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PRE-DEPLOYMENT TRAINING - LESSONS LEARNED

TRAINING FOR PEACE by UNITAR

TRAINING FOR PEACE: essential tool to prevent and ma- possibilities at hand frequently has
“Lessons Learnt by the United nage violent conflicts between and a negative impact on the credibi-
Nations Institute for Training and within states, and to support natio- lity of missions and, thus, on their
Research (UNITAR)” nal actors in protecting and buil- effectiveness, which to a great
ding peace. extent depends on the quality of
By Claudia Croci & UNITAIR Staff Over many decades, peace opera- interaction with receiving commu-
tions have notably evolved to keep nities. Equally, the effectiveness of
up with the ever-changing natu- individual peacekeepers plays a
As reflected in the Article 1 of its re and characteristics of conflicts. prominent, though often underesti-
Charter, the United Nations has Once limited to the maintenance mated, role in determining success
been created by the international of ceasefire and appeasing con- or failure of UN peace operations.
community with a unifying aspira- flicting parties, mission mandates In this context, not only civilians
tion of bringing about ubiquitous have critically expanded to include but peacekeepers themselves in-
and perpetual peace. Although 74 such sensitive and complex issues creasingly become a target of vio-
years after, the need for peacekee- as protection of civilians, promo- lent attacks making the number of
ping is still in place and urgent, the tion of human rights, preventing casualties among them grow at a
conciliating impact achieved and and responding to sexual exploi- dramatically high pace. A recent
the number of lives saved by over tation and abuse and much more. report on “Improving Security of
1 million of courageous women As a result, current peace opera- United Nations Peacekeepers”,
and men deployed at various time tions involve significant – old and also known as the Cruz Report after
to more than 70 UN peacekeeping new – challenges such as complex one of its authors Lt. Gen. Carlos
operations in total are staggering. conflict settings, the lack of capa- Alberto dos Santos Cruz, has come
Today, with more than 100,000 bilities to implement their manda- out specifically as a reaction to this
military, police and civilian per- te, or the absence of underpinning worrisome trend of increased thre-
sonnel from 122 countries serving peace processes. The gap between ats to the lives of peacekeepers2.
in 14 peacekeeping operations1, the ambitious mandates and hei- The report puts forward a list of key
predominantly on the African con- ghtened expectations of the pro- areas to be prioritized for a positi-
tinent, peacekeeping remains an tected populations and the actual ve change to occur in the safety of

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