United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone

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UNAMSIL
operation area Sierra Leone
German name United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone
English name United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone
French name Mission des Nations unies in Sierra Leone
Beginning October 22, 1999
The End December 31, 2005
management Daudi Ngelautwa Mwakawago ( Tanzania )
December 2003 to December 2005
Alan Doss ( Great Britain )
July to December 2003
Oluyemi Adeniji ( Nigeria )
December 1999 to July 2003
Deaths 192
costs 2.8 billion US dollars
Location of the operational area LocationSierraLeone.svg

The United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone , or UNAMSIL for short (German: Mission of the United Nations in Sierra Leone ) was launched on October 22, 1999 by the United Nations Security Council . This peace mission , which followed the UNOMSIL ( United Nations Observer Mission in Sierra Leone ) observer mission , was supposed to guarantee the agreements of the Lomé peace agreement regarding the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of fighters of the civil war parties. Their goal was to end the civil war that had raged in Sierra Leone since 1991 and was waged with extreme brutality. The final abandonment of the civil war parties, however, forced a British military operation ( Operation Palliser ).

Although UNAMSIL, which lasted until December 2005, is considered one of the exemplary peace missions of the United Nations, it was initially almost on the verge of failure when several hundred of its soldiers were kidnapped by the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in May 2000 , which also terminated the ceasefire . After another round of negotiations with Charles Taylor involved , the hostages were released; as a result, UNAMSIL was able to disarm 75,000 fighters, force the supporters of the RUF to give up and stop the illegal trade in diamonds that had financed the weapon purchases (" blood diamonds ").

At the same time, a number of civil measures were implemented, such as the establishment of the Special Court for Sierra Leone to try war criminals and a " Truth and Reconciliation Commission " ( Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission modeled on the South African Truth Commission ) to reconcile perpetrators and victims. Citizens of Sierra Leone were educated in human rights . Together with other UN organizations, the country's economy was reorganized with the aim of quickly creating jobs and income for the disarmed and now hopeless young fighters. Schools and hospitals were built.

UNAMSIL had an authorized strength of 13,000 soldiers ( UN Security Council Resolution 1289 ), which was increased to 17,500 in January 2001 ( UN Security Council Resolution 1346 ). After the pacification of the country, the United Nations Integrated Office for Sierra Leone (UNIOSIL; German: Integrated Office for Sierra Leone of the United Nations ) began work.

Germany also supported the mission. A team from the Technical Relief Organization (THW) was responsible for the maintenance and repair of the generators of the UN peacekeeping force, thus ensuring the power supply for the peacekeeping mission. The THW ended its operation in December 2006.

In 2014, the whole sequence of UN programs by Ban Ki-moon was viewed in retrospect as a success.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wolf-Christian Paes: bpb: Peacebuilding: Sierra Leone. In: ecoi.net - European Country of Origin Information Network. Retrieved August 8, 2015 .
  2. ↑ Sierra Leone | bpb. In: www.bpb.de. Federal Agency for Civic Education, accessed on August 8, 2015 .
  3. ↑ https://www.thw.de/DE/Aktion/Einsaetze/Ausland/Projektgebiete/Sierra_Leone/sierra_leone_node.html
  4. ↑ Transcript of the Secretary-General's Remarks at Joint Press Conference with President of Sierra Leone , un.org, March 5, 2014