Charting a new course for UN peacekeeping

Around the world, UN peacekeepers with their blue helmets are the face of the United Nations. Blue helmet missions are one of the UN’s fundamental tasks – namely, international peacekeeping. Peacekeeping is an essential pillar of international efforts to promote peace and security. From South Sudan to Lebanon and Cyprus, UN peacekeeping missions play a crucial role in containing conflicts, protecting civilians and supporting sustainable peace processes. Around 70,000 soldiers, police officers and other civilian personnel are currently employed in 11 UN peacekeeping missions around the world. Germany, too, is a part of these efforts.

UN peacekeeping missions comprise a wide range of tasks. Besides military activities such as monitoring ceasefires, their mandates often contain civilian components. These include endeavouring to mediate between the parties to a conflict; supporting security-sector reform; destroying small arms; monitoring elections; establishing rule-of-law institutions and monitoring the human rights situation.

At the same time, UN peacekeeping missions face great challenges. New threats, complex conflicts and geopolitical challenges all require that UN peacekeeping be further developed and reformed.

UN Peacekeeping Ministerial focuses on future UN efforts in this sphere

This is the task that falls to the UN Peacekeeping Ministerial. Foreign and Defence Ministers from around the world are gathering in Berlin to discuss the future of UN peacekeeping. At the conference, the delegations will debate various approaches to present-day and future challenges, as well as announce specific pledges of support for UN peacekeeping missions.

The Ministerial is being co-organised by the Federal Foreign Office and the Federal Ministry of Defence. The Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community is involved when it comes to police-related elements of blue helmet missions.

By hosting the UN Peacekeeping Ministerial in Berlin, Germany is providing a forum for the development of specific contributions to the UN’s future peacekeeping efforts. The aim is to enhance the long-term effectiveness of UN peacekeeping missions, to promote greater acceptance of blue helmet missions and to improve security for peacekeepers deployed on these missions.

Germany is assuming responsibility for peace and security

With this UN Peacekeeping Ministerial, Germany is underscoring its long-standing commitment to UN peacekeeping missions. As a proponent of multilateralism, Germany is actively working to promote effective UN peacekeeping.

Germany’s efforts in this regard are not only political. By providing 6.1% of the overall budget for UN peacekeeping missions, Germany is the fourth-largest contributor, and it leads the list of donor countries that give extrabudgetary support to UN peacekeeping projects. Currently, Germany is contributing military, police and civilian personnel to five UN peacekeeping missions, as well as to one Special Political Mission.

Moreover, Germany supports UN peacekeeping through bilateral stabilisation and capacity-building activities, such as by seconding mobile training teams. As the largest contributor to the UN Peacebuilding Fund, Germany provides important impetus for coordination of activities in the spheres of peacekeeping, crisis prevention and sustainable peacebuilding.