• Pakistan calls for adequately funded missions, clear mandates
• Urges stronger protection for peacekeepers
WASHINGTON: Pakistan has urged the United Nations not to allow financial constraints and cost-cutting measures to weaken its peacekeeping operations, warning that reductions in resources could undermine the organisation’s ability to maintain international peace and security.
The warning comes as UN peacekeeping faces mounting financial and political pressures.
The General Assembly approved a $5.1 billion budget for operations for 2026-27, about 10pc lower than the previous year’s allocation.
Last year, a funding crisis forced the organisation to reduce mission expenditures and repatriate a quarter of its uniformed personnel.
Against this backdrop, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative, Ambassador Syed Haider Shah, called for reforms that improve the effectiveness of peacekeeping without sacrificing the capabilities needed to carry out its mandates.
“What is needed is the political will in the Security Council to use this important instrument when circumstances require,” he told the Fourth Committee of the 81st session of the UN General Assembly on Friday.
Pakistan is one of the largest and longest-serving contributors to UN peacekeeping. Ambassador Shah noted that peacekeeping operations face increasingly complicated political and security environments. Growing reliance on regional arrangements and ad hoc operations, he argued, demonstrated that the need for a credible UN presence remains undiminished.
Welcoming the UN secretary general’s review of operations, Pakistan outlined six reform priorities: giving primacy to political solutions, ensuring focused and adequately resourced mandates, preserving institutional strengths, preparing for future military and police requirements, improving peacekeeper safety and maintaining peacekeeping as a collective UN responsibility.
A central concern was the widening gap between responsibilities assigned to missions and resources made available. Mr Shah cautioned against allowing financial ceilings to determine operational requirements.
He argued political objectives must first establish a mission’s goals; the mandate should then determine required personnel, equipment and financial resources. Peacekeeping missions can help stabilise conflict situations, protect civilians, sustain ceasefires and preserve space for negotiations. But these functions depend on political processes and adequate operational capabilities working together.
Pakistan also urged member states to preserve the distinctive advantages of UN peacekeeping, including universal legitimacy, predictable financing, established command systems and the ability to draw specialised capabilities from across the UN membership.
“Efficiency and cost reduction must therefore strengthen peacekeeping, not hollow out the capabilities that give UN peacekeeping its unique value,” the ambassador said.
Welcoming the secretary general’s first report on accountability for crimes against peacekeepers, Ambassador Shah also noted the appointment of Assistant Secretary General Elizabeth Spehar as senior focal point on the matter.
He called for the resolution’s effective implementation through stronger investigations and prosecutions, better tracking of cases and greater support for national capacities to ensure that those responsible for attacks on peacekeepers were brought to justice.
Pakistan stressed the importance of the Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations (C-34), describing it as the universal intergovernmental forum for shaping policy.
“Peacekeeping remains a vital, effective and cost-efficient means for ensuring peace and security,” Mr Shah concluded.
Published in Dawn, November 8th, 2026
