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From the beginning days of UN peacekeeping, civilian staff, as part of the UN Field Service, have provide such field support for UN peacekeeping as vehicle maintenance, logistics and telecommunications. As a distinct peacekeeping component, however, civilians were first deployed in the UN's 1960-1964 Congo operation. Today's multidimentional peacekeeping, involving the strengthening of local institutions and, in some cases, responsibility for transitional administrations, requires the participation of a growing number of civilian personnel--over 12,500 local and international personnel by mid-2000.
Most peacekeeping operations are headed by a civilian, and all mission personnel report to the Secretary-General through the chief of mission. Civilian staff carry out tasks related to political aspects of the mission, administration and logistics, human rights and public information. Increasingly, civilian staff have responsibilities related to governance of local and State-level administrations and services, budgetary and fiscal systems, public utilities and the health and education sectors, judiciary systems, demobilization and demining. For many of these highly specialiazed personnel, the United Nations is increasingly turning to Govenments and international organizations.
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