In March 2000, Secretary-General Kofi Annan set up an independent panel to make "a clear set of recommendations on how to do better in future in the whole range of United Nations activities in the area of peace and security". Chaired by former Algerian Foreign Minister Lakhdar Brahimi, the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations included members from all six continents, with wide experience in humanitarian, development and police work, as well as military peacekeeping.

In its report released on 23 August, the Panel stressed that "without renewed commitment on the part of Member States, significant institutional change and increased financial support", the United Nations would not be capable of executing the critical peacekeeping and peace-building tasks that are at the core of its mission: "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war".

The Panel pointed out that some of the peacekeeping missions of the past decade were particularly hard to accomplish. They tended to deploy where conflict had not resulted in victory for any side, or where a military stalemate or international pressure had brought fighting to a halt, but some of the parties to the conflict were not seriously committed to ending the confrontation. United Nations operations thus did not deploy into post-conflict situations but tried to create them, it said.

The United Nations and its members faced a pressing need to establish more effective strategies for conflict prevention, the Panel said. Furthermore, the Organization would continue to face the prospect of having to assist communities and nations in making the transition from war to peace, highlighting the key role of peace-building in complex peace operations. Therefore, the UN system needed to strengthen its permanent capacity to develop and implement peace-building strategies and support programmes.

The Panel concurred that consent of the local parties, impartiality and the use of force only in self-defence should remain the bedrock principles of peacekeeping. Experience showed, however, that in the context of intra-State or transnational conflicts, consent could be manipulated in many ways.

"Impartiality for United Nations operations", the Panel stressed, "must therefore mean adherence to the principles of the Charter." United Nations peacekeepers-troops or police-who witness violence against civilians should be presumed to be authorized to stop it, within their means, in support of basic UN principles. However, operations given a broad and explicit mandate for civilian protection must be given the specific resources needed to carry out that mandate, it said.

The first 6 to 12 weeks following a ceasefire or peace accord were often the most critical ones for establishing both a stable peace and the credibility of a new operation, the Panel said. Opportunities lost during that period were hard to regain. At the same time, when recommending force and other resource levels for a new mission, "the Secretariat must tell the Security Council what it needs to know, not what it wants to hear". Mission strengths must be set at levels according to realistic scenarios that take into account likely challenges to implementation. Security Council mandates, in turn, should reflect the clarity that peacekeeping operations require for unity of effort when they deploy into potentially dangerous situations.

The Panel recommended that Headquarters' support for peacekeeping be treated as a core activity of the United Nations, and as such the majority of its resource requirements should be funded through the regular budget of the Organization. The Department of Peacekeeping Operations and other offices that plan and support peacekeeping are currently primarily funded by the Support Account, which is renewed each year and funds temporary posts only.

Currently, the total cost of peacekeeping support amounts to roughly 2 per cent of the $2 billion spent annually on peacekeeping. The Panel also criticized staff shortages as "obviously an untenable state of affairs". Some 32 officers provide military planning and guidance to 27,000 troops in the field, while 9 civilian police staff provide guidance for up to 8,600 police officers. That approach to funding and staff, the Panel said, "seemed to confuse the temporary nature of specific operations with the evident permanence of peacekeeping and other peace operations activities as core functions of the United Nations".

The Secretary-General set up the Panel after publishing two reports highlighting United Nations failure to prevent genocide in Rwanda in 1994 and to protect the inhabitants of Srebrenica (Bosnia and Herzegovina) in 1995. On 23 August, Mr. Annan, in letters forwarding the Panel's report to the General Assembly and the Security Council, announced that he had asked his Deputy, Louise Frechette, to follow up on implementing its recommendations and submit an action plan for the Assembly to consider during the current regular session. He also hoped the report would receive attention from world leaders at the Millennium Summit.

On 27 September, the Security Council held its first consultations on the independent Panel's recommendations. It was briefed by Deputy Secretary-General Frechette and the Panel's Chairman, Ambassador Brahimi. In a presidential statement, the Council said it agreed on the importance of "clear, credible and achievable" mandates and on the "critical" need to ensure that peacekeeping missions were deployed rapidly, with the necessary levels of qualified, equipped and well-supported personnel, a unified chain of command and clear rules of engagement. Recommendations for frequent and more timely consultations with countries that contribute troops to UN peace operations were "viewed favourably". In addition, the Council emphasized the need to improve the United Nations ability to provide "accurate, timely, frank and comprehensive information and analysis". While supporting the "general thrust" of the report's recommendations, the Council agreed that further discussion was needed and decided to establish a working group, which would present to the Council specific recommendations for action by the end of October.

On 30 October, the Secretary-General presented the first outline of financial resources needed to implement the far-reaching changes proposed by the independent Panel. In his report to the General Assembly, Mr. Annan said that the Department of Peacekeeping Operations would be substantially reinforced and strengthened, while other entities supporting peace operations would also receive a boost, including the Electoral Assistant Division of the Department of Political Affairs and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. The plan calls for an increase of 249 support staff at a cost of $22 million. Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Jean-Marie Guehenno called the proposals "an emergency package", addressing only the most critical needs. Other recommendations in the report would require further study, he said. Currently, there are 15 ongoing peacekeeping operations, with some 38,000 military personnel and civilian police, as well as some 3,300 international and 8,500 local civilian personnel.

The Panel recommends a series of far-reaching changes in the structure and management of United Nations peace operations Doctrine and Strategy More effective conflict prevention strategies need to be developed, as prevention is "far preferable for those who would otherwise suffer the consequences of war, and a less costly option for the international community than military action, emergency humanitarian relief, or reconstruction after a war has run its course". There must be a doctrinal shift to greater use of civilian police and human rights experts in complex peace operations to reflect an increased focus on strengthening the rule of law and improving respect for human rights in post-conflict environments. Demobilization and reintegration programmes should be integrated at an early stage into the planning and implementation of complex peace operations, in order to reduce the likelihood of resumed fighting. Peacekeepers must be able to defend themselves and their mandate, with "robust rules of engagement", against those who renege on commitments or seek to undermine peace accords by violence. The Secretariat needs to strengthen the permanent capacity of the United Nations to develop peace-building strategies. Peacekeepers and peace-builders are "inseparable partners", since only a self-sustaining peace "offers a ready exit to peacekeeping forces". Mandates Before the Security Council agrees to implement a ceasefire or peace agreement, it should assure itself that the agreement meets threshold conditions, such as consistency with human rights standards and practicability of specified tasks and time-lines. The Security Council should not finalize resolutions authorizing large peacekeeping missions until Member States have pledged the necessary troops and resources. The peacekeeping support staff at UN Headquarters must be strengthened, with an increase in funding. The Secretariat "must tell the Security Council what it needs to know, not what it wants to hear, when formulating or changing mission mandates". Troop-contributing countries should have access to briefings on matters affecting the safety and security of their personnel. Deployment Time-lines "Traditional" UN peacekeeping operations, sent to monitor a ceasefire or the separation of forces after inter-State wars (as between Ethiopia and Eritrea), should be fully deployed within 30 days. More complex peace operations, sent to help end intra-State conflicts (as in Sierra Leone), should be fully deployed within 90 days. Transitional Civil Administration A panel of international legal experts should explore the feasibility and utility of an interim criminal code, for use in places where the United Nations is given transitional administration mandates with temporary executive powers (as currently in Kosovo and East Timor), pending the establishment of local rule of law and law enforcement capacity. Personnel The Secretary-General should systematize the selection of mission leaders, with the compilation of a comprehensive list of potential special representatives, force commanders, civilian police commissioners and other heads of substantive components. Member States should work together to form "coherent, multinational, brigade-sized forces", ready for effective deployment within those time-lines, and should each establish a national pool of military and civilian police officers and other specialists. The Secretariat should establish revolving "on-call" lists of about 100 specialists each in all peacekeeping-related areas: military and civilian police officers, as well as judicial, penal, human rights and other relevant specialists. Pre-selected civilian candidates, assembled on an Internet/Intranet-based roster drawn from national pools in each field, should be available on short notice to establish new mission headquarters or strengthen existing missions. Conditions of service for civilian specialists should also be revised so that the United Nations can attract more qualified personnel, and reward good performance with better career prospects. Speed and Efficiency A global logistics support strategy should be prepared to enable rapid and effective mission deployment within the time-lines proposed. The Secretary-General should also be allowed mission start-up funds-up to $50 million-to begin planning before the Security Council approves a mission, so that when approved it can be deployed quickly. Field missions should be given greater freedom to manage their own budgets, including procurement and civilian recruitment authority. Additional ready-made mission "start-up kits" should be maintained at the UN Logistics Base in Brindisi, Italy. Funding For Peacekeeping Support Peacekeeping should be treated as a "core activity" of the United Nations rather than a "temporary responsibility". Headquarters support of peace operations should be funded through the regular UN budget, instead of the current "Support Account" justified year by year and post by post. Structural Reforms Related to Peace Operations A new information and strategic analysis unit should be formed to service all United Nations departments concerned with peace and security, to be jointly administered by the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) and the Department of Political Affairs (DPA). Integrated mission task forces (IMTFs) at Headquarters should be created to plan and support each peacekeeping mission from its inception. Authority for peacekeeping-related budgeting and procurement functions should be delegated from the Under-Secretary-General for Management to the Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations for a two-year trial period. The Civilian Police Unit of DPKO should be moved out of the military reporting chain, and a new criminal law unit should be established. A pilot peace-building unit should be created within DPA, and its Electoral Assistance Division expanded, with substantially increased funding, to meet the rapidly growing demand for its services. Procurement, logistics, staff recruitment and other support services for smaller, non-military field missions should be provided by the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS). Operational planning and support of public information in peace operations should be established either in DPKO or within a new Peace and Security Service in the Department of Public Information. The field mission capacity of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights should be substantially enhanced with funds from the regular budget and from mission budgets. Systematic Use of Information Technology A responsibility centre should be created at Headquarters to devise and oversee implementation of information technology strategy for peace operations and Web site development. An enhanced peace operations element should be on the current United Nations intranet, linked to the missions through a peace operations extranet. Geographic information systems technology should be more extensively used, integrating operational information with electronic maps of the mission area, for applications as diverse as demobilization, civilian policing, voter registration, human rights monitoring and reconstruction. New Chief of Peacekeeping Replacing Bernard Miyet on 1 October, the new head of the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations, Under-Secretary-General Jean-Marie Guehenno of France, said that implementing the Panel's recommendations on improving the Organization's capacity to maintain and build peace would be one of his top priorities. He also stated that one of the key challenges for his Department was simultaneously addressing day-to-day issues while attempting structural changes, bringing together operational and political concerns. Having recently visited UN peace operations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Sierra Leone, Mr. Guehenno said that the integration between political considerations and operational constraints faced by UN peacekeepers in the field and by UN staff at Headquarters was "not always adequate".

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