Annan Creates Panel to
Overhaul Peacekeeping Tasks
UNITED NATIONS - Secretary-General Kofi Annan Tuesday created a blue-ribbon panel
to study an overhaul of U.N. peacekeeping operations in light of U.N. disasters in Rwanda
and the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica.
Annan said the group, led by former Algerian foreign minister Lakhar Brahimi, is
expected to complete its work in time for September's ``Millennium Assembly,'' a summit of
government leaders from around the world.
``It is a question of being clearer about what we are trying to do, what kind of forces
we need to do it, what are the conditions in which different kinds of missions are
appropriate, and what do you do when circumstances change.'' Annan told a news conference.
``What do you do, for instance, if the peace you are trying to keep breaks down and
large numbers of civilians are in danger of being massacred?'' he asked.
Annan said the eight-member panel was created to follow up on reports last year
analyzing the disastrous reaction of the United Nations during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda
and the massacres in Srebrenica a year later.
Annan headed U.N. peacekeeping operations during that period, from 1993 to 1997.
``We must not promise too much, or raise expectations higher than are justified by the
will of governments to act. But we must do whatever we can to raise the standards of
international behavior and responsibility,'' Annan said.
With an apparently underfunded and understaffed operation being deployed for the
many-sided war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Annan said mandates have to be
clear and achievable and matched with resources.
But he said small numbers of troops were sometimes dispatched by the international
community ``to create the impression something is going to be done.''
Brahimi, who has represented the United Nations in several operations around the world,
from Haiti to Afghanistan, acknowledged that whatever the United Nations decided the
15-member Security Council, with its five veto-bearing nations, had the final say on any
peacekeeping venture.
Britain and France have been blamed for being too cautious in Bosnia while the United
States was faulted for preventing early deployment of troops in Rwanda.
But Brahimi said basic principles were worth repeating, even if ``we are not going to
invent the moon.'' Governments, he said, often begin projects with much enthusiasm and
then ``other things happen in the world and they leave the U.N. hanging.''
Peacekeeping studies have been done frequently at the United Nations, most notably by
Annan's predecessor, Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who wrote two of them in
1992 and in 1995, called ``Agenda for Peace.''
His 1992 analysis outlined duties of peacekeepers in various situations: traditional
monitoring of cease-fire lines as in Cyprus; more complicated missions that involved human
rights and elections such as in Cambodia and El Salvador; and situations where force might
have to be used.
After abortive operations in Bosnia and Somalia,
he reassessed his study in 1995, saying enforcement action was beyond the capacity of the
United Nations except on a limited scale. But he proposed a rapid reaction force available
for instant deployment, a suggestion immediately scoffed at by the United States.
Since then, some U.N. members have earmarked troops for peacekeeping operations but it
still takes the world body five months to organize a mission and recruit soldiers. Any
study is expected to recommend this process be accelerated.
In addition to Brahimi, panel members include: Brian Atwood, the former head of U.S.
Agency for International Development; Cornelius Sommaruga, retired president of the
International Committee of the Red Cross; Gen. Klaus Naumann, former chief of the German
defense staff; Hisako Shimura, president of Tsuda College in Japan who has been involved
in peacekeeping issues; Zimbabwean Gen. Philip Sibanda, U.N. force commander in Angola;
Dame Ann Hercus of New Zealand, the former special U.N. envoy in Cyprus; and Briton
Richard Bonk, who organized the civilian U.N. police in Bosnia.
William Durch of the Washington-based Stimson Center, a think-tank, will head a
research team.