Global Policy Forum

By Deaglan de Breadun

The continuing value of the Irish contribution to United Nations peace missions is a matter of importance to the head of UN peacekeeping operations, Under-Secretary-General Jean-Marie Guehenno. The former French diplomat has responsibility for 60,000 people on 15 missions around the world and, although Irish participation forms a relatively small percentage, he points out that experience counts as well as numbers.

Sitting in his office on the 37th floor of UN headquarters in New York, he explains. 'Ireland has been in peacekeeping for many years and has developed an expertise that is quite remarkable. I like to say, to be a good peacekeeper you have to be a good soldier - plus!' In other words, you need all the training of the professional soldier but, in addition, the political acumen required to deal with a very sensitive situation.

'You are in situations where you show force so as not to use it - peacekeeping is not about waging war.'

He has come to value the level of Irish political acumen. The perception of Ireland as independent of various power blocs is a further positive element. 'In peacekeeping, it is very important that the UN force not be perceived as being aligned with any particular political agenda . The UN force is there to support the UN Charter, to support the will of the international community, not to be aligned with one alliance or the other.

'A country like Ireland in that respect sends a very good message and is very much accepted by the various parties because they don't feel that, behind Ireland, this or that power is going to try to push its own agenda. In that sense also, the image that is projected by your country fits very well with the goals of peacekeeping.'

The fact that Ireland, a prosperous European country, remains committed to peacekeeping sends 'a very good message' about the universal nature of the UN. 'We have seen in recent years a tendency of developed countries to be less present in peacekeeping. The majority of peacekeepers now come from the developing world. I don't think that's a healthy situation. The burden has to be shared between rich and less-rich countries, between the various regions of the world.'

Wide-ranging reforms in UN peacekeeping were proposed in the Brahimi report two years ago. There has been relatively little publicity about the implementation of that document, but Mr Guehenno says it is a case of 'good news is no news' and that the report gave considerable momentum to the process of streamlining and upgrading the peacekeeping side of the UN.

He is reluctant to be drawn on the recent proposal by the UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, to send a multinational force to the Middle East.

'There is a need, considering what has happened, to go beyond just observers and that's what the Secretary-General has said very strongly.'

Such a force would not come under the aegis of Mr Guehenno. 'The key difference is that a 'coalition of the willing', a multinational force, is financed directly by the participating countries and the chain of command is not the UN. There is a lead nation that brings together the force - it may be authorised by a mandate of the Security Council - but it is not under the UN chain of command.'

He sees this approach as very useful in particular circumstances.

'The key is that peacekeepers are there to keep a peace, that is peacekeepers are deployed on the basis of a peace agreement for which the parties think that the intervention, the presence of a third party will provide a measure of reassurance that will facilitate the implementation of the agreement. If the agreement is not yet there, to insert peacekeepers is a dangerous thing and that's where there is a difference really between peacekeeping and enforcing.'

He continues: 'If there is one lesson that we have to remember from what went tragically wrong in some operations of the 90s, it is precisely when you try to mix two different types of operation, a peacekeeping operation and a peace-enforcement, or a war, operation. Remember what happened in Somalia, where there were basically conflicting goals which led to a very disastrous situation. We feel that the key to success is clarity.' The European Rapid Reaction Force has been a controversial issue in Ireland. Mr Guehenno has nothing to say about that debate but, as head of UN peacekeeping, he does have his own perspective on the RRF.

'I welcome the efforts of the Europeans to develop military capabilities in a co-ordinated fashion, provided that will eventually mean a stronger and more effective contribution to UN peacekeeping efforts.'

It was none of his business to take a position on military arrangements between European countries. 'What the UN will watch carefully is how these efforts will translate into a greater, more effective contribution of EU countries to UN peacekeeping, that's really what we care about as far as the UN is concerned.'

The reputation of UN peacekeepers suffered during the 1990s because they failed to prevent large-scale massacres in places such as Srebrenica and Rwanda.

The UN mission to the Congo is seen by Mr Guehenno as a major test for the peacekeepers of the current decade. Behind his desk there is a map of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, riven by internal strife and plagued by foreign intervention.

He believes some progress has been made, but he wants to see more.

'If we manage to turn the corner in the DRC and to make progress, I think it will send a very strong signal for the whole continent, so the stakes are very high.'

Mr Guehenno finds time to ponder such issues as the future of democracy. His 1993 book, The End of the Nation-State, generated debate with its thesis that the very idea of national sovereignty was being eroded, from the top by globalisation and from below by the growth of regional government.

But properly functioning states are still vital for the preservation of peace: Afghanistan showed what can happen when states begin to crumble. Pointing out that 'a lot of conflicts come from weak state structures', he says he values the role of nation-states as the custodians of world peace.

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