Member states of the United Nations often employ peacekeeping missions as a default for actually implementing the right policies or lacking the will to do the right thing, said Abiodun Williams, Director of Strategic Planning in the Executive Office of the United Nations.
Williams, a former Georgetown professor, addressed approximately 100 students in the ICC auditorium on Tuesday. He discussed the past successes and failures of U.N. peacekeeping missions over the course of its history. He cited the U.N. Brahimi report, a critical analysis of U.N. peacekeeping missions, as providing key lessons that must be learned for U.N. missions to be successful in the future.
The Brahimi report, Williams said, was commissioned by the U.N. Secretary-General after the disastrous failures of U.N. missions in places such as Rwanda in 1994 and Szrebernitza in 1995. The United Nations’ failure at Szrebernitza, he said, was a low point for U.N. credibility. At that moment, Williams said, the U.N. was seen as incapable of peacekeeping force. According to Williams, the U.N. failure there can be attributed to the lack of both a clear mandate and realistic objectives.
Furthermore, he said, members of the international community made promises that they failed to keep. This, he said, is “immoral” and there must be an “end to half-measures.”
Williams also said that the blurred lines between peacekeeping and peace-enforcing, along with the difficulty of maintaining impartiality and neutrality in war-torn areas, hinder the success of U.N. peacekeeping missions.
Nevertheless, Williams said, U.N. peacekeeping “is again in fashion.”
Williams cited the current efforts of the United Nations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Eritrea as examples of effective U.N. missions. Williams said that no other organization, including regional entities such as NATO, can substitute for the United Nations.
The reason for this resurgence, he said, is that the United Nations has “unmatched legal and moral authority” within the international community because it is the primary body into which new states seek membership in order to gain legitimacy, as well as the political force of the Secretary-General.
Presently, the duties of the United Nations have been expanded to monitoring election, demobilizing armed forces, humanitarian aid, monitoring safe ares, escorting refugees, training local police and aiding transitioning governments, he said.
Williams also said that there is a shift occurring in U.N. nations regarding the supply of troops from member countries. Traditionally, he said, troops would come from Nordic countries, particularly Canada. But now, he said, there is a reluctance among these countries to send troops and the new supply, approximately 75 percent, come from developing nations.
These new troops, he said, often lack equipment and training. Williams said that this problem could be mitigated if there was a standing U.N. army as prescribed in the charter. But currently, he said, no country is committed to that goal.
