0 about the author

 
 

---

103 
CHAPTER TWENTY 
PEACEKEEPING CHALLENGES AND NEW DEVELOPMENT 
It's an established fact that the concept and practice of peacekeeping have undergone 
tremendous changes from what it used to be since its inception and will continue to develop mainly 
because of the recent critiques, comments and debates on its mode of operations. 
According to Obadiah (2013), Peacekeeping intervention, ideally, is preceded by a 
ceasefire agreement, since there can be no peacekeeping in the middle of an offensive war. But 
what happens where such agreement proves difficult-or impossible- and global peace and security 
are threatened? 
Most peacekeeping operations set up before the 1990s generally operated in permissive 
environments where they had the consent and support of host governments for their presence but 
today's new dimensions to conflict has reduced the pride of place which consent hitherto occupied. 
In the same vein, during the 1990s, missions were deployed in the context of internal wars or in 
the shadow of complex emergencies and during these situations, the UN is all too often forced to 
work under conditions of lawlessness and violence, where militias and paramilitary groups act 
autonomously.. These challenges posed by intra-state wars and the impact of violent civil conflicts 
have severally' called into question most of the perceived assumptions about peacekeeping and its 
processes. The post Cold War conflicts have put UN's capabilities to test, as UN's failures in 
Somalia, Rwanda and Bosnia have generated a lot of discourse. 
Two important events that further questioned the capabilities of the UN peacekeeping 
experience include the Rwanda genocide of 1994, where more than 800,000 people were killed. It 
was described as "one of the most abhorrent events of the twentieth century". A year later, in one 
of the worst war crimes since the end of the Second World War, the Bosnian town of Sebrenica 
was besieged by Serb militias. During this siege, about 8,000 Muslims were killed under the 
watchful eyes of the UN peacekeeping contingent deployed there. 
The difficult experiences of the mid-1990's in countries such as Bosnia-Herzegovina and 
Rwanda prompted the UN to reassess its approach to peacekeeping. In March 2000, a Panel on 
United Nations Peace Operations issued a report that has come to be known as the "Brahimi 
Report" (A/55/305-S/2000/809),
 
named after the Panel's chairperson, Under-Secretary-General 

---

104 
Lakhdar Brahimi. The report offered an in-depth critique of the conduct of UN peace operations 
and made specific recommendations for change. The report also underlined consent by the warring 
parties, a clear and specific mandate and adequate resources as minimum requirements for a 
successful UN mission. Consequently, the UN and Member States initiated a number of reforms 
aimed at improving UN peacekeeping, such as the establishment of a pre-mandate financing 
mechanism to ensure that adequate resources are available for new mission start-ups. 
Investigations were conducted and reports concluded that faced with the growing efforts 
to murder, expel or terrorize the entire population, the neutral, impartial and mediating role of the 
UN was proving to be grossly inadequate. Also, there was a call for the UN to undergo a process 
of reflection in order to better clarify and improve on its capacity to respond to the various forms 
of conflict. More so, the politics of consultations and negotiations that usually precede 
peacekeeping preparation /operations and its attendant bottleneck, can best be blamed for most 
UN failures (Galadima, 2013). 
In essence, it seems reasonable for us to argue that, the major challenge for peacekeeping 
in the twenty first century remains in the development of a concept that will clarify the specific 
ways in which new peacekeeping efforts should properly function. This must include specific 
suggestions and recommendations for the incorporation of the concepts into practice. 
As a follow up to the above; Hudson (2005:118) submitted that, 'For any peacekeeping 
operation to be successful, capacity-at institutional and troop level-and political will are needed, 
and both of these prerequisites are largely absent on the African continent.' More so, many African 
nations have considerable experience as. peacekeepers in UN missions' but their technical support 
framework in practice can hardly agree with the theoretical position.
Again Hudson (2005), in presenting peacekeeping from a gender perspective, argued, that 
a common feature of international, regional, and sub regional peacekeeping operations is their lack 
of a gender - analytical approach. According to her, women and children, those often hit by 
conflict, are excluded from peacekeeping decision-making. In addition, women's views and 
concerns are also missing from the processes and institutions concerned with peacekeeping in 
Africa. 
Moving further, Bedont (2005 :86)" posited that' the UN system has proved dysfunctional 

---

105 
and incapable of providing accountability where national authorities have failed to act' in the area 
of prosecuting or punishing soldiers who have committed some form of offense or breached the 
Rule Of Engagement during PKO's. 
We must add here that peacekeeping functions have diversified significantly in recent 
years, and all peace seeking organizations have strove to adapt to new tasks and challenges, given 
the fact that the contexts and environments in which these missions are deployed have also become 
more complex. (Millennium Report). Just recently, on the 23rd of April, 2015, (Aljazeera News) 
UN Peacekeepers were killed in Sudan, and this is also one of the daunting challenges being faced 
by the UN and indeed other Peacekeeping Actors. 
In a nutshell, according to Agada (2008), Feldnian (2008), Vorrath (2012), Galadima 
(2006), (UNIT AR POCI 2007), these are some of the major and obvious challenges confronting 
peacekeeping operations and its Actors:
1.
Slow rate of UN peacekeeping operation deployment 
2.
Non robust mandate as was seen in the casualty recorded in UNOSOM II 
3.
Changing nature of operational environment 
4.
Inadequate funding 
5.
Inadequate intelligence required for counterinsurgency 
6.
Ineffective enforcement of arms embargo 
7.
Securing the Consent of the parties in conflict is also a challenge 
8.
Inadequate manpower and logistic 
9.
Non tackling of root causes of conflict 
10.
Non cooperation of war lords 
11.
Non participation of troops from developed nation-sometimes 
12.
The non use of force in self-defense has to be considered' as one of the challenges 
13.
Use of inadequate weapons by the UN's peacekeepers