Briefing Security Council on Somalia, Under-Secretary-General Says Expanded Role of Support Office Will Require Increased Investment
The United Nations Support Office for the African Union Mission in Somalia (UNSOA) required “significant” strengthening, the Under-Secretary-General for Field Support told the Security Council today, with its efforts reprioritized around strategic objectives set by the 15‑member body and within areas of African Union operations with the Somali National Army.
Laying out a series of proposals, Atul Khare said such changes meant redefining the Support Office’s clients as the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM) and the Somalia National Army. Medical support infrastructure would be extended on a limited basis to provide medical evacuation assistance to the Somali National Police in areas where AMISOM operated. While the Secretariat would do its part, critical support would need to come from the Council, the General Assembly, Member States and the African Union.
He hoped to present proposals to the General Assembly for strengthening the Support Office, he said, which would likely represent a $60 million annual increase and a one-time cost of $13 million in investment.
A three-month strategic review of the Support Office, from July to September, had found that its resources had not kept pace with the “dramatic expansion of its tasks, which now included support to both high-intensity military operations, as well as highly mobile political engagement in Somalia and beyond. The clients had grown from one to five, and the number of personnel it supported from 8,000 to 33,000 — all in an area that had expanded from 100 square kilometres to more than 400,000.
He said the Support Office was working in a “significantly non-permissive” environment, against the backdrop of Al-Shabaab and a humanitarian crisis. Fatalities in AMISOM in 2014 had exceeded the combined deaths from malicious acts in all United Nations peacekeeping operations combined. In the last 18 months, United Nations personnel and facilities had been attacked an average of once every 10 weeks.
The logistical enabling environment was also weak, he said, affected by insecurity in the major supply routes, where three‑quarters of all improvised explosive device attacks against AMISOM occurred. While proud of what UNSOA had achieved with its comparatively small and restricted resource base, he said that had come at the expense of effective service delivery in critical areas of maintenance services, field defence supplies, tentage, mobility and construction.
As such, future efforts would also be refocused on “surge support”, he said, to address critical gaps, strengthening human rights due diligence policy and
sexual exploitation and abuse compliance, coordination and joint decision-making frameworks, and environmental stewardship.
The Council would need to strengthen the Support Office’s accountability framework, he said, through a single, clear mandate focused on the delivery of support to — but operationally separate from — its clients. That would require a stronger reporting relationship with the Council; a leadership function headed by an Assistant Secretary-General and a new name.
Clear roles for the delivery of logistical support had been agreed with the African Union Mission. Encouraged by the Union’s efforts to generate the enabling units authorized as part of AMISOM, he said that, in parallel, UNSOA would support the establishment of those units in all sectors of the Union’s operations to support the opening of the main supply routes.
He would send Assistant Secretary-General for Field Support Anthony Nathan Banbury to Somalia from 18 to 20 October to follow up on the Council’s guidance. During Mr. Banbury’s visit, on 19 October, he would also address the Support Office staff.
The meeting began at 10:15 a.m. and ended at 10:20 a.m.