L12: UN and Peacekeeping

UN Emergency Force

• In 1956, to facilitate the disengagement of British, French, and Israeli troops from Egypt following the Suez Crisis, a multilateral armed force dispatched to help keep the peace until a political settlement could be reached

  • Act as buffer → keep both sides from each other

• Egypt requests UNEF withdrawal in May 1967

  • Controversial: Egypt called to remove these troops → attacked later

History of UN

• Created in June 1945

• Original membership 51 states (now 193)

• Primary mandate, as espoused in UN Charter, is maintaining international peace and security

• Security Council pre-eminent organ responsible for maintaining international order

UN: security council

• 5 permanent members (P5) w/ veto rights

• Until 1965 six rotating members

• After 1965 ten rotating members

• For a resolution to pass, at least nine votes for and no P5 votes against

UN Charter: article 2(4)

"All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations"

UN Charter: article 2(4) problem

• Prohibition against the use of force does not cover all situations

• Sovereign states can use force within their territory

• Some theorists believe a state may be able to use force outside its territory, e.g. force used for humanitarian purposes or to protect citizens of the intervening state who are living abroad

• However, the UN Charter does not acknowledge these situations as exceptions to the prohibition against the use of force

UN Charter: article 51

"Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security."

Exceptions to article 51

• Self-defense must be necessary and proportionate to the aggression

• When a state faces an imminent attack, it may have a right to act in anticipatory self-defense

  • Article 51 and other provisions of the UN Charter do not address this situation

  • However, customary international law recognizes the right of anticipatory self-defense when an armed attack is imminent and inevitable

    • How can you be sure that they are going to attack??

       → what proof do you have?

       → other reasons to build up forces than getting ready to attack

Security Council powers

• Chapter VI (Pacific Settlement of Disputes)

  • Security Council authorized to call disputing parties to resolve their conflict through peaceful means such as fact-finding, good offices, negotiation, arbitration and judicial settlement

• Chapter VII (Action with Respect to Threats to the Peace, Breaches of the Peace, and Acts of Aggression)

  • Grants Council coercive authority - it can compel compliance with decisions binding on member states

  • It may impose diplomatic and economic sanctions and authorize military force

• Chapter VIII (Regional Arrangements)

  • Do chapter 7 but give it to someone else to deal with

  • Encourages regional organizations to engage in peaceful dispute settlement and requires Council's authorization before taking coercive action

  • Grants Council power to delegate enforcement to regional bodies

UN Charter: Article 42

The Security Council ….. "may take such action by air, sea, or land forces as may be necessary to maintain or restore international peace and security. Such action may include demonstrations, blockade, and other operations by air, sea, or land forces of Members of the United Nations"

What are peace operations?

• Range from small observation and monitoring missions to peacebuilding in conflict-afflicted societies

• Original role of peacekeepers was to serve as buffer forces and observers

• Usually small-scale under Chapter VI

• Some exceptions occur under Chapter VII: e.g. use of force authorized in Korean War, 20k strong peacekeeping force in Congo/Katanga

What was the first UN peacekeeping mission?

United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (Arab-Israeli war)

United Nations Truce Supervision Organization

• Created in 1948 to monitor the ceasefires after the first Arab-Israeli war

• Unarmed military observers

  • Still there today

• Still monitors ceasefire agreements in Lebanon, Golan Heights, Sinai

what was the first large scale UN authorized mission?

Korean War

 → purpose: repel N Korean forces after they had invaded S Korea

Still exists today

Peacekeeping Principles

1. UN-mandated missions

2. Consent of parties

3. Impartiality

4. Voluntary troops contributions

5. Minimum use of force

   • only self-defense

Cold War peacekeeping Examples

Includes:

• UN Emergency Force (Sinai)

• UN Observation Group in Lebanon

• UN Operation in the Congo

• UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus

• UN India-Pakistan Observation
  Mission

• UN Interim Force in Lebanon

Cold War peacekeeping

Fall of Soviet Union, they withdraw from different places, UN takes up this place

• UN invokes Chapter VII authorizing military force (US-led coalition) to remove Iraqi
  troops from Kuwait

• UNPROFOR in Bosnia is UN's largest peacekeeping mission

• New missions in Afghanistan, Cambodia, Angola, Namibia, El Salvador and Nicaragua

• then to Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda, Kosovo, Haiti, Democratic Republic of Congo, etc.

• Shift from peacekeeping to peace
  enforcement

• Second generation peacekeeping includes electoral assistance, human rights monitoring

Peacekeeping evolution

• 1992: peace-enforcement units called to established to deal with challenges that exceeded peacekeeping→ never created

  • Organizations like NATO called upon in these situations → provide protection for UN peacekeepers

• By 2010 ~10,000 uniformed personnel in the field

• Peacekeeping operations have more and more been undertaken by regional organizations (ex. African Union)

Peacemaking

• Measures to address conflicts in progress and usually involves diplomatic action to bring hostile parties to a negotiated settlement

• Involves negotiation, mediation, and democratic decision-making processes

• Uses mutual dialogue to achieve fair agreement about how to solve the immediate problem, thereby removing the parties' incentives to use violence

Peacekeeping

• Refers to the deployment of national or, more commonly, multinational forces for the purpose of helping to control and resolve an actual or potential armed conflict between or within states

• Peacekeeping forces are normally deployed with the consent of the parties to a conflict and in support of a ceasefire

• Usually unarmed or only lightly armed

• Does not right wrongs or address the conflicts causing the violence

Peace enforcement

• Refers to the use of military assets to enforce a peace against the will of the parties to a conflict when, for instance, a ceasefire has failed

• Peace enforcement often exceeds the capacity of peacekeeping forces and is thus better executed by more heavily armed forces

Peace building

• Measures targeted to reduce the risk of relapsing into conflict by strengthening national capacities for conflict management and to lay foundation for sustainable peace and development

• Transformation of social relations - repairing the systemic factors that were causing and exacerbating harmful conflict

What are other actions the UN can take other than force?

Economic sanctions and international criminal prosecution

Peacekeeping origins

• League of Nations brought in to resolve territorial dispute between Colombia and Peru, 1933-34

• The League appointed three member nations (Guatemala, Ireland and Spain) as a 'Commission for the Administration of the Territory of Leticia'

• Each side's military forces were withdrawn and an internationalized force of Colombian troops under the Commission's supervision policed the disputed area

Weakness of League of Nations

• Intended to prevent states from going to war, the final sanction was the threat of force

• Ultimate authority rested on the mobilization of world opinion

• Belief that the threat of economic sanctions, alone, would be sufficient to deter states from aggression

  • Sanctions worked during ww1, so thought was that they would in future cases as well

  • Article 16 reflected the experience of WWI when the blockade weapon had been used to good effect

LoN peacekeeping example: Abyssinia (Ethiopia)

• Following 1935 Italian invasion, limited sanctions were imposed

• Not applied by all member nations and did not include some key products such as oil

• The League made no attempt to limit Italy's ability to wage war, such as closing the Suez Canal to Italian shipping

• Sanctions were dropped following the Italian conquest of Abyssinia in 1936

• Leads to widespread belief that League of Nations unwilling or unable to use collective force to prevent conflicts

UN Peacekeeping and the Decline of war

There is no question that the UN played an important role in helping to shut down some deadly conflicts over the past six decades

BUT ...

• UN deals with consequences of war, not onset of war

• Hard for peacekeeping to explain the long-term downward trend in war given its relatively recent invention

• While peacekeeping has been shown to be effective at preventing the resumption of specifi vars. its effects on the overall level of war in the world are not straightforwar

• Consent of parties means peacekeeping "works" when it is not needed and "fails" when it is needed most

• Prospective availability of peacekeeping to maintain peace once achieved probably allows some wars to end that would otherwise last longer

Did the UN promote peace during the Cold War?

• UN did not have a significant effect on relations between the superpowers

• UN was virtually powerless when it tried to push a policy that one of the superpowers opposed

• It did serve as a convenient forum for seeking international legitimacy, third party mediation, and dealing with issues the superpowers were mainly indifferent to or had a common interest in resolving

The UN after the Cold War

Some successes but also many failures

• NATO did not initially have UN support in 1999 when it went to war with Serbia over Kosovo

• When the US could not get the UN's permission to invade Iraq in March 2003, it simply ignored the UN

  • But after Saddam Hussein overthrown, UN becomes involved in post-war reconstruction (UNSCR 1483)

• UN unable to check Russian aggression against Ukraine in 2014/2022

Right to Protect

• Calls for initiating wars against countries that commit serious crimes against their own civilian populations

• Goes well beyond peacekeeping and can only be implemented under UN
  auspices

• If the major powers get serious about this doctrine, there should surely be a significant increase in the number of wars fought in the future

• However, R2P is not likely to gain much traction, simply because it will be difficult to get the Security Council to sanction R2P operations, as occurred with Chinese and Russian opposition to intervention in Syria

Srebrenica

• Town designated a safe area by UN and protected by Dutch peacekeepers

• Dutch forces were under-supplied, under-equipped and superiors at the UN were unwilling to give it additional support

• July 1995, Dutch forces confronted by advancing Bosnia Serb army

• Massacre of 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys by Bosnian Serb forces

• Ethnic cleansing of 20k civilians

• Worst instance of mass murder since WWII

• In July 2014 a Dutch court found the Dutch government liable for deaths of more than 300 Bosnian Muslims

Rwanda

• UN Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) created in 1993 with mandate to oversee peace agreement ending civil war

• Following renewal of violence in April 1994, UN reduces its military presence

• With onset of genocide, UN Commander Dallaire requests reinforcements but is unsuccessful

• Uses limited forces to protect as many civilians as possible

• Reinforcements eventually arrive in June but only after 800,000 Tutsis murdered

Rise and fall of peacekeeping missions

• Until 2016 number of UN operations increases with 117k personnel deployed on 16

• operations

• Thereafter it begins to fall

  • Operations in Liberia, Haiti and Darfur end

  • Budget cuts

  • Security Council gridlock

• UN peacekeeping missions have steadily reduced in number and size

  • Only several remaining (Central African Republic, South Sudan/Abyei region, Western Sahara)

• June 2023: military junta in Mali request withdrawal of UN mission (MINUSMA)

  • Deployed in Mali since 2013

• Coincides with request to end French military mission and invitation to Wagner Group

• Democratic Republic of Congo terminates UN mission (MONUSCO)

  • UN troops deployed in Congo for two decades

UN peacekeeping today

11 missions

Top 10 contributions of troops and why

1. Bangladesh

2. Nepal

3. India

4. Rwanda

5. Ethiopia

6. Pakistan

7. Egypt

8. Indonesia

9. Ghana

10. China

One reason they do this is monetary —> get paid to contribute troops

Female peacekeeping

• Shift from all-male peacekeeping units to greater temale participation, including all-emale police units

• Focus on protecting vomen in post-conflict societies

• By 2020, 1/3 of peace operations personnel were women

Scandals

• Rape

• War crimes

 

Very rarely do the people get punished for the crimes they commit

African-led peacekeeping

Increasing shift from UN to African-led operations → African Union

Reflects decreased UN legitimacy and preference for regional peacekeepers

Since 2000, 38 African-led peace support operations

Ten active operations as of 2023

other organizations that lead peacekeeping missions

• NATO

• EUFOR (operation Althea)

• Russian

Who can be an honest broker if UN is involved in the conflict?

 → created the neutral nations supervisory commission in order to do this

Ukraine war: Elements of ceasefire deal

• Ceasefire agreement

• Agree on ceasefire line

• Creation of Joint Military Coordination Commission

• Agreement on a buffer zone and limitation zones for heavy weapons

• International monitoring and verification mission (to include European troops?)

• Humanitarian demining

• Humanitarian corridors

• Security guarantees

• Build on ceasefire to achieve political settlement

Ukraine war: preconditions for ceasefire

• For Ukraine - legally binding security assurances?

• Confidence-building measures/de-escalation

  • No attacks on port infrastructure

  • No attacks on civilian ships in the Black Sea

  • No attacks on other critical infrastructure, e.g. energy installations

  • No targeting of Ukrainian airports

Ceasefire line

• Line of Contact or basis for a demilitarized zone?

  • Demilitarized zone implies a long-term de facto division of the country

  • Line of Contact considered more of a transitional arrangement

• Buffer zone or zone of separation

  • Approximate 10-15 km wide would be absent of military forces, heavy and light weapons, as well as being a no-fly zone for UAVs - except those of international monitors

  • Wider buffer zone

    • 50km for artillery of 100mm calibre or more

    • 75km for multiple rocket launchers

    • 150km for certain missile systems

    • Must be verifiable

    • Separate agreement needed for maritime security

Ukraine war: International monitoring and verification

• Requires a clear mandate and assumption of a ceasefire

• Length of ceasefire line probably 1200 km (5x length of Korean DMZ) - need to patrol 24/7

• Probably an international mission rather than a UN one

• Core tasks include monitor ceasefire and to verify withdrawal of troops and heavy weapons

• Large force interposing itself between Russian/Ukrainian forces unlikely (50k troops)

• Lighter force located on both sides of ceasefire line limited to monitoring and verification (15k troops)

• International force equipped with armored vehicles, helicopters, light aircraft, UAVs

• Led by Force Commander reporting to UN Security Council

• Composition of force agreed to by both sides?

  • UN Force - blue berets?

  • Will Russia accept troops from NATO countries, incl. NATO minus America?

  • Which countries are willing/able to send troops and viewed as impartial?

    • Global South?

• If only civilian force, will either side have confidence in it?

• Indefinite commitment

Ukraine war: military component

• Monitor implementation of ceasefire/report violations

• Verify withdrawal of heavy weapons

• Support de-mining

• Enable humanitarian corridors

Ukraine war: civilian component

• Monitor/report on human rights violations

• Provide humanitarian assistance with a focus on marginalized and vulnerable groups including the elderly, women, your and children

• Provide medical/psychological assistance to population (e.g. helping with
  PTSD)

Ukraine war: security guarantee

• Ukraine will want guarantees it will receive military (direct/indirect) and other support if Russia resumes aggression

  • What type of deterrent will be sufficient?

  • European troops stationed in Ukraine (tripwire force)

  • European troops stationed near Ukraine ready to intervene quickly?

  • European patrolled No Fly Zone?

  • More weapons - higher quality

  • New/renewed sanctions on Russia for ceasefire violations?

• What will Russia demand?

  • No NATO troops in Ukraine?