RECENT INITIATIVES TO DEVELOP NON-MILITARY
INTERVENTION UNITS
EUROPEAN UNION
Paragraph 56 of the conclusions of the Cologne Summit
held in June 1999, states:
"The European Council invites the Council
(General Affairs) to deal thoroughly with all discussions on aspects
of security, with a view to enhancing and better co-ordinating
the Unions and Member States non-military crisis response tools.
Deliberations might include the possibility of a stand-by capacity
to pool national civil resources and expertise complementing other
initiatives within the common foreign and security policy."
UK GOVERNMENT
The UK government announced on 25 June that
it was making British peacekeeping troops available to the UN.
These troops would be able to go anywhere in the world at a moment's
notice. Besides soldiers, aircraft, engineers and medical facilities,
the UK contribution to the UN will also include civilian police
officers who, according to Robin Cook, "are playing an increasingly
important role in peacekeeping."
US GOVERNMENT
In a speech on 23 July to the OSCE Reinforced
Permanent Council, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Ronald
Asmus emphasised the need to strengthen the OSCE's capability
to play the role envisaged for it under the Helsinki Final Act
and the Charter of Paris. He said:
"It is in this spirit that we have proposed
the creation of an OSCE civilian rapid response capability or
REACT. Rapid deployment of skilled civilian expertise is essential
to effective conflict prevention, crisis management, and post-conflict
rehabilitation. We must commit to make national contingents of
experts, trained to OSCE standards and specifications, available
in such OSCE functional areas as democratization, human rights,
policing, and elections. These teams could be used as surge capacity
in crises, rapid deployment when political agreements are reached,
and crisis prevention . . . Another tool is strengthened policing
capabilities that will allow the OSCE to be our organisation of
choice for appropriate missions in the OSCE region."
In addition, US Secretary of State for Defense,
William Cohen, said in a press conference on 10 July:
"As we've pointed out on so many occasions
in the past, peacekeeping is not a primary mission, certainly
of the US forces, and I suspect that is the case for many of the
other NATO countries as well. Peacekeeping involves a different
type of training, and capabilities. What we need to do is to have
more police on call, ready to deploy to Kosovo, as they were required
to be deployed into Bosnia; we need much more in the way of civil
implementation than is currently taking place."
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