Mandate and Institutional Environment

In the DPA, the parties request UNMIBH to monitor, observe and inspect judicial and law enforcement activities, including conducting joint patrols with local police forces, to advise and train law enforcement personnel, to analyze the threats to public order, advise government authorities on the effective organization of their police forces, and to facilitate improvements in law enforcement (cf. ICG 2002: 5).⁷⁰ IPTF was not armed nor mandated to enforce local laws. It therefore depended in the implementation of their mandate or on the consent of the parties (Dziedzic and Bair 1998: 270). Where the implementation of the Dayton Agreement ran contrary to the will respective parties, IPTF was in essence unable to act and react, at least in the beginning of the mandate.

The mandate of UNMIBH was a political compromise from its beginning, and not the result of deliberate planning or a needs-means analysis. On the Bosnian level, the constitution, provided in Annex 4 of the Dayton Agreement, did not create a functional but rather a weak central state with two strong entities, three constituent people, ten quite independent cantons, and effectively three armies and three police forces (ICG 2001: 20) – a rather difficult environment to implement a wide mandate. The maintaining of a “safe and secure environment for all persons” rested with the signatories themselves, with IPTF and IFOR only in assisting roles (Dziedzic and Bair 1998: 269). Although Richard Holbrooke as the US Special Envoy wanted IPTF and IFOR to have strong mandates, the Pentagon rejected a robust mandate after the failures in Somalia and Rwanda, and rejected plans to integrate military and police functions, as this would involve UN staff in the military chain of command (ICG 2002: 4-5). As a result for IPTF, the Police Commissioner as head of IPTF had no enforcement powers, but only recourse to notify the High Representative or the

68 S/RES/1035, 21 December 1995.

69 Dayton Peace Accords, Annex 11: Agreement on International Police Task Force [http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/intdip/bosnia/day21.htm], seen on 30 August 2004.

70 S/RES/1035, 21 December 1995, para. 2,3.

IFOR/SFOR Commander, of any violations.⁷¹ But notifications did not oblige any international actor to draw consequences or react.

The mandate of IPTF ended on 31 December 2002.⁷² Additional to this, significant changes concerning the scope of tasks given to IPTF have been made through the following Security Council Resolutions:

- Resolution 1088 outlined that IPTF should intensify its work in giving advice to law enforcement agencies on democratic policing principles, in investigating or assisting with investigations into human rights abuses by local law enforcement personnel, to report on their compliance with IPTF-prescribed guidelines and their actions to implement these.

This could include dismissal where deemed appropriate by the IPTF Commissioner due to failing to cooperate with the IPTF or adhere to democratic policing principles.⁷³

- Resolution 1103 increases the international civilian police staff maintaining law and order in the internationally administered town of Brcko.⁷⁴

- Resolution 1107 again expands IPTF’s human rights investigation tasks. Its main points are the increase of staff of 120 additional officers for human rights investigations, acknowledging the fact that if IPTF was to implement its mandate in a satisfying manner, it would have to move from a police force with primarily generalist functions to one with a substantial number of police experts in specialized fields. A request to member states to provide “qualified police monitors” for these purposes was included.⁷⁵

- In following the conclusion of the Bonn Peace Implementation Council Conference of 9-10 December 1997, the Security Council endows IPTF with the task of creating special training units for “key public security issues” (returns, organized crime, drugs, corruption, terrorism, crowd control/crisis management) (Monk 1999 Annex 1:3), and calls for cooperation between agencies working on judicial and legal reforms (such as OSCE and Council of Europe).⁷⁶

- In order to be able to fulfill all new tasks, UNMIBH was granted an additional 30 posts.⁷⁷

71 Dayton Peace Agreement, Annex 11, Art. IV Para. 2.

72 S/2002/618, 5 June 2002.

73 S/RES/1088, 12 December 1996, para. 28; Cordone 2000: 193.

74 SC Res. 1103, 31 March 1997.

75 SC Res. 1107, 16 May 1997, para. 2

76 S/RES/1144, 19 December 1997, cf. http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/missions/unmibh/mandate.html, seen 2 September 2004.

77 S/RES/1168, 21 May 1998.

- With Resolution 1184, the Security Council approves the establishment of a “programme to monitor and assess the court system in Bosnia and Herzegovina, as part of an overall programme of legal reform”, and thus provides an important foundation of UNMIBH’s further work on judicial reform.⁷⁸ The program became known as the Judicial System Assessment Program (JSAP).⁷⁹

IPTF’s mandate only provided a very basic framework for implementation.⁸⁰ As stated by UN Staff, the key frustration was that the mandate was insufficiently “robust”. Policing was added to the DPA as the last part, Annex 11.⁸¹

3.1.1.2. Institutional environment

UNMIBH consisted not only of IPTF, although it was its main part and task. A Civil Affairs Unit was responsible for policy advice as well as for the achievement of political support among local authorities for UNMIBH’s work. The SRSG was furthermore in charge of coordinating the UN System in Bosnia-Herzegovina, including the UN’s humanitarian assistance. Civilian Affairs Officers were co-deployed with the CIVPOL colleagues at 20 IPTF stations throughout the country, and monitored in cooperation with UNHCR population movements and political developments. UNMIBH furthermore was responsible for establishing a Mine Action Center, which was operational as of 20 May 1996, and thereafter the lead agency for de-mining and the development of indigenous de-mining capacity (US GAO 1998: 6). The Public Affairs Office was to support the mission by raising public awareness and level of information. Furthermore, the administration of UNMIBH covered the human resources and financial management of UNMIBH, UNMOP, and UN Liaison Offices in Belgrade and Zagreb. Two Trust Funds, established in 1994 (Restoration of Essential Public Services in Sarajevo) and 1996 (Police Assistance Programme), were administered as well.⁸²

Equally important for the cooperation concerning the implementation of the mandate was the presence of the Office of the High Representative, which was the main implementing body of the civilian parts of the DPA, in contrast to the military components, which were followed up by NATO’s Implementation Force (IFOR). The Office of the High Representative had

78 SC/RES/1184, 16 July 1998, para. 1

79 See http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/missions/unmibh/mandate.html [seen 13 December 2004].

80 Shashi Tharoor formulates that the Dayton agreement was “a masterpiece of diplomatic drafting but largely unimplementable as an operational directive” (cited in Williams 1998: 25).

81 On the importance of policing in the DPA, Richard Monk brought up the example of Annex 8, which dealt with the restoration of public monuments, and only Annex 11 was concerned with policing. In today’s policy environment, it would be in place 2 (Author’s interview with Richard Monk, 21 September 2004).

82 [http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/missions/unmibh/background.html], seen 2 September 2004.

difficulties in establishing its initial presence, and lacked authority to coordinate the international actors in place. Furthermore, it had no authority over IFOR, which made coordination and cooperation in the absence of consultation mechanisms a difficult task (Williams 1998: 61).