In Hindsights
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In March, an event took place that has raised a number of questions about the relationship of the Security Council with the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
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Parting Reflections of Executive Director Ian Martin
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The fact that procedural votes are occurring more frequently—there have been five since 2014, whereas there were only two in the decade prior to that—may be a reflection of the difficult dynamics in the Council in recent times, as well as the willingness of members to push for the Council to address specific issues, in spite of opposition from some members. Procedural votes can also be viewed as a useful way to of raise awareness and create a record of the Council’s efforts to engage on critical issues.
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In 2017, the Council held the highest ever number of public meetings since it was created. It was also a year that saw the most vetoes cast since 1988, but among the resolutions that were adopted, there was a drop in non-consensual decision making. There was a fall in the total number of decisions taken—resolutions and presidential statements.
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Six draft resolutions were vetoed in 2017, the most since 1988, and five of them focused on the use of chemical weapons in Syria. The Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) of the OPCW and the UN was the centerpiece of the Security Council’s efforts to determine responsibility for the use of chemical weapons in Syria. It was established throughresolution 2235on 7 August 2015, largely a result of negotiations between the US and Russia. Three consecutive vetoes by Russia led to its termination at the end of 2017, dismantling what had been one of the rare examples of Council action on the Syria file.
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For much of its existence, the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC)—created as an advisory body to the Security Council, the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council—has been looked at cynically by some members of the Security Council as not providing much added value to the Council’s work. The UN general membership and staff in the UN Secretariat have also often viewed the PBC as something of a disappointment. Council members, particularly the P5, have questioned its ability to advise on conflict-affected situations and have found its meetings redundant, duplicating discussion and information provided by the Secretariat during Council sessions. The PBC’s supporters, in turn, have criticised the Council for not being receptive to working with the PBC, thus limiting its ability over the years to demonstrate its value. Tensions have existed since the PBC’s creation in 2005, which occurred as Security Council reform stalled, with the P5 seeing the PBC as a forum created by member states to discuss peace and security issues, encroaching on the prerogatives of the Security Council.
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The children and armed conflict agendahashad a difficult few years. Increasingly complex crisishaveled to a deteriorating situation for children in conflict situations and a rise in violations against them.
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Following weeks of negotiations over most of the summer, the Council reached agreement on 30 August on a new version of the compendium of its working methods, commonly referred to as “Note 507”. The document was elaborated under the leadership of Japan, in its capacity as chair of the Informal Working Group on Documentation and Other Procedural Questions, the venue for most discussions regarding the Council’s working methods.
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More than two years ago, the High-Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (HIPPO) issued its report, with recommendations to ensure better design and delivery of UN peace operations. Since then, there has been little discussion by the Council of the...
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The year 2017 marks the tenth anniversary of the Security Council’s earliest consideration of climate change. During the past decade, it has been a matter of some controversy whether or not the Council is an appropriate body to address this issue. Numerous Council members have underscored the security implications of climate change, but China, Russia and other countries have expressed concern that the Council’s engagement on this matter encroaches on the prerogatives of other UN organs, notably the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council. Despite the political tensions associated with addressing climate change, the Council has over time managed to engage with this issue in two open debates, in formal meetings covering a wide range of emerging threats to peace and security, and in informal Arria-formula meetings.
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On 15 June, the Security Council adopted apresidential statementon Yemen, which focused on the country’s humanitarian crisis and confidence-building measures related to Hodeidah port. It was the Council’s first product on the Yemen war in nearly 14 months, with the exception of the annual resolution that it adopts to renew the Yemen sanctions regime. In total, the Council has adopted five decisions on Yemen since the start of the Saudi Arabia-led intervention on 26 March 2015:resolution 2216, two resolutions to renew the sanctions measures and two presidential statements. This output contrasts with the Council’s activity regarding other major wars and humanitarian crises, such as those in South Sudan and Syria.
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In the past few years, the Security Council has devoted more and more time to open debates. From 90 hours in 2013, the cumulative duration went up gradually to more than 160 hours in 2016. Most open debates in the last several years have been thematic, with situation-specific ones, other than the quarterly Middle East open debate, being rare exceptions.
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In the first half of April, the Council was engaged in a series of contentious meetings and negotiations on Syria that culminated in Russia’s eighthvetoof a Syria resolution since October 2011.
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The Council has created several tools with considerable potential to enable its members to increase their own access to and understanding of gender-related conflict analysis in the various country settings on its agenda. Council members have adopted new practices as well as continued using existing ones to respond to some of the recommendations of the three UN peace and security reviews conducted in 2014-2015 on peace operations, peacebuilding and implementation of resolution 1325 to this same end. Our research report,Women, Peace and Security: Closing the Security Council’s Implementation Gap, examines significant recent developments in the Council, most notably the establishment of the Informal Experts Group on Women, Peace and Security and, for the first time, inviting women’s civil society representatives to brief the Council at country-specific meetings.
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One of the most important tasks the Security Council is mandated by the UN Charter to perform—and one of the things that it does least well—is to prevent violent conflict. In recent years, wars have erupted in the Central African Republic, Mali, South Sudan, Syria, Ukraine and Yemen, among other cases, while political solutions to long-standing conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Darfur, for example, have proved elusive, with civilians suffering the brunt of the fighting. Humanitarian crises have become more pronounced, and there are now some 65 million people displaced by conflict worldwide, the highest number since the establishment of the UN in the wake of World War II.
