The senior UN peacekeeping officer defended the agency’s global missions amid mounting fears that they had retreated in response to demands from African countries for their departure from Mali to the Congo.
Despite having 70,000 officers globally, the force has a far smaller budget ($5.5 billion) than the New York City Police Department, according to Under Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix on Wednesday. At a U.N. peacekeeping ministerial meeting in Accra, Ghana, he informed delegates that member state divisions have impeded efforts.
Most of the United Nations’ peacekeeping operations are located in Africa, specifically in the Western Sahara, Sudan, and the Central African Republic. They have, however, come under increased criticism and scrutiny for their capacity to complete their tasks successfully. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for example, locals have protested that peacekeepers haven’t done enough to keep people safe from armed groups.
The operations have gradually withdrew from Africa; to continue, they need permission from the U.N. Security Council. Mali’s leaders asked for the UN to remove its peacekeeping troops in June. Congolese leaders presented the Security Council with a similar request in September.
The mission had failed to stop fighting, Congolese President Felix-Antoine Tshisekedi stated at the time. However, on Wednesday, Lacroix defended the force, telling reporters that the U.N. had received feedback from the locals indicating they wanted the peacekeepers to do more.
Lacroix stated of Congo, “peacekeeping can only function if the U.N. has the sovereign support.”
As sharp disagreements over the battles in Gaza and Ukraine surface among UN members, a two-day ministerial meeting is underway in Accra. Organisations such as the United Nations Security Council, whose job it is to uphold global peace and security, have had difficulty coming to an agreement over Israel’s most recent war with Hamas militants, which started in October after the group made a devastating incursion into southern Israel.
While Lacroix bemoaned the fact that the budget for peacekeeping accounted for only 0.3% of the total military budget worldwide, he also pointed out that peacekeepers save lives at a comparatively low cost, making peacekeeping a smart investment.
He claimed that terrorists, armed groups, and criminal networks with access to deadly weapons confront peacekeepers in their operations. He claimed that in addition to dealing with improvised explosive devices, peacekeepers are increasingly facing dangers from “the weaponization of digital tools,” such as hate speech and misinformation that frequently incites violence against them and the people they are entrusted with defending.
“We are making every effort to increase the influence and efficacy of these operations, even in the face of obstacles. We will keep working to promote political solutions and long-term peace, particularly by encouraging locally driven conflict resolution and mediating political settlements,” Lacroix stated.
Lacroix stated that peacekeepers were providing logistical support for this month’s elections at the request of authorities, particularly in North and South Kivu and Ituri provinces, even though Congolese leaders had asked the U.N. to start evacuating. Peacekeepers have been stationed in the mineral-rich but impoverished east of the Congo since 1999, where rebel groups such as M23 have long been at odds with the government.
Mahamadu Bawumia, the vice president of Ghana, stated that rather than abandoning peacekeeping efforts, UN members should seek to make them better. He also pointed out that there are increasing hazards facing peacekeepers, endangering their capacity to fulfil their missions and maintain stability in the areas they serve.
