PEACE-KEEPING and PEACE-MAKING 9 Peace-Keeping
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Please see the Cover and Contents in the last pages of this e-Book Online Study Materials on PEACE-KEEPING AND PEACE-MAKING 9 Peace-keeping The term “peace-keeping operation” does not occur in the United Nations Charter. It came into general usage only in the 1960s, to describe a concept and practice that had evolved out of necessity. This happened because, soon after the creation of the United Nations in 1945, it was clear that some of the means provided in the Charter to maintain international peace could not be applied because of the cold-war confrontation among the permanent members of the Security Council. Thus, instead of the strongest countries using their joint military might to enforce world peace, as the Charter envisaged, the United Nations began to field military observer missions and, later, lightly armed forces drawn normally from medium and small powers. Though the League of Nations used a similar technique (sending a 3,300-member multilateral force to be present during the 1935 plebiscite to decide the fate of the Saar Valley), peace-keeping operations are a genuine innovation of the United Nations. Sent with the agreement of the parties in conflict, the United Nations personnel aim not to enforce peace but to contain explosive situations and give peace a chance. They are essentially a holding action, designed to halt or control a conflict while concerted efforts are made to bring the warring parties to the negotiating table or otherwise provide the time and create the climate necessary to bring about a peaceful settlement. The definition of a peace-keeping operation as used in the Secretary-General’s reports is that of an operation involving military personnel, but without enforcement powers, established by the United Nations to help maintain or restore peace in areas of conflict. Such operations fall broadly into two main categories: observer missions and peace-keeping forces. In either form they operate under 370 the same basic principles. They are established by the Security Council and, exceptionally, by the General Assembly, and they are directed by the Secretary-General. They must have the consent of the host Governments and, normally, also that of other parties directly involved. The military personnel required are provided by Member States on a voluntary basis. The military observers are not armed and, while the soldiers of United Nations peace-keeping forces are provided with light weapons, they are not authorised to use force except in self-defence. The operations must not interfere in the internal affairs of the host country and must not be used in any way to favour one party against another in conflicts affecting Member States. Another requirement of peace-keeping is a broad political consensus among the membership for its mandate and continued functioning. Also fundamental is the need for the continuing support not only of the countries or parties principally concerned in the conflict but also of the States contributing troops. Besides support, there must be co-operation. Since the peace- keepers have no capacity for enforcement and their use of force is limited to self-defence— as a last resort—any determined party could effectively defy a peace-keeping force. Peace-keeping operations have usually been employed in regional conflicts. They fulfil the role of an impartial and objective third party to help create and maintain a ceasefire and form a buffer zone between opposing forces. They have become an important instrument of the United Nations, particularly the Security Council, in preventing local or regional conflicts from escalating. Ground rules and other arrangements for the organisation and conduct of a peace-keeping operation have not so far been formally established. The typical United Nations peace-keeping operation has had to improvise from the outset. There have been 13 peace-keeping operations (the international force in Korea was an enforcement action and was not under United Nations control). Over the last four decades, 664 men have given their lives in keeping the peace for the United Nations. The first peace-keeping operation established by the United Nations was an observer mission, the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO), set up in Palestine in June 1948. Later, other observer missions were set up: the United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) in 1949, the United Nations Peace-keeping 371 Observation Group in Lebanon (UNOGIL) in 1958, the United Nations Yemen Observation Mission (UNYOM) in 1963, the United Nations India-Pakistan Observation Mission (UNIPOM) in 1965, and the Mission of the Representative of the Secretary-General in the Dominican Republic (DOMREP), also in 1965. Of these, UNTSO and UNMOGIP are still in operation. There have been in all, seven peace-keeping forces. The first was the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF I), which was in operation in the Egypt-Israel sector from November 1956 until June 1967. The United Nations Force in the Congo was deployed in the Republic of the Congo (now Zaire) from July 1960 until June 1964. The United Nations Security Force in West Irian (UNSF) was in operation from October 1962 until May 1963. The second United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF II) functioned from October 1973 until July 1979. The other three forces, which are still in operation, are the United Nations Peace-keeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP), established in March 1964; the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF), established in the Syrian Golan Heights in June 1974; and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), established in March, 1978. Truce Supervision Organisation The first United Nations peace-keeping operation was the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO), set up in 1948 to supervise the truce called for by the Security Council in Palestine during the first Arab-Israeli war. UNTSO played a pioneering role in the Middle East, the functions of its observers changing as the situation changed in the areas they covered. UNTSO personnel have also been available at short notice to form the nucleus of other peace-keeping operations and have remained to assist those operations. While UNTSO was initially used in supervising the original truce of 1948, its function was radically altered in 1949 with the conclusion of four General Armistice Agreements between Israel and the four neighbouring Arab countries. Its main responsibility then was to assist the parties in supervising the application and observance of those Agreements. Its headquarters was established at Government House in Jerusalem, where it remains today. While Israel has denounced the General Armistice Agreements, following the 1956 and 1967 wars, this unilateral action has not been recognised by the United Nations and the machinery of supervision has been retained, although it is not being used at present. 372 In the wars of 1956, 1967, 1973 and 1982, UNTSO observers remained on the ceasefire lines, often under fire, performing an invaluable service as go-betweens and often preventing isolated incidents from escalating into larger conflicts. Following the 1967 war, UNTSO established two ceasefire observation operations, in the Israel- Syria sector and in the Suez Canal zone. In 1972 a similar operation was set up in southern Lebanon. When peacekeeping forces were later deployed, in the Sinai in 1973, on the Golan Heights in 1974 and in southern Lebanon in 1978, UNTSO observers were attached to the new forces to assist them. Today, UNTSO observers continue to be assigned to the last two of these forces which are still in operation. In addition, a group of UNTSO observers has remained in the Sinai to maintain a United Nations presence. There is also a group of observers in Beirut. UNTSO has also made available observers to other United Nations operations not connected with the Arab-Israeli conflict. In June 1984, the Governments of Iran and Iraq, in response to an appeal by the Secretary-General, undertook to refrain from initiating military attacks on purely civilian population centres in either country. The Secretary- General, with the agreement of the two countries, set up two observer teams, based in Teheran and Baghdad, each composed of three military observers and a civilian political adviser, to verify compliance. (See also the section on Iran and Iraq in chapter eleven). UNTSO reached its maximum strength of 572 observers in 1948. In 1985 it had an authorised strength of 298 observers, provided by Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the Soviet Union and the United States. Observer Missions in India and Pakistan Less than a year after UNTSO was established, a new group of military observers was formed to supervise the cessation of hostilities in Jammu and Kashmir. Under the scheme of partition provided by the Indian Independence Act of 1947, the State of Jammu and Kashmir was free to accede to India or Pakistan. The accession became a matter of dispute between the two countries, and fighting broke out later that year. The question first came before the Security Council in January 1948, when India complained that tribesmen and others were invading Kashmir and that extensive fighting was taking place. India charged that Pakistan was assisting and participating in the invasion. Pakistan Peace-keeping 373 denied India’s charges and declared that Kashmir’s accession to India following India’s independence in 1947 was illegal. In January 1949, a ceasefire came into effect, and the military observers, who were subsequently organised as the United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP), were deployed to assist in its observance. In July 1949, India and Pakistan concluded the Karachi Agreement, which was negotiated under United Nations auspices. The agreement established a ceasefire line and prohibited strengthening of defences or increase of forces in certain areas.