Can UN Peace-keepers bring Peace To Darfur?

The question should not be whether UN peacekeepers can bring peace to Darfur , but why they can't or shouldn't. The world has had enough of armchair rhetorics where resolutions are reached but nothing concrete is achieved on the ground while hundreds of thousands of lives are wasted.

The United Nations Security Council is a branch of the United Nations charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the United nations charter, include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, the establishment of international sanctions, and the authorization for military action. Its powers are exercised through the United Nations Security Council mandated by resolutions of the General Assembly, to which most independent African states including Sudan belong.

That in itself is the legal mandate of the UN as a force that should move ahead and tackle the Darfur question. Many arguments have been raised against using the UN peacekeepers as a combat force, because the argument advanced is that it is only peacekeeping they are there for,not war. The moral question one needs to ask is whether violation of human rights by Warlords through the support by Sudanese authorities is not a justifiable reason to use force.

How many more innocent blood must be shed before UN moves in to bring peace? A lot of debate has been raised regarding the legality or not of deploying UN forces for combat purposes, and to their real or actual mandate. But as debate goes back and forth, millions of lives have been lost in Rwanda, Congo, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast.

Only when lives have been lost do we see a belated action by UN. Sudan as a member of the AU, and the UN is legally and morally obligated to adhere to the UN charter. Failure to adhere to any of its resolutions, tacitly or otherwise means a violation, which now gives the UN authority to carry out its mandate to safeguard human rights and dignity. If the US government could invade Iraq and Afghanistan in the name of war on terror, then it is hard to envision why a combined UN Security Council and General Assembly cannot say that enough is enough to the Darfur farce, and move in to bring sanity and peace in the horn of Africa.

A peaceful Africa, means a prosperous continent. A prosperous African continent translates into fewer refugees running to Europe or elsewhere to seek economic and social security. Huge financial and human resources come into play to maintain refugees. It is time therefore that the UN lived up to its mandate to create a lasting solution to these artificial wars. If possible their mandate should include deposing latter-day despots who are keeping Africa forever stagnated.