Beyond the Emergency

Development Within UN Peace Missions

Jeremy Ginifer

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780714647609
• eBook ISBN: 9781135219451
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This volume focuses on the issue of development within the UN peace mission. It examines a number of critical issues relating to the interface between development, relief and peacekeeping, including institutional coordination, the implementation of development in the field, and the contending philosophies that sometimes underpin military and developmental approaches to human security. Not least, it poses the question of how sustainable development fits within the post-conflict space of UN peace missions.

OPERATIONAL ISSUES AND CASE STUDIES: AFRICA FOCUS

The Issue of the Military: UN Demobilization, Disarmament and Reintegration in Southern Africa

CHRIS ALDEN

This article will analyse the United Nations’ experience of demilitarization in southern Africa with reference to peacekeeping missions and the transition from emergency to developmental contexts. Three UN peace-support operations in southern Africa – the UN Transition Assistance Group (UNTAG), the UN Operation in Mozambique (ONUMOZ) and the UN Angola Verification Mission (UNAVEM) – will be examined to assess the international organization's role. The article focuses on the importance of developing a regional approach to demilitarization; the imperative of co-operation both within the UN itself and the international donor and non-governmental organization (NGO) community as a whole; and the need to develop a greater understanding of the efficacy of ‘targeting’ demilitarization programmes towards ex-combatants.

The demilitarization of combatants – a process which encompasses the demobilization and disarmament of troops and their reintegration into society¹ – has as its premise the proposition that combatants are particularly dangerous elements to interject into a fluid post-conflict situation. Both the perpetrators and, as often, the objects of brutalizing violence, combatants have the capacity to disrupt the fragile peace settlement, either by returning to open hostilities with their opponents or resorting to armed banditry in the aftermath of a formal declaration of peace. Accordingly, it has become a kind of cardinal principle that this volatility may be offset through a targeted programme which builds on the structured demobilization and disarmament of combatants, in conjunction with monetary and educational incentives designed to facilitate the peaceful reintroduction of combatants into civilian life. This two-phased approach to the question of demilitarization is composed of both the short-term objectives of emergency assistance and the long-term objectives of development. As such, it is subject to all of the complexities inherent in the emergency to relief continuum.

The demilitarization programmes instituted by the UN have, in the main, recognized the necessity of extending the scope of demilitarization beyond the short-term objectives of demobilization and disarmament. In the lexicon of the UN, peace-building represents the transitional point between the demobilization of combatants and their full reintegration into society:

Peacemaking and peacekeeping operations, to be truly successful, must come to include comprehensive efforts to identify and support structures which will tend to consolidate peace...[T]he concept of peace-building as the construction of a new environment should be viewed as a counterpart of preventive diplomacy.²

Nevertheless, conceptual clarity is needed if UN peace support operations are to act effectively in this area. In the same vein, it is noted that the controversies which often attend project design and implementation in demilitarization are themselves a product of this disjuncture between the emergency ethos and the development ethos.³ Indeed, it is the contention of one Special Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG) that this disjuncture is one of the major failings of UN peace-support operations.⁴ The gap between the emergency and development is more than a mere intellectual oversight to be recognized and corrected; it finds institutional expression in the plethora of UN agencies which make up such operations.

A further complication is the role of the international NGO community, which itself is divided along the emergency and development fault line and, accordingly, acts with varying degrees of autonomy from UN peace-support operations. This has the effect, at times, of contradicting the aims of the mission and, in other instances, ameliorating the failings of the UN.

The UN, Demilitarization and the Southern African Context

Demilitarization, as it has become abundantly clear in the wake of UN involvement in southern Africa, is not a national problem but rather a regional one. The three cases from southern Africa – Namibia, Angola and Mozambique – provide valuable examples of UN involvement in demilitarization, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of its changing approach in the region. Most notably, the UN refined its demilitarization programme to include both short- and long-term components, as well as moving towards an integrated and comprehensive approach to the issue of the military. In each case study the following areas will be examined: the demilitarization programme as conceived in the peace settlement; the demilitarization programme as organized by the UN peace-support operation; and the record of implementation.

Namibia and UNTAG

Established in the wake of the signing of the New York Accords in December 1988, Namibia was the first post-Cold War mission of the UN, the largest peacekeeping operation since the ill-fated mission to the Congo and the most complex undertaken by the organization at the time. As such, it posed a series of challenges to the UN's capacity to conduct a multidimensional operation that incorporated elements of traditional peacekeeping as well as novel components in such areas as policing and election monitoring. Its successful conclusion, despite some serious incidents, gave considerable encouragement to the international community as to the efficacy of extending the UN role in peacekeeping world-wide.

The Peace Agreement and Demilitarization

The agreement formally ending the conflict in Namibia had in fact been drawn up in 1978 under the auspices of the UN's Western Contact Group. Security Council Resolution (SCR) 435 (1978), which called for the withdrawal of the South African military, administrative control over the territory and democratic elections, and formed the basis for the cessation of hostilities and the transition to independence. Following the assent of all parties to the New York Accords, the Security Council (SC) passed Resolution 629 (1989), which officially established the Namibian mission. Accordingly, the UN was charged with the supervision of the cease-fire, the monitoring of the conduct of the South West African Police (SWAPOL) and observing the election campaign. The timetable for the operation was to cover 12 months and involved the following steps:

• a cease-fire was to be formally established on 1 April;

• the disbanding of the South West African Territorial Force (SWATF) and SWAPO and the reduction of the South African Defence Force (SADF) from 32,000 to zero by 8 November 1989;

• elections were to be held on 16 November 1989.

All of these steps were to take place in tandem with the Cuban withdrawal from Angola, overseen by UNAVEM I (see below). Overseeing the implementation of the entire process would be a SRSG and a South African-appointed Administrator-General. To fulfil the stated aims of SCR 435, UNTAG would be structured to include civil, police and military components. The civil component consisted of the SRSG's Office – which was supported by 42 smaller political offices established across Namibia's ten regions – and which would provide general direction and co-ordination to the mission, as well as preparing the foundation for UN Development Programme (UNDP) involvement after the mission. In addition, an independent jurist would arbitrate on matters relevant to the peace process; the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) would be responsible for the repatriation of refugees in advance of the elections; an electoral division would oversee voter registration and monitor the elections in November 1989; and there would be a logistics division. The police and the military component are discussed below.

UNTAG and Demilitarization

In the Namibian case, the UN mission's involvement in demilitarization was conceived wholly in terms of short-term objectives, that is, the demobilization and disarmament of combatants. No provisions for the reintegration of former soldiers were introduced into the programme; nor were they the recipients of any targeted projects, assistance or funding beyond that provided in the course of their stay in the reception areas. The first aspect of UNTAG's role in demilitarization centred around the supervision of the confinement, then withdrawal, of South African troops from Namibian territory, and the concomitant repatriation of SWAPO guerrillas from their bases in southern Angola and Zambia. Linked to this was the monitoring of the cease-fire between the former foes. To fulfil these objectives UNTAG was to bring in a team of 200 military observers and 7,500 peacekeepers. Their tasks were to monitor the following:

• the restriction of the SADF to bases within Namibia by 1 April 1989, and their subsequent withdrawal from the territory, with: the first reduction to 12,000 troops by 14 May 1989; to 1,500 by 1 July 1989; and total withdrawal by 8 November 1989;

• the dismantling of the SWATF, commando and ethnic units, and their disarmament by 1 April 1989;

• the disarming and repatriation of SWAPO forces, including the confining of selected forces to bases in Angola and Zambia;⁵

• the policing of official entry points into the country and reception areas for returnees.

The second aspect of UNTAG's role in demilitarization was the monitoring of the Namibian police and those elements of the SADF which had taken up civil functions during the transition period. Complicating the situation further was the incorporation of the notorious counter-insurgency unit, Koevoet, into SWAPOL. With SWAPOL given the principal role in maintaining law and order during the transitional period, it would be the job of the UN's 360-strong civil police force to ensure that it did not engage in acts of intimidation against the population during the run-up to the election. The use of civil police in fulfilling this task was one of UNTAG's innovations; no other mission had undertaken such a direct and extensive policing role.

Implementation

The implementation of the demilitarization programme was subject to the problems and constraints facing UNTAG. Despite having literally years to prepare for the mission, when it came to implementing the objectives of SCR 435(1978) it was clear that little work had been done in terms of the actual mechanics of the operation. In the first instance, delays in the passing of enabling legislation by both the SC, which authorized the particulars of the operation only on 16 February and the General Assembly (GA), which gave its approval two weeks later, cut an already narrow margin for the deployment of UNTAG to the bare minimum. With the budgetary constraints imposed by the SC, the UNTAG peacekeeping deployment was reduced to 4,650 personnel (while officially remaining at the original figure), lowering total costs from US$700 million to US$446 million.

Another issue to emerge was uncertainty as to UNTAG's chain of command. This was to impact upon the already problematic communications between New York and the field headquarters, as well as adversely affecting communication between the several components of the mission in Namibia.⁶ Unwieldy procurement procedures, which obliged UNTAG to forgo the purchasing of material from nearby South Africa so as to maintain adherence to international sanctions, and a lack of logistics in the field were further obstacles.⁷ Despite this, the picture of the mission was one of co-operation and successful co-ordination between its different elements.

The first, and most dangerous, crisis came in the early days of the mission with the unexpected infiltration of hundreds of SWAPO guerrillas into Namibia from their bases over the border. SWAPO contended that the intention of the incursion was merely to move its forces into Namibia as part of the larger demobilization exercise, while South African officials declared it to be an outright violation of the terms of the peace agreement. Though UNTAG had already been alerted to the possibility of SWAPO incursions at least a month before it actually took place, it was clear that neither New York nor the field office in Windhoek had made provisions for this contingency.⁸ Faced with the prospect of unilateral action on the part of South Africa, UNTAG agreed to allow the SADF to suspend its confinement and respond to the incursion by releasing six battalions. Over 200 SWAPO members were killed and, after a meeting of the Tripartite Commission, it was announced that SWAPO would return to its bases outside Lubango in Angola under UNTAG escort.⁹ By 13 May, the ceasefire was back in place.

Another issue which clouded the demilitarization process was the incorporation of Koevoet into the police force which had, inexplicably, won UN approval in advance of the UNTAG mission. Complaints by the civil police contingent CIVPOL, whose task it was to pair up with SWAPOL, as to both the conduct of Koevoet and that of the police in general provoked a crisis.¹⁰ After much negotiation, Ahtisaari, the SRSG and Pienaar, the Administrator-General, worked out a compromise which saw Koevoet members leave the police and CIVPOL numbers increase substantially to 1,500.¹¹

Much of the formal disarmament and demobilization process was effectively run outside the UNTAG framework with the UN playing the role of observer or monitor. In the case of SWAPO, disarmament took place in Angola and Zambia, followed by registration of repatriated refugees, including former guerrillas, at selected assembly areas over a seven-day period. As noted above, the SWATF disbanded in advance of the UNTAG mission and, though its arms were stored on South African military bases, the UN had dif...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Contributor Page
• Preface
• Introduction and Overview
• Development and the UN Peace Mission: A New Interface Required?
• Conceptual Issues
• Peace Operations: From Short-Term to Long-Term Commitment
• Beyond Post-Conflict Peacebuilding: What Links to Sustainable Development and Human Security?
• Operational Issues And Case Studies: Africa Focus
• The Issue of the Military: UN Demobilization, Disarmament and Reintegration in Southern Africa
• A Peacekeeper's Perspective of Peacebuilding in Somalia
• The UN in Mozambique and Angola: Lessons Learned
• Humanitarian And Military Co-Operation
• Improving UN Developmental Co-ordination within Peace Missions
• The Stretcher and the Drum: Civil-Military Relations in Peace Support Operations