United Nations Policing
United Nations Police are a crucial part of UN peace operations around the world. More than 11,000 UN Police, from more than 90 countries, are currently working in 18 different field missions. Every day these women and men patrol, provide training, advise domestic policing services, help ensure compliance with international human rights standards and assist in a wide range of activities to restore and promote security, public safety and the rule of law. The benefits of this work are clear: UN Police help to create a safer environment where communities will be better protected and criminal activities will be prevented. The diverse national experiences of these United Nations Police officers, and their commitment to peace and security, are their best tools to promote sustainable peace through justice and security. 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. 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." |
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Maintained by the Peace and Security Section of the Department of Public
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"The unprecedented global demand for United Nations Police reflects a growing understanding of the beneficial role they are playing in war-torn countries during the crucial post conflict stabilization phase [...] In addition to protecting individuals, they help society as a whole by redefining the role of policing in countries emerging from conflict, forging trust in uniformed police, establishing faith in national justice systems and fostering confidence in peace processes."