Office of Rule of Law and Security Institutions (OROLSI)
The Office of the Rule of Law and Security Institutions (OROLSI) was created within the Department of Peacekeeping Operations in 2007 to provide and coordinate United Nations expertise and assistance in the areas of rule of law including policing, mine action, disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of ex-combatants, and security sector reform, in support of national and international efforts to protect and strengthen peace.
Dmitry Titov, Assistant Secretary-General for Rule of Law and Security Institutions in the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, addresses a press conference on the new Convention on Cluster Munitions.
UN Photo/Paulo Filgueiras
OROLSI is led by Mr. Dmitry Titov, Assistant Secretary-General who reports to the Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Mr. Alain Le Roy.
Sustainable Peace through Justice and Security
Rule of law and public safety and security are central to sustainable peace in countries emerging from conflict. UN Member States have increasingly recognized that reinforcing rule of law and establishing viable security institutions are fundamental to peacekeeping and peace-building.
OROLSI’s main priority is to ensure support to United Nations field missions as mandated by the Security Council and/or the General Assembly. OROLSI serves as the global United Nations focal point for police and corrections issues. The provision of assistance or support is always contingent on either a request or a legislative mandate, and is subject to the availability of resources.
OROLSI provides strategic advice and guidance at UN headquarters and to UN field missions in the area of rule of law and security institutions. In close collaboration with other members of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations and the Department of Field Support, OROLSI’s components concentrate on the planning of field activities, doctrine development, screening and deployment of personnel as it is essential to identify the right personnel, as well as identifying and disseminating lessons learned.
OROLSI brings together all relevant Department of Peacekeeping Operations entities: the Police Division (PD), the Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) Section, the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS), the Security Sector Reform (SSR) Unit and the Criminal Law and Judicial Advisory Service (CLJAS).
Police Division
The number of police officers authorized for deployment in United Nations peacekeeping operations and special political missions increased fifteen-fold over the past decade from under 1,170 in 1995 to 15,000 in 2009. Today there are more than 12,000 officers deployed in 13 peacekeeping operations and four political missions. The United Nations has been deploying police officers for service in peace operations since the 1960s. Traditionally, the mandate of police components in peace operations was limited to monitoring, observing and reporting. Beginning in the early 1990s, advisory, mentoring and training functions were integrated into the monitoring activities in order to offer peace operations the opportunity to act as a corrective mechanism with domestic police and other law enforcement agencies.
Officers of the United Nations Police (UNPol) and Détachement intégré de sécurité (DIS) interview Sudanese refugees in their camp.
UN Photo/Olivia Grey Pritchard
At the end of the 1990s, UN Police were called upon to provide interim law enforcement in Eastern Slavonia, Kosovo and Timor-Leste, and in 2000 the Panel on United Nations Policing and Peace Operations concluded that the primary goal of the police in peace operations should be “to focus primarily on the reform and restructuring of local police forces in addition to traditional advisory, training and monitoring tasks”.
The Police Division is leading a global effort to increase the number of female officers in national police services and in its ranks. Police, in almost all societies, are an inherent part of rule of law and security. The Police Division works closely with DPKO’s Criminal Law and Judicial Advisory Service (CLJAS), the Security Sector Reform Unit (SSR) and assists the DDR Section and Mine Action Service in the implementation of their mandates. For more information about this Division see the Police Division’s website.
Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration Section (DDR)
The Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) Section of the Office of Rule of Law and Security Institutions of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) provides support for planning new disarmament, demobilization and reintegration program in DPKO-led operations in coordination with other components of the Office of Rule of Law and Security Institutions, Integrated Operational Teams, the Department of Political Affairs and other entities within the United Nations Secretariat, as well as United Nations agencies, funds, and programs.
At present the team is supporting DDR processes in BINUB (Burundi), MONUC (the Democratic Republic of the Congo), UNOCI (Côte d’Ivoire), UNMIS (Sudan), UNMIL(Liberia) and UNAMID (Darfur) as well as a Community Violence Reduction Program in MINUSTAH (Haiti). The Section is also assisting with planning for DDR and associated processes in Somalia. To the extent possible, the Section also provides advisory support to special political missions with DDR mandates.
The DDR Section is also responsible for monitoring, evaluating, disseminating lessons learned and best practices on DDR in peacekeeping. Many of these have already been captured in the Integrated DDR Standards (IDDRS) which were developed by the Inter-Agency Working Group on DDR which the Section co-chairs with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The Section also assists with the training of DDR personnel which is most often carried out through a network of training partners who have formed the Integrated DDR Training Group (IDDRTG) in order to provide IDDRS-compliant training. For more information see the: Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration website, which is a joint initiative of OROLSI’s DDR Section and 16 other partners from the United Nations system.
United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS)
The United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) is the focal point for the coordination of the UN effort to eliminate landmines and explosive remnants’ of war and to mitigate their impact on people's lives. UNMAS is one of 14 UN entities that make up the "UN Mine Action Team." The coordinating role that UNMAS plays promotes effective and efficient use of resources, prevents duplication of efforts and ensures that services are prioritized and targeted. And in that role, it is responsible for leading the monitoring of progress against benchmarks set in an inter-agency mine action strategy for 2006-2010. The strategy includes goals such as reducing death and injury by 50 percent, expanding freedom of movement for at least 80 percent of the most seriously affected communities and developing national mine action institutions. UNMAS also builds security and national capacities and enables development. It also ensures that UN peacekeepers can safely deploy in war-torn nations without undue risk or threat from mines and unexploded ordinance. For additional information and details about this work, visit, the Mine Action website managed by UNMAS.
Security Sector Reform Unit (SSR)
Security Sector Reform Unit (SSR) focuses on building effective, accountable and sustainable security institutions that operate within a framework of the rule of law and respect for human rights. To this end, the SSR Unit in OROLSI brings together a small number of multi-disciplined specialists to provide a focal point and technical SSR resource for DPKO and its peacekeeping operations, for other United Nations actors and for national and for international partners engaged in supporting SSR.
The SSR Unit, where requested and in close cooperation with other DPKO entities, provides technical support to SSR processes, primarily at the political-strategic level, including: facilitating national SSR dialogues after conflict; providing support for processes leading to reform of national security policies and architectures; providing specialist advice and strategic guidance on SSR programmes and projects; facilitating the provision of holistic and coherent United Nations support and assisting in the mobilization of resources for SSR (both human and financial).
The Unit, in close cooperation with members of the United Nations Inter-agency SSR Task Force, also drafts technical guidance in a number of areas on the basis of lessons learned and best practices from United Nations experiences. The SSR Unit manages a United Nations SSR Community of Practice, which all interested United Nations staff members are encouraged to join. More information can be obtained by emailing ssr@un.org.
Criminal Law and Judicial Advisory Service (CLJAS)
CLJAS was created in 2000 to help implement rule of law mandates in complex peace operations. In 2007, CLJAS became a part of the Office of Rule of Law and Security Institutions (OROLSI).
The Challenge
Justice systems in post-conflict countries often suffer from severe and systemic problems. The administrative capacity and physical infrastructure of these systems are often dilapidated and in some cases completely destroyed. Added to this there is a lack of sufficiently qualified officials and inadequate training facilities and educational institutions to help repair these systems. Insecurity that follows an armed conflict is exacerbated. Prisons suffer from overcrowding, prolonged periods of pre-trial detention (due to the lack of a judicial system), poor sanitation and poorly trained prison staff.
In the Field
The Cayes Prison in Haiti following armed conflict. This and other prisons in Haiti, have been re-built with the assistance of the UN. UN Photo
There are approximately 170 judicial affairs officers and 175 corrections officers currently working in peace operations in Afghanistan, Burundi, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Darfur, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Kosovo, Liberia, Sudan and Timor-Leste. These officers are working to strengthen judicial and corrections institutions that can play a key role in the restoration and consolidation of peace. Facilitating the maintenance of law and order, serving as a peaceful mechanism for resolving disputes and preventing impunity for crimes committed during, as well as after, a conflict are key to peace-building. The demand for United Nations justice and corrections assistance within peace operations has been growing steadily. Since 2000, the mandates of all United Nations peacekeeping operations have included justice and corrections components.
Justice
Mission justice components assist in the mapping and assessment of the host countries’ justice sectors and in the development of national justice reform strategies. They play a key coordination role among international stakeholders and engage in programmatic activities such as developing national judicial training capacity; assisting in legislative drafting and constitutional reform; promoting professionalism, integrity, accountability and transparency within the justice institutions; raising awareness of issues such as gender and juvenile justice; and strengthening the provision of legal aid.
Corrections
In the area of corrections, activities have focused on assisting national authorities in strategic planning and implementation of institutional reform; sourcing donor funding for prison reforms and development; assisting in the improvement of prison conditions and providing advisory and mentoring services relating to prison management; and assisting in the recruitment and training of national corrections personnel.
Support from Headquarters
The Criminal Law and Judicial Advisory Service (CLJAS) undertakes the planning for justice and corrections components in new United Nations peace operations; engages in assessments and evaluation of existing field missions; advises and supports field missions on substantive and operational matters related to justice and corrections and assists with staff recruitment, resource mobilization and planning for projects and programs.
CLJAS also prepares and facilitates the use of comprehensive training materials, best practices tools, and broad-based sharing of collective knowledge and lessons learned, including through the maintenance of an electronic Rule of Law Community of Practice network. The Service develops and disseminates guidance materials and serves as a centre of expertise on justice and corrections reform at United Nations Headquarters.
Guidance Material
Completed guidance material include: DPKO Policy Directive on Prison Support in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations; Supporting National Prison Systems: Lessons Learned and Best Practices for Peacekeeping Operations; Prison Support Guidance Manual; Lessons Learned Study: Legal and Judicial Rule of Law Work in Multi-dimensional Peace Operations; Primer for Justice Components in Multidimensional Peace Operations: Strengthening the Rule of Law; and Management of Prison Support Programmes in Peace Operations Training Course package.
This material and other reports, best practices and lessons learned can be found at the DPKO Best Practices website. For more information contact: dpko-cljas@un.org.