Peace Problems at the UN
SAMUELS, GERTRUDE
AFTER THE COLD WAR Peace Problems at the UN BY GERTRUDE SAMUELS United Nations AS THE THREE-MONTH opening session of the 48th General Assembly approaches its December 21 closing date, the main...
...The first was Samuel R. Insanally, 57-year-old career diplomat and Ambassador from Guyana, who is the Assembly's one-year rotating President...
...People in the UN and in the United States are saying, 'We have no national interest in these conflicts...
...No one respects the decisions of the Council because of the posture of the United States and the others...
...This organization was conceived in a totally different era—for a community that consisted of victors and vanquished...
...But neither should we accept it as permanent...
...We went from an organization that 'gives good meaning,' to use Woody Allen's phrase, to one that has to conduct complex field operations...
...As it is at present...
...Frederic Eckhard, the 50-year-old associate spokesman of Secretary General Bou-tros Boutros-Ghali, who served as UN spokesman at the Geneva peace talks and in Sarajevo, discussed the way this has affected the World Organization: "The change was so rapid and the expansion so great that the UN was taxed to the limit...
...I talked about the problem with three UN veterans...
...calls for military action to maintain or restore international peace and security...
...Speaking November 8 at the opening of a seminar on ethnic conflict at the National Defense University in Washington, he said: "If peaceful efforts fail, the concept of collective security...
...But we have to work from that reality," he concluded...
...My second interview was with Ambassador Jose Luis Jesus of Cape Verde, the Security Council President for November, who will soon complete his two-year term as one of 10 nonpermanent members of the 15-member body...
...What kind of machinery...
...But without a real force of its own to back up Security Council resolutions, its efforts are constantly being undermined...
...But, yes, you have to listen—you must have the Assembly behind you...
...In the past, we have taken steps to implement the Council decisions...
...In former Yugoslavia, our frustration has been the greatest because, despite a huge commitment of troops and money, we have not achieved our political objectives, and have only partially met our humanitarian ones...
...After one shell landed on a small market in an apartment complex, I watched the bodies being carried away in the trunks of civilian vehicles, with arms and legs dangling at the back...
...We should not send our troops.' They forget that no nation is secure, no nation is at peace, unless there is peace in the world...
...Almost overnight, we shifted from talk to action...
...So, first of all, we have to look at the Security Council in terms of expansion, of making it more democratic—more capable of guaranteeing peace and security...
...In his modest mission, hung with pictures of his island country off the coast of West Africa, he strongly urged that, in the first instance, diplomacy and negotiation are the way to achieve compliance with Council resolutions: "If you're going to use force, there will be a battle...
...That is a very touchy question...
...It cannot play any role in peace and security...
...The criteria will take into account broader representation, including developing countries...
...For example, it could provide guidance not only to the Security Council but also to the Economic and Social Council, or the International Court of Justice...
...They're just threats, empty threats...
...Otherwise, you are not likely to succeed...
...In separate interviews...
...What are you recommending...
...I would look out of my window and see a shell slam into a house on a nearby hillside," he said quietly, "and wonder if it hit a bedroom or a child or a family having an evening meal...
...If its decisions can be ignored because there is no one willing to back them up," he answered bitterly, "the Security Council is nothing, absolutely nothing...
...Indeed, my concern about the future is that the world remains unruly...
...It wasn't just the volume that changed, but the nature of the job...
...The thing is, that's a new frontier for the United Nations...
...We don't live in a perfect world...
...The UN went in there on a humanitarian mission...
...He spread a large map of Sarajevo over his cluttered desk and pointed to an area near the center of town where the UN headquarters are located...
...listening to 184 opinions is not easy...
...A gracious and forthright man...
...The almost simultaneous launching of huge missions in Yugoslavia, Cambodia and Somalia were impossible to staff with the existing personnel, so we had to innovate by borrowing civilians from foreign ministries and relying on peacekeeping troops to do civilian jobs...
...Is it because the member nations are not willing to supply enough troops...
...Are we to go back to the failure of the League of Nations...
...I'm recommending," he said, "that the member nations, especially the powerful ones, review their policies as to their commitment to maintain peace and security in accordance with the Charter...
...When you deal with internal conflicts, like civil war, peacekeeping is not only more difficult, it is more dangerous...
...Apart from the emotion, I felt frustration that we, the UN, were powerless to stop the fighting...
...the Assembly President replied...
...Gertrude Samuels reports regularly on the United Nations for this magazine...
...The other distinctive thing about the nature of our operations today is that they are taking place inside natural borders...
...Peacekeeping machinery that would facilitate compliance with the Council and Assembly...
...Somalia, Haiti...
...It should have a much greater role to play than it has at the moment...
...AFTER THE COLD WAR Peace Problems at the UN BY GERTRUDE SAMUELS United Nations AS THE THREE-MONTH opening session of the 48th General Assembly approaches its December 21 closing date, the main unresolved question facing the World Organization's 184 member states is how to improve peace enforcement...
...It's a question of how we can achieve consensus...
...We met at his office on the second floor of the Secretariat Building...
...We must not be deterred by failure...
...My own view is that the UN has to rapidly try to develop machinery that would respond to their feelings...
...But when such actions are taken, member states must be aware of the dangers involved, and they should be prepared to stand up to the consequences and to stay the course...
...Since the end of the Cold War, the UN has certainly been thrust into the center of international politics...
...That's what it was intended to do...
...The Secretary General himself does not appear to have any doubts about its value...
...It's going to be a very delicate process and the sooner we start, the better...
...Take the whole hesitancy in dealing with the violations by the Serbs in former Yugoslavia: Time and again, the world has seen an ineffective Security Council unable to enforce its own decisions...
...I would have thought that the moral authority alone of the UN would sway all members to heed it...
...It is a fact," he observed, "that the Security Council has been freed up to do what it was supposed to do...
...We are setting up a working group during this Assembly on the restructuring of the Security Council...
...he responded at length when I raised the issue of strengthening peace procedures: "One focus for me as chief of this Assembly is the restructuring of the United Nations...
...Didn't peacekeeping lead to war in Somalia...
...I don't think we can expect it to function adequately, to meet current needs...
...And there can be no peace in the world if the Council cannot implement its decisions...
...Haiti, Iraq, and Kuwait...
...One cannot expect the impossible: When you leave a very rigid nationalism to experiment with internationalism, you are bound to have some fallout effects...
...Another area of concern to me is giving the Assembly the kind of life that is expected of it in the Charter...
...Of what value, then, is the Security Council...
...Unfortunately, you have countries that are not willing to do that...
...At the same time, the 43-year-old diplomat bluntly declared: "No decision of the Security Council is respected unless there is a force to back it up...
...The United Nations currently has 18 so-called peace operations (observer missions, protection units, peacekeeping forces) in such places as Cyprus, Angola, El Salvador, former Yugoslavia, Somalia...
...Today, the operational tasks have multiplied to include not only peacekeeping but also organizing elections, monitoring human rights, resettling displaced populations, manning transitional governments, even assisting in the writing of constitutions—in Namibia and Cambodia, for instance...
...At this General Assembly, I see a soul-searching assessment of the value of peace enforcement...
...The enforcement capability of the Council has to be enhanced...
...Well, the degree of acceptance is conditioned by the individual positions of member states...
...But now you see a trend in the UN, especially among powerful members of the Security Council, not to engage their own forces, their natural resources, their human resources, to make sure that the decisions are going to be implemented...
...Why are the Security Council's resolutions being ignored in places like Bosnia...
Vol. 76 • November 1993 • No. 13
