Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T20:15:59.588Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

2 - Peacekeeping in the new world disorder

Australia's response, 1991–96

from Part 1 - Strategy and policy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 May 2022

David Horner
Affiliation:
Australian National University, Canberra
John Connor
Affiliation:
University of New South Wales, Sydney
Get access

Summary

This chapter describes the Keating Government's approach to peacekeeping in the context of international affairs and Australian defence and foreign policy. During the life of this government, from December 1991 to March 1996, it further limited Australia's commitment to the former Yugoslavia, but decided to send troops to Somalia in 1992–93, to send police and military personnel to Mozambique in 1994, to provide military support to the peace process in Bougainville in 1994, to send a contingent to Rwanda in 1994–95 and to send police to Haiti in 1994–95. The stories of most of these latter missions will be told in subsequent volumes, but the general policy framework is described here as it affected decisions about the continuing management of Australia's involvement in maritime sanctions (Operation Damask), the elimination of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (Unscom), Cambodia, Yugoslavia and Western Sahara, which continued well into the time of the Keating Government. Before looking at Australia's approach to peacekeeping under this government, however, we need briefly to outline the changes in international affairs during this period.

The New World Disorder

The year of 1992 began with high optimism that the United Nations would be able to play a major role in resolving conflicts around the world. At the beginning of the year Boutros Boutros-Ghali, a former Egyptian Deputy Foreign Minister, succeeded Javier Pérez de Cuéllar as UN Secretary-General. With the increasing number and complexity of UN peacekeeping operations, on 31 January the Security Council invited Boutros-Ghali to prepare an ‘analysis and recommendations on ways of strengthening and making more efficient within the framework and provisions of the Charter the capacity of the United Nations for preventive diplomacy, for peacemaking and for peace-keeping’. In response, on 17 June 1992 Boutros-Ghali delivered a report, An Agenda for Peace, which set out the different roles of peacekeeping-type operations and changed the lexicon of peacekeeping. He defined the terms ‘preventive diplomacy’, ‘peacemaking’, ‘peacekeeping’ and ‘post-conflict peace-building’. Among many recommendations, he suggested that member states make armed forces available ‘on a permanent basis’ for both peacekeeping and peace enforcement tasks.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Good International Citizen
Australian Peacekeeping in Asia, Africa and Europe 1991–1993
, pp. 16 - 38
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2014

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Gration, Peter, ‘Forces play vital role in world peace’, Australian, 22 May 1992, p. 32Google Scholar
Sibley, David, ‘Serving with UN forces ‘preferred option”’, Canberra Times, 1 August 1992, p. C1Google Scholar
Parkinson, Tony, ‘Australia takes more of the peace action’, Sunday Age, 20 December 1992 Google Scholar
Mills, Stephen, ‘UN duty leaves thin khaki line at home’, Financial Review, 5 January 1993, p. 4Google Scholar
Stewart, Cameron, ‘What price peace?’, Australian, 18 January 1993, p. 7Google Scholar
Munro, Ian, ‘UN operations will halve nation's defence: expert’, Sunday Age, 10 January 1993, p. 6Google Scholar
Walker, Jamie, ‘Role in UN peacekeeping forces at limit: Gration’, Australian, 16 April 1993, p. 5Google Scholar
Stewart, Cameron, ‘Peacekeeping deflects defence force – Dibb’, Australian, 27 May 1993, p. 1Google Scholar
Stewart, Cameron, ‘Over here or over there?’, Weekend Australian, 29 May 1993, p. 18Google Scholar
Cumming, Fia, ‘Push for new UN peace role’, Sunday Herald Sun, 4 April 1993, p. 27Google Scholar
Eccleston, Roy, ‘Peacekeeping force needs more training: army chief’, Australian, 24 June 1993, p. 5Google Scholar
McPhedran, Ian, ‘Peace-keeping “not a priority”’, Canberra Times, 23 June 1993, p. 20Google Scholar
Grey, J.C., ‘Peacemaking/peacekeeping: The Australian Army view’, Asia–Pacific Defence Reporter, June–July 1993, p. 8Google Scholar
Stewart, Cameron, ‘Ray calls for regional peace force’, Australian, 29 July 1993, p. 2Google Scholar
Jones, Bruce, ‘Australia's warning on UN peace keeping’, Sun-Herald (Sydney), 12 September 1993, p. 2Google Scholar
Jennings, Peter, ‘Applying the Evans test to serve the national interest’, Financial Review, 14 October 1993, p. 16Google Scholar
Evans, Gareth, ‘Recognising the peacekeepers’, Australian War Memorial, 22 October 1993 Google Scholar
Cole-Adams, Peter, ‘Evans changes tack on need for UN force’, Canberra Times, 19 July 1994, p. 3Google Scholar
Pearce, Ruth, AS International Organisations Branch, to Evans, 3 August 1994 Google Scholar
Stewart, Cameron, ‘Ray rejects UN plea for military engineers’, Australian, 23 February 1995, p. 7Google Scholar
Stuart, D., Director UN Political and Commonwealth Section, DFAT, to C. Moraitis, Foreign Minister's Office, 14 February 1995 Google Scholar
Kearns, Graham, Acting FAS International Policy, to Defence Minister, 18 April 1966 Google Scholar
McCarthy, Phillip, ‘UN head's plan may thwart Evans's ambition’, Sydney Morning Herald, 15 April 1995, p. 6;Google Scholar
McCarthy, Phillip, ‘Army for UN gains support’, Age, 29 September 1995, p. 9Google Scholar
Barker, Geoffrey, ‘Ray lashes out at UN “body bags”’, Financial Review, 2 August 1995, p. 7.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×