Mandate Extension for Iran's Panel of Experts - S/RES/1984 (2011)

S/RES/1984 address a bureaucratic role of the organization in extending the mandate of the Panel of Experts that deal with the sanctions established to try to change the behavior of the Iranian authorities. It is interesting to point out that the resolution does not mention the country or any other identifying elements. The relationship with the sanctions that Iran is under is established through the citing of previous resolutions that deal with the Iranian situation. Other than those references, there is little that distinguishes this specific resolution from other extensions of mandates of Panel of Experts.

Dealing with Afghanistan through the UN mission - S/RES/1974 (2011)

S/RES/1974 addresses questions related to the stabilization of Afghanistan and the long-term work of the UN mission that exists in the ground (UNAMA). In this regard, they grant an extension of the mandate of the mission and reaffirms several agreements that have been established in the past. It also puts forward the importance of the UN efforts through the civilian side of the operation and the importance of the access for humanitarian assistance in the country.

No More Security Need for the Special Court for Sierra Leone - S/RES/1971 (2011)

S/RES/1971 is a resolution completely focused on altering the needs and requirements for action take became outdated or unnecessary in the changing international context. The United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) was providing security services for the Special Court for Sierra Leone, but they are deemed not required any more by the authorities that command the efforts in the area.

UNMIT gets a mandate extension and elections supervision duties - S/RES/1969 (2011)

S/RES/1969 deals mainly with the tasks that are delegated to the UN mission in Timor Leste (UNMIT) as they relate to the preparations for the 2012 elections in the country as well as the efforts on peacebuilding and institution building. It extends the mandate of the mission until late February 2012 and it also includes several elements that call for national capacity building in the country, specially when it comes to the development of judicial infrastructure and police capacities on the ground. Overall, it’s goals are closely related to continue the previous work of the organization in the country.

Arms and rough diamond controls under UNOCI - S/RES/1980 (2011)

S/RES/1980 deals with the extension of the mandate of the UN mission in the Ivory Coast (UNOCI) and it seeks to expand the goals of the mission on the ground, dealing with the current obstacles that they face. There are several calls for the mission to be concerned in the ground and also tries to enhance the authority and legitimacy of the new president that was instated after previous UN resolutions, such as S/RES/1975. There are several discussions and demands related to arms embargo and the demobilization of militias. It is a resolution that tries to encompass all the issues that are pending for the stabilization of the Ivory Coast.

Expansion of Sanctions after Elections in the Ivory Coast - S/RES/1975 (2011)

S/RES/1975 tries to address the issue of violence and lawlessness in a post-electoral environment in the Ivory Coast. To achieve this goal, the resolution augments the sanctions regime that was already in place in the country and take action related to the freedom of the press and the humanitarian situation on the ground. Those efforts are shown amidst calls for cooperation from all parties, condemnation of the violence as well as calls for the end of violence, combined with a strong call for the lifting of the siege of a hotel. The strong wording of the resolution closely relate to the broad mandate that was defined under S/RES/1609.

Inter-mission Cooperation in Africa - S/RES/1981 (2011)

S/RES/1981 exists to govern the extension of the transfer and redeployment of troops and assets from the mission in Liberia to the Ivory Coast. It is based on letter provided by the Secretary-General as it relates to the role of the redeployed assets in the region. The document contemplates an extension of the authorization for the redeployment of the assets.

3 Infantries, 1 Aviation Unit and 2 Military Helicopters - S/RES/1968 (2011)

S/RES/1968 mainly regulates and extends the period that there will be redeployed troops from the mission in Liberia (UNMIL) to the mission in the Ivory Coast (UNOCI). There is very little added to the deployment of troops, but only the call to extend the possibility of the redeployment while calling for the States that contribute with both military and police troops to do so in order to enable the deployment to take place.

Helicopters and Troops from Liberia to Ivory Coast - S/RES/1967 (2011)

The S/RES/1967 deals with details of inter-mission cooperation between the UN mission deployed in Liberia and in the Ivory Coast. In this sense, there is a discussion and determination of how the two mission will deal with the re-deployment of forces currently located in Liberia to the Ivory Coast, establishing deadlines and number of troops and equipment that is going from one mission to another. The arrangement has since been expanded at different times, but this resolution is part of this effort to exchange deployed forces.

The end of UNMIS means the start of UNMISS - S/RES/1997 (2011)

S/RES/1997 is one of rarest resolutions that the United Nations Security Council ever issues. The document order the withdrawal of the troops of the UNMIS from the country and it to be deployed to the new missions in the region, the UNMISS and UNISFA. This is one of the rare moments in the workings of the Council in which the mandate of a mission was not extend, but rather let to expire. Nonetheless, the UN presence in the region did not change as a result of this change, since from the writing of the resolution one can assume that all the assets will just be redeployed.

An UN mission formed before the country - S/RES/1996

South Sudan is a new country that has many birth-certificates within the archives of the United Nations Organization, one of them is S/RES/1996, which establishes the United Nations Mission in the Republic of South Sudan (UNMISS). It is dated before the establishment of the new republic and due to this fact it calls for its actions to be adopted after the proclamation of the new independent state. It sets out to determine the very broad mandate of the mission in the country as well as the several calls for cooperation among the relevant regional actors. The tasks assigned to the mission are related to basic elements of governance, such as specific actions related to institution-building in the region and core government functions, such as basic services.

South Sudan membership - S/RES/1999 (2011)

S/RES/1999 is one of the most important and most simple resolutions that the United Nations Security Council can issue. The resolution only states that they have examined the application of the Republic of South Sudan and that it recommends that the General Assembly to admitted the country to membership. There is very little information on the resolution, the important elements regarding the application of the country to the organization are not on the resolution but rather in other documents sent to the organization.

Dealing with Somali Pirates - S/RES/1976 (2011)

S/RES/1976 addresses the issues of Somali piracy that took place in the coastal region of the country earlier in the year. The largest portion of the document is dedicated to the call for establishment of domestic law that address piracy and armed robbery at sea. The overall resolution aims at addressing the lack of law enforcement capability from the countries in the region while seeking for help from the broader international community. All in all, the resolution has an strong tone but still put forward constraints to the possible actions that can be taken by the enforcers of the law enforcement actions.

UN Mission Interaction in Africa - S/RES/1609 (2005)

The resolution 1609 deals with the integration of the mission of the United Nations in Ivory Coast, (UNOCI) with its nearby missions in Sierra Leone and Liberia and also with the change of the mandate related to the first mission. The overall goal of the resolution is to integrate the efforts of the different portions of the military efforts that are taking place in the region. The mandate that is developed through the resolution encompasses most of the activities possible that might take place in the efforts of the peacekeeping mission and the peace-building in the nation. In this regard, it is a pretty extensive mandate that goes from issues of elections to the actual building of the authority of the State.

Relief Coordination in Somalia - S/RES/1972 (2011)

S/RES/1972 should be seen as a UN response to humanitarian issues that took place in Somalia. The response mainly consists on lifting temporarily some of the sanctions that are currently imposed on the country, as a way to provide some humanitarian relief for the local population. This lifting of the sanctions is to be highly regulated through reports to the Council and the efforts of an Emergency Relief Coordinator.

DPRK takes the “dis” out of Disarmament - I Think Therefore IR

From my note on North Korea's chairmanship of the Conference on Disarmament, I expanded the comment on another blog. I Think Therefore IR is an effort from mostly University of Exeter graduate students to bring discussions related to IR in general and IR theory to a general audience.

DPRK takes the “dis” out of Disarmament

The United Nations’ members are trusting its Conference on Disarmament to the North Koreans. If that does not sound strange enough to you, allow me to remind you that since their first missile test in 2006, the country is under UN Security Council sanctions based on S/RES/1718. A sanctions regime that was reinforced and augment in S/RES/1874, that established a Panel of Experts as a response to actual nuclear test. So what was announced on June 28th, 2011 through a press release is that a country that is currently under Security Council sanctions for weapons proliferation violations will be chairing a United Nations organ whose mission is to stop the proliferation of weapons. This action undermines the credibility of the Conference on Disarmament and of the UN system as whole. It shows that the very organization that established the sanctions regime does not take it into consideration when voting for leadership roles.

Read more

Extension of Panel of Experts - Sudan - S/RES/1982 (2011)

S/RES/1982 is one of the simplest resolutions possible at the United Nations Security Council. It extends the mandate of a Panel of Experts appointed in 2005 and renewed several times before. In this case it is a Panel that deals with issues related to the situation in Sudan. In this regard, it is one of the bureaucratic necessities that existed in the UN system to allow one of its parties to have a longer shelf-life.

Quick Response to South Sudan Referendum - S/RES/1978 (2011)

S/RES/1978 is a short and straight forward response to the referendum that took place in South Sudan and voted for the transformation of that region into an independent country. In this regard, the main goal of the resolution can be seen as assuring the international community and the interested parties in South Sudan that the United Nations will support the results from the ballot box and that it will assist in implementing those results. The resolution extends the mandate of the mission in Sudan temporarily, until July 9; a time in which we can probably expect a new resolution to be released establishing a new mission on the region, possibly under a different name.

Mandate Extension and Elections in the DR Congo - S/RES/1991 (2011)

S/RES/1991 addresses questions related to the electoral process in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, while working through some of the peacekeeping and peacebuilding efforts that the UN mission, MONUSCO. The fundamental concern expressed throughout the resolution is indeed with the safety of the electoral process and the possible human rights violations that have taken place in the region. It recognizes the challenges that lay ahead of the mission, otherwise there would be no point in extending the mandate, while congratulating of previous efforts. This is a very common occurrence among UNSC resolutions, but the generality of the sentence does apply to S/RES/1991, as it really discuss the security improvement and as well as the concerns.

Cooperation between Peacekeeping Mission - S/RES/1992 (2011)

S/RES/1992 (2011) deals with an interesting aspect of cooperation between peacekeeping operations. The United Nations currently has missions deployed in bordering Liberia and Ivory Coast and there are issues in the region that are shared by the two missions. Some of these border issues are being addressed through inter-mission cooperation arrangements and by the exchange of military personnel between the two deployed forces.

Renewing 1973's UNDOF in the Middle East - S/RES/1994 (2011)

S/RES/1994 is another exercise in extension of mandate in a UN peacekeeping operation that has been going on for a while. In this case it is the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force that is placed in the border between Israel and Syria since S/RES/338 (1973) and has been in place since the end of the Yom Kippur War and remains there since. This time frame makes the UNDOF one of the oldest peacekeeping operation established by the UN.

Extending the former Yugoslavia tribunal - S/RES/1993 (2011)

S/RES/1993 is a simple resolution that resides in the realm of bureaucratic necessities in order to extend the life of temporary institutions. In this resolution they address the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and its judges. The whole enterprise gets its life extended until December 31, 2012 this extended time is designed to conducted and finish the trails of the individuals under the tribunal .

New Peacekeeping Operation in Sudan UNISFA - S/RES/1990 (2011)

S/RES/1990 creates a new peacekeeping mission in Africa, this time in south Sudan to deal mainly the backlash of the possible of the creation of a new country. The efforts of the mission are closely related to the political development that is taking place in the country towards pacification. The mandate is related to redeployment of forces, de-mining operations, delivery of aid and also building a policy force. The force is designed to be up to 4,200 in military numbers and it is supposed to last six months.