Oh say it isn’t so? An actual article about the U.N. embracing Private Military Contractors? lol. All I have to say is that I am flabbergasted.
Now the rule of thumb here, is don’t be the typical customer and not care about what goes on with your contract or how it is written. If you actually care about the quality of the product, then hold the company you are contracting with to the standard written in the contract. It takes leadership, and I highly suggest using your powers of firing people or defaulting the contract, and get the service you want. Don’t do like the State Department, and look the other way while a company does a completely crappy job or embarrasses them. And don’t go cheap, because you get what you pay for in this industry–learn from everyone else’s mistakes and you will do well.
As to the companies involved with providing these security services to the U.N., all eyes are on you. The media and myself will be all over you, if you screw it up. If you apply Jundism to your contract, and just ensure that the U.N. gets good quality customer service and satisfaction, then you will do just fine.
By the way, I hope the author of this article, and the U.N. for that matter, understands that more than likely they are not getting all Royal Gurkha Rifles. They are probably getting Nepalese guards(former army and police), with maybe a few RGR’s mixed in. It would be like calling a bunch of U.S. mall guards, Green Berets. The Gurkha or RGR’s are Nepalese/British special forces, and it is disrespectful to those who really are Gurkha to confuse them with the regular guards. It’s a pet peeve of mine, because everyone that talks about the Gurkha usually have in mind the kick ass dudes that protect Madonna or the Sultan of Brunei, and that just isn’t the case. –Matt
——————————————————————
U.N. embraces private military contractors
By Colum Lynch
Sunday, January 17, 2010
For years, the U.N.’s top peacekeepers have been among the world’s staunchest critics of private security contractors, often portraying them as unaccountable mercenaries.
Now they are clients.
As the U.N. prepares to expand its operations in Afghanistan, it is in talks with a British security firm to send in scores of additional Nepalese Gurkhas to the country to protect them.
The U.N.’s top security official, Gregory Starr, the former head of U.S. State Department Security, has also been advocating an increase in the use of private security firms in Pakistan, where U.N. relief workers have been the target of kidnappings and killings, according to U.N. officials.
The embrace of a private security contractor marks a shift for the United Nations, which has relied on governments to supply peacekeepers to protect U.N. staff. In Iraq, the U.N. used a contingent of Fijian peacekeepers for protection. But it has accelerated its move toward hired guns in Pakistan since the Taliban launched an October attack against a U.N. residence, killing five U.N. employees, including two Afghan security guards, and triggered the withdrawal of U.N. personnel from the country.
Those officials will return along with an additional 800 U.N. staff that have been budgeted for the Afghan mission. The latest drive has been led by Starr, who relied heavily on private security contractors to protect American diplomats in Iraq and Afghanistan. Starr who joined the U.N. last May, once defended the security company Xe Services, formerly known as Blackwater USA, following allegations that it killed Iraqi civilians. “Essentially, I think they do a very good job,” he told Reuters in 2008.
Starr declined to discuss the U.N.’s policy. But a U.N. spokesman, Farhan Haq, responded on behalf of Starr. “He wanted you to know that our understanding of the current usage of the term ‘Private Security Contractors’ typically refers to contractors doing close protection work for movement security, such as Blackwater/Xe, Triple Canopy, Dyncorps, Aegis, and many other companies providing this type of service. However, the U.N. doesn’t avail itself of this type of service. We do use some private companies to provide static security guards at some sites in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but primarily rely on host countries to provide our security.”
Still, the trend has alarmed some U.N. officials and experts, who fear that the U.N. will not be able to hold private contractors accountable. “I am not a fan,” said Jean-Marie Guehenno, the U.N.’s top peacekeeping official from 2000 to 2008. “The signal from the international community is we care about you, but not to the point of risking our own boys, and that’s not a good thing,” he said.”This is a dangerous precedent for the U.N.,” added Jake Sherman, who served in the U.N. mission in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2005. Sherman recalls encountering a group of security guards that was hired by a western security firm to act as unarmed security guards at Afghan election sites. Sherman said they possessed concealed automatic weapons.
The use of private contractors has always been controversial at the U.N., which commissioned a feasibility study in the late 1990s to determine whether private military contractors could maintain security in the refugee camps established in Eastern Zaire following the Rwandan genocide. The idea was dropped as too costly and politically controversial. Today, there’s a U.N. special rapporteur who monitors their behavior, and routinely issues scathing reports on the alleged excesses of these firms, including the former Blackwater USA. The U.N. General Assembly has passed a resolution urging the U.N. to take precautions that its hiring practices don’t alter the international character of the U.N. or endanger its staff.
But a study by the Humanitarian Policy Group of security by the U.N. and other humanitarian organizations shows that U.N. peacekeepers have been quietly turning to private security, particularly in hazard stations like Somalia and Afghanistan. And the U.N.’s secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, recently confirmed that his organization will have to turn to the private sector to protect its people.
In Afghanistan, the U.N. has contracted an Afghan subsidiary of the London-based company, IDG Security Ltd., to provide 169 Gurkhas, according to figures compiled by the U.N. Mission in Afghanistan (some U.N. officials say there may be as many as 400 Gurkhas protecting U.N. officials). They are charged with supplementing security provided by the Afghan National Police.
Many U.N. officials in the field said it is naive to think you can rely on barely functioning governments to provide security for U.N. workers, particularly when they are being targeted by combatants or terrorists.
Nick Horne, a former U.N. political officer, said the Gurkhas were first brought in about three years ago because of concerns that the U.N. couldn’t count on the Afghans in a pinch. He recalled one incident in Gardez, when an Afghan police officer responsible for securing the U.N. compound there went on vacation, leaving his weapon with his 14-year-old son to stand guard.
“As a former beneficiary of this policy, I welcomed it. The gurkhas are professional, polite and discrete. It also frees up Afghan police for policing duties. Obviously it costs money — I don’t know how much — but it does enable the U.N. to continue operating in an increasingly hostile environment.”
Story here.