IN RESPONSE TO BRAHIMI REPORT, COMMITTEE ON STAFF SECURITY

Press Release
3 July 2008

Hopes Brahimi Panel recommendations will be implemented more effectively
than those issued after Baghdad bombing


The Independent Panel on Safety and Security of UN Personnel and Premises World-wide, headed by Mr. Lakhdar Brahimi, has released a sobering report which while it indicts the Organization for failing “to develop a culture of accountability in security management,” appears to insulate “the higher echelons of the hierarchy, including the Secretary-General from the System’s passivity observed by the Panel.

The report shows that the UN and particular individuals failed to do their duty, and in ways somewhat similar to the circumstances leading up to the 19 August 2003 attack against the United Nations in Baghdad. While the Under-Secretary-General for Safety and Security took the honorable course of action by resigning, the Staff Union’s Committee on the Security and Independence of the International Civil Service does not believe that fault solely lies with one person.

In the name of accountability, the Committee calls on the Secretary-General to take fully responsibility for the insufficient implementation of the security management system approved by the General Assembly. It further calls upon him to immediately take action to prevent future tragedies from occurring and staff from being endangered; to immediately remove any individuals that failed in their duties; and to swiftly implement the reforms and recommendations of the Brahimi Panel. The Committee urges – for the safety of all staff – that more effective reforms be instituted that will prevent loss of life on the scale experienced in Baghdad or Algiers.

The Committee is not enthused by the appointment of Mr. Ralph Zacklin—an insider who has served as a legal counsel of the United Nations peacekeeping operations—to head an “independent” accountability group that will review the responsibilities of the key individuals and offices connected with the attack on the UN premises in Algiers. The apparent conflict of interest of some members of the group, and their track record at the UN, does not portend a restoration of confidence and morale among the staff. Reliance on senior UN officials to conduct a peer review on accountability issues has proven to be a failure in the past, a situation which the long overdue reform of the internal justice is expected to rectify.

The Committee welcomes the bulk of the recommendations of Mr. Brahimi’s panel, especially with regard to ensuring adequate and sustainable funding for security and safety; establishing the principle of “no programme without security; the urgency of reorganizing the constituent security management structures into a single unified system; the importance of having a reliable, appropriate, and robust information technology (IT) support system to develop information and knowledge, critical to security analysis and threat assessment; and the Panel’s reiteration that safety is half the mandate of DSS and that a dedicated Safety Unit should be established within DSS with competent staff and resources to enhance the safety of UN personnel and to develop a system-wide guidance on air safety.

U.N. had warning of terror attack

By Betsy Pisik
Washington Times

NEW YORK — U.N. and Algerian officials were warned in advance of a December terrorist attack in Algiers that killed 17 U.N. staffers but they failed to boost security measures at the U.N. compound, a preliminary report says.

"The hostile intent against the U.N. in Algeria was present and well-known before the attack," David Veness, U.N. undersecretary general for safety and security, wrote in a 20-page preliminary report, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Times.

Six months before the attack, "the media branch for [al Qaeda in the Maghreb] issued a direct threat against the U.N.," Mr. Veness wrote.

Beginning in April, the U.N. security coordinator for the Algerian compound sent a series of urgent messages to headquarters in New York, warning that the likelihood of an attack on the compound housing seven U.N. agencies was "high" and that damage would be "severe."

In subsequent warnings, Babacar Ndiaye of Senegal, the U.N. security coordinator, sought barriers to protect the compound and other measures.

Despite the warnings, the compound remained at "Phase 1" of a five-level security system used by the United Nations — a level considered safe enough for U.N. staffers to bring their families to live overseas.

Mr. Ndiaye died in the Dec. 11 attack that killed 17 and injured at least 40.

Shortly afterward, al Qaeda claimed credit for the bombing, boasting that it used nearly a ton of explosives against "the den of international apostasy."

Local press reports shortly after the attack quote Algerian Interior Minister Noureddine Yazid Zerhouni as saying that the government had reason to expect an attack because in April, authorities had arrested a man with surveillance video of the site on his cell phone.

That man, an al Qaeda associate, was wanted in connection with an April 11 attack on the presidential palace in Algeria and a nearby police station.

It was the deadliest attack on the United Nations since the August 2003 Baghdad bombing that killed 22, and forced the organization to leave Iraq for more than a year.

Islamist turmoil has plagued Algeria for years. Up to 200,000 people were killed in a civil war that began in 1992 after the army canceled elections that a now-banned Islamist party was poised to win.

The war ended a decade later, but an Islamist insurgency continued.

By 1996, however, the situation was calmer and the Algerian government began complaining to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan that security precautions stigmatized Algeria with "an undeserved bad image abroad to the extent that it kept out foreign investment," according to the Veness report.

The U.N. subsequently lowered the threat level in stages, ultimately to its lowest level.

Mr. Veness also wrote that the Algerian government was slow to respond to repeated requests for additional security.

He said "care has been taken not to apportion blame or responsibility."

The warnings were received at the U.N. headquarters in New York, but it is not clear from the Veness report how the U.N. responded.

The U.N. Staff Union, a New York-based organization that represents many but not all U.N. employees, has called for a full investigation to find out why better protections were not in place.

The group has publicly questioned why the formal risk assessment for that duty station was so relaxed, given the threats and attacks on foreigners and government buildings.

Just two weeks ago, the United Nations announced the formation of a seven-member panel to review U.N. security arrangements around the world.

Though the review is in response to the Dec. 11 attack, it will not focus on how so many red flags were missed in Algiers, said senior U.N. official Lakhdar Brahimi, who is in charge of the project.

Mr. Brahimi told a press conference last month that the blue and white U.N. flag was no longer a symbol of neutrality and protection, but in fact a target.