In addition to military deployments, civilian pence missions have been established in several countries to help verify agreements, promote stability, prod-former belligerents into respecting human rights and assist in rebuilding state institutions to bring justice and lasting pence.
What began in 1992 as the UN Observer Mission in El Salvador (ONUSAL) has been scaled back in 1996 to a core presence with limited functions. Since 1992, the UN Mission has been reduced from over 1,000 observers to just seven international staff and three police observers. Now called the UN Office of Verification (ONUV), it verifies the remaining peace accords, coordinates technical assistance with the UN Development Programme and offer its good offices to resolve hostile situations.
ONUV is one of three civilian missions created by the General Assembly to complement peace-making activities undertaken by the Secretary-General and his representatives. Along with ONUV, the UN Mission in Guatemala (MINUGUA) and the International Civilian Mission in Haiti (MICIVIH) monitor human rights agreements, report violations, support national authorities in upholding respect for human rights and carry out human rights promotion and education programmes.
Pulling puppet-strings to dramatize human rights
Using a roving marionette theater to spread the idea of conflict resolution by peaceful means in a rural region riven by years of bloody land disputes was just one of MlCIVIH's initiatives in 1996, the second full year since international intervention restored constitutional rule in Haiti.
In an escalating squabble over grazing and right of way, two farmers threaten to kill each other at the next cockfight. Then one of their wives suggest turning to Josapha, the literacy teacher. Josapha arranges a meeting between the two. At first, they just shout. Josapha gradually gets them to calm down and explain their grievances. Finally she helps them work out a settlement involving mutual concessions and commitments.
This is a story acted out by three foot tall marionettes to 350 villagers who interject comments and debate throughout. At the end, the excited audience besieges the observers of MICIVIH, who have crossed the Artibonite River by dugout with a Haitian puppeteer troupe to present this didactic tale. Can MICIVIH help mediate in the village's own land conflict with the neighboring village? Can MICIVIH help train one of the villagers to be a mediator like Josapha?
Art contests, street murals, seminars and radio shows, together with spots and documentaries for radio and TV, were also used to promote awareness of human rights and the role of democratic institutions. MlCIVIH's observers continue to monitor human rights violations as they did in 1993 and 1994 under the former, de facto regime. But now MICIVIH is the government's partner, and its monitoring is part of a concerted international effort to help build a new police force and a new prison authority, and revive the ailing judicial system to which MICIVIH contributes through field observation, analysis, advice, training and the publication of detailed, public reports.
In October this year the parties concluded a landmark agreement on strengthening civilian power and on the role of the armed forces, thus completing negotiations on substantive issues. Earlier agreements covered human rights, resettlement of persons displaced by the armed conflict, the creation of a historical clarification commission, the identity and rights of indigenous persons socio-economic issues and the agrarian situation. In December, the Guatemalan Government and the URNG reached an agreement on the details of a cease-fire, to be followed by a final pence agreement scheduled to be signed on 29 December in Guatemala City. The parties have requested the UN to deploy a verification mission to monitor compliance with the peace accord.
A New York Times report earlier this year characterized the United Nations role in Guatemala as a "catalyst for a new tolerance for political dissent and protest about human rights violations". MlNUGUA's presence has helped end the spiral of violence and fear of a 34 year conflict in which an estimated 100,000 people have been killed.
Civilian Missions: operating on a shoe-string
Operating on a shoe-string, these missions are widely acknowledged as having made a critical difference to people tired of conflict and ready to work towards peace. Forced to make cuts in the UN budget in March 1996, the Secretary-General advised the General Assembly that cutbacks would affect funding for MICIVIH and MINUGUA, which were expected to cost 540 million in 1996 and $50 million in 1997.
He urged Member States to decide which existing programmes should be curtailed, postponed or terminated. Moreover, he cautioned that this was not just a budgetary problem: "It goes right to the heart of the purposes for which this Organization was created. The human rights missions whose future is at stake have been established to help bring an end to long-standing conflicts and create conditions for a lasting peace for the peoples of the countries concerned. They have been designed in a way that responds to the frequently-expressed wish of the Member States that higher priority should be given to preventive and peacemaking activities, which are less costly than peace-keeping operations."
Human rights field operations are an important new UN presence in the field, frequently as components of peace-keeping missions, or parallel to them. Despite financial and administrative difficulties, human rights observers have also been fielded in Rwanda, Burundi and Zaire, and are to be deployed in Georgia.