press conference by Department of Political Affairs concerning Secretary-General’s

report on conflict prevention

 

Traditional methods used to prevent conflicts from erupting or spreading, such as the dispatch of envoys or projects to teach mediation skills, were not well known or particularly well supported with the resources they required, Ibrahim Gambari, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, said at a Headquarters press conference today.

Presenting the Secretary-General’s report on conflict prevention, he said that correcting that resource imbalance was one of its key points.  For example, over the last five years more than $18 billion had been spent on United Nations peacekeeping alone, yet, if a fraction of that were to be spent for prevention so that peacekeepers did not have to go in it would have been money well spent and much more cost-effective.

Accompanied by David Hamburg, Chairman of the Secretary-General’s Advisory Committee on Genocide Prevention, the Under-Secretary-General said it was fashionable for policy experts to debate the merits of “soft” power versus “hard” power in international affairs.  By that analogy, the report would argue the need to spend more on the “soft” side of United Nations activities so that less would ultimately be spent on “hard” military deployments.

The report contained lots of ideas on practical ways to direct resources towards prevention, he said.  There was a need to recognize the dual challenge, first, of tackling the sources of stress and tension within States and in societies, and, second, strengthening conflict-resolution mechanisms more accessible at the national, subregional and regional levels, as well as within the United Nations system as a whole.

He said the report found that countries under stress tended to be more vulnerable across the board, so that dealing with the immediate political problem was often not enough.  It was also necessary to address such other problems as environmental degradation, migration, poverty and HIV/AIDS.  For example, deep down the conflict in Darfur was about the environment, water, grassland for cattle, land for farming and the conflict between pastoralists and nomadic people.  In Côte d’Ivoire, the enormous migration from neighbouring countries had made it difficult to define who was a true Ivorian.

While the idea of promoting the culture of prevention had taken root in the United Nations, and most parts of the system saw it as a core part of their mandate, the report’s main message was that there was still a long way to go.  That was partly because it was so difficult to make a compelling case for prevention since the United Nations was so busy trying to “put out fires”.  It was difficult to demonstrate successful prevention, but when it failed, everyone paid the price, not only in lives lost, but in resources diverted from development.

Citing the high cost of humanitarian assistance and peacekeeping and reconstruction, he said that, when conflicts were not prevented or when they recurred, peacekeeping operations were deployed repeatedly.  In Africa, for example, when Nigeria was about one week old as an independent country it had sent peacekeepers to the then Congo.  Today, 46 years later, there was a United Nations peacekeeping operation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.   Angola and Haiti had also seen repeated deployment of peacekeeping missions.

However, while the failures of prevention efforts were more conspicuous, the success stories were barely noticed, he said.  A huge conflict between Nigeria and Cameroon over the Bakassi Peninsula had been averted thanks to the Secretary-General’s enormous efforts.  Similarly, he had successfully prevented conflict between Gabon and Equatorial Guinea and lent his good offices in Cyprus and Myanmar.

Mr. Hamburg said that a movement growing “below the radar” at the United Nations and elsewhere had been trying to think about the feasibility of prevention.  Today’s world contained immense dangers affecting every Member State and region.  No country was too far away to escape damage by a small group from the other side of the world.  The proliferation of small arms and light weapons, which were easily available in many parts of Africa for $5 or less, had killed millions of people in the 1990s.

The dreadful experiences of Bosnia and Rwanda had made it imperative to stimulate people all over the world to think about conflict prevention, especially in light of what small arms and light weapons could do, not to mention nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.  Without prevention, the ability of the human species to get through the twenty-first century would be in question.  In addition, the incitement to hatred and violence had greater capacities as communications had grown.  The Internet had its dark side, as did radio, which had been used to murderous effect in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.

A correspondent asked what relevance the report had in light of events in the Sudan, Iraq, Lebanon, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda.  What innovative approaches did it put forward, since there was nothing new about the need to spend more on creating dialogue and stemming the flow of small arms and light weapons?

Mr. Gambari said the report stressed the need to involve civil society and the private sector in addressing the root causes of conflict as they both had a role in addition to that of Governments.  “Prevention is far too important to be left to Governments alone”, he added.  It also underscored the need to address environmental degradation, migration, poverty and HIV/AIDS, which were non-traditional sources of conflict but real nonetheless.  There was also a need for the United Nations system to implement a culture of prevention rather than merely talk about it.

Asked if the Department of Political Affairs could have prevented the conflict in Somalia, given that the Department of Political Affairs had no monitoring capacity there, the Under-Secretary-General said the Department depended on the Nairobi-based United Nations Peacebuilding Office for Somalia for information.  It also depended on the help and cooperation of some Governments, as well as United Nations entities.

The Secretary-General’s Special Representative had been very active in promoting dialogue in Somalia.  The Transitional Federal Governments and the Islamic Courts Union had just completed a round of talks in Khartoum and hopefully there would be a third round.

Asked about the role of preventive military intervention, Mr. Gambari said that he wished it were possible in Darfur but it would be even more difficult to implement than all the resolutions adopted by the African Union’s peace and security mechanism, the regional body itself and the Security Council.

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For information media • not an official record