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Everyday Peacekeeping in the Central African Republic

Image courtesy of United Nations Photo/Flickr. (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

This article was originally published by Political Violence at a Glance on 13 April 2020.

Imagine this: You are a farmer in northwest Central African Republic. In 2013, several of your family members and friends were killed by the ex-Séléka, a predominately Muslim rebel group that briefly took control of a large part of the country. Your wife survived, but was violently raped by some ex-Séléka fighters. A loosely organized network of Christian militias, generally referred to as the anti-Balaka, managed to defeat the ex-Séléka. Subsequent retaliatory attacks by the anti-Balaka, and communal clashes between the Christian and Muslim populations, forced almost the entire Muslim population to flee from the area where you live.

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Peacekeeping Missions in Mali and Somalia

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This graphic of the week lists the various international peacekeeping missions currently taking place in Mali and Somalia. To find out more about what political and operational challenges these peacekeeping missions face, see here. For more CSS charts, maps and graphics on defense policy, click here.

Five Reform Areas for Effective Peacekeeping Performance

Image courtesy of US Pacific Command/Adam Montera

This article was originally published by IPI Global Observatory on 6 July 2018.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres rightly prioritizes performance by including it as one of the five pillars of his Action for Peacekeeping (A4P) reform initiative. Peacekeeping operations are a principal tool, and one of the most expensive and visible ways, that the UN intervenes to prevent and mitigate conflict. Improving peacekeeping performance is thus essential, but it will not be easy.

The Threat of US Cuts: Helping Peacekeeping Help Itself?

Courtesy of Thomas Hawk/Flickr. (CC BY-NC 2.0)

This article was originally published by IPI Global Observatory on 30 March 2017.

As the prospect of United States funding cuts hangs over the United Nations and its flagship peacekeeping operations like the sword of Damocles, many are asking whether the threat might in fact provide the impetus for necessary reforms. The picture will become clearer at the April 6 Security Council thematic debate on peacekeeping, which the US is organizing. If UN member states remain focused on reform and reinvest in political strategies, and if the bureaucracy helps itself by initiating real rather than merely rhetorical change, a positive outcome is possible.

Reports of proposed US cuts have generated much panic around Turtle Bay for the past couple of months. This started with a January draft US presidential executive order—never signed into action—recommending “eliminating wasteful and counterproductive giving” to the world body. It culminated in March with the release of the US federal budget blueprint for 2018, which confirmed the White House’s intention to cut 40% of the State Department’s $2.2 billion annual contribution to the UN’s overall peacekeeping budget, which comes to just under $8 billion.

Paying for AMISOM: Are Politics and Bureaucracy Undermining the AU’s Largest Peace Operation?

Amisom Uganda 33Btn 23
Courtesy of AMISOM Public Information/Flickr.

This article was originally published by IPI Global Observatory on 11 January 2017.

How a peace operation is financed is always an important issue. But money matters for the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) have recently become highly politicized. This is in large part because of the complicated set of arrangements and mechanisms that are required to fund AMISOM. Particularly since mid-2015, some of these arrangements have come under pressure to change owing to a variety of factors, including the longevity of the mission, circumstances in the global economy, and other international crises on the African continent and beyond. The changes have had the predictable knock-on effect of causing political arguments between the African Union, the AMISOM troop-contributing countries (TCCs), and some of the mission’s key partners, most notably the European Union.

This report answers six key questions to explain how AMISOM is financed and how some recent decisions taken by the EU have generated considerable conflict within the mission and among some of its contributing states.