
UN peacekeeping mission was established in the Middle
East, more than 3 500 peacekeepers have died in service.
The UN describes peacekeeping as a global investment
that provides a flexible and expanding instrument to
help countries transitioning from conflict to peace. In
2016, its budget was over $7.9 billion – a steady increase
from the $3.8 billion budget in 2005, but still a fraction
of global military spending. In April 2017, the UN had
deployed 112 911 personnel (military, police and
civilians) from 124 different countries on 16 missions.
Peacekeeping is a cost-effective international tool to
address conflicts. However, conflict prevention is the core
purpose of the UN. This means the UN must consider how
peacekeeping, in conjunction with other available tools,
can (or even should) best prevent conflicts.
Conflict prevention should be the UN’s top priority, says
Secretary-General António Guterres
Traditional peacekeeping could be
considered a conflict-prevention tool, as it
was designed to de-escalate conflicts or
oversee the implementation of ceasefires
to prevent the relapse of countries
emerging from conflict.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres
says responses to conflicts should
consider the entire peace
continuum, from prevention
through conflict resolution
and peacekeeping to
peacebuilding and
development, avoiding
‘one-size-fits-all’ peace
operations.
Part of the challenge
of bringing prevention to
the forefront of UN initiatives is
the fact that peacekeeping is a
costly initiative and highly reactive
by nature. And, while conflict
prevention has been rhetorically
sound, it still requires further practical understanding.
In response to these needs, several initiatives have been
undertaken by the UN to enhance conflict prevention. A
number of reviews of its key tools on peace and security
were conducted, including the reports from the High-
Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (HIPPO),
the UN peacebuilding review and the global study on
women, peace and security.
The imbalance between support for peacekeeping vs
conflict prevention is expected to grow
The HIPPO report, in particular, brought back the idea
of primacy of politics within peacekeeping responses,
saying peace operations must be better aligned with
the UN’s key objective of preventing conflicts, mediating
peace, protecting civilians and sustaining peace.
Compared to mediation and peacekeeping, where
decades of international experience have delivered
lessons and principles, the prevention of armed conflicts
is approached in an ad hoc manner with many disparate
perspectives – diplomatic, political, developmental and
economic, among others.
Peacekeepers can provide many lessons
and tools to ensure prevention is
more effective. In particular, the UN’s
Joint Mission Analysis Centre can
provide early warning to inform
decisions taken by senior mission
leaders. And the role of the UN
Department of Safety and Security
in providing analyses of security
situations on mission, country,
regional and global levels should
as a matter of routine be shared
timeously with those responsible for
conflict prevention.
Peacekeeping will remain a
cost-effective tool to deal
with conflicts. But a more
balanced approach which
uses other available tools
would honour not only the
important work done by
peacekeepers, but all efforts
to prevent conflicts and
sustain peace.