Special Committee calls for careful study of 'rapid reaction force.'(United Nations Special Committee on Peace-Keeping Operations)

A suggested UN "rapid reaction force" has raised a variety of important and complex political, legal and financial issues and should be studied carefully, the Special Committee on Peace-keeping Operations reported after its four-week 1995 session (10 April-5 May, New York).

Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, in his "Supplement to An Agenda for Peace", issued on 25 January, had proposed that the UN needed to give serious thought to the idea of a rapid reaction force.

Some members, however, expressed caution, arguing that the use of such a force in internal conflicts would be unacceptable since that would erode the principle of State sovereignty. They also pointed out that the efficiency of an operation was not so much related to the speed of deployment, but more to its political capacity. Further, the establishment of such a force would duplicate the capabilities of Member States and give the UN an undesirable military image.

To facilitate the rapid deployment of troops, the 34-member Committee urged the Secretary-General to develop a deployable headquarters team, composed of personnel skilled in essential military and civilian functions, that could be sent quickly to mission areas. Special attention should be paid to the question of rapid and effective responses to emergency situations in Africa, it added.

The Committee, in its report (A/50/230), also stressed the importance of clearly defined mandates, objectives, command structure and secure financing for peace-keeping operations.

It recommended the appointment of a Special Representative of the Secretary-General for larger operations with overall authority for their components, and reaffirmed the importance of an effective public information capacity.

Emphasizing that peace-keeping operations should respect States' sovereignty and not intervene in matters essentially within their domestic jurisdiction, the Committee reaffirmed three basic principles underlying those operations: consent of the parties; impartiality; and the non-use of force except for self-defence.

Whenever possible, consultations should be held between the UN Secretariat and prospective troop-contributing countries before the establishment of new missions, and troop contributors should receive situation reports on the operations.

Reaffirming that training was essentially the responsibility of Member States, the Committee asked for a study on the feasibility of attaching training assistance teams to the headquarters of peace-keeping missions, and to coordinate and facilitate the use of standardized procedures. The completion of a code of conduct for UN peace-keeping personnel was also called for.

Kofi Annan, Under-Secretary-General for Peace-keeping Operations, told the Committee that peace-keeping continued to face unforeseen new challenges, experiencing both setbacks and successes.

"At a time when concerns are being expressed in a number of forums about a possible retreat from multilateralism, Member States have continued to demonstrate an ability to work together fruitfully and productively under challenging and, yes, potentially dangerous conditions", he said.

At present, there are some 60,000 military and civilian personnel serving under the UN flag in peace-keeping operations worldwide, he reported. The UN had improved its ability to respond to situations in the field. A sound skeletal structure had been developed in the Department of Peace-keeping Operations, but given the enormous complexity, as well as the size and number of operations, the staff was still thin by any standard.

What was needed was a greater capacity to: conduct feasibility studies of options for the consideration of the Security Council; translate mandates into achievable concepts of operations: provide timely guidance and support to the field, as well as meaningful feedback to the Council; and on the basis of experience, develop and refine doctrines, operational concepts and standard operating procedures.

Two significant improvements had been made in the area of preparedness, Mr. Annan added. First, stand-by arrangements had continued to be developed and now included 40 Member States. Second, the UN had developed at Brindisi, Italy, start-up kits containing basic equipment and supplies needed to initiate and sustain non-military components of a peace-keeping operation until its own systems were operative. That meant that those start-up kits and other equipment could be moved to virtually any African port capable of handling ocean-going ships within 12 days.