UN peacekeeping command, control arrangements: Pakistan calls for 'refinement, improvements'

Pakistan has called for "refinement and improvements" in United Nations' peacekeeping command and control arrangements that would enable the field missions deployed in hotspots around the world to deal with violent situations more efficiently and effectively.
While acknowledging that the system was generally sound, Ambassador Masood Khan, Pakistan's permanent representative to the UN, underscored the need for evolving and adapting the concepts and doctrine of command and control to complex and multidimensional UN peacekeeping operations. "The peacekeeping command and control requires determination, direction and deployment of optimal strategic direction of political, military and civilian assets," he said while participating in a discussion sponsored by the Ireland's UN Mission to review the successes of command and control arrangements of UN peacekeeping operations.
In this context, Masood Khan recommended selection of professionally competent commanders having adequate operational experience to handle UN assets and troops, with UN experience a pre-requisite. He called for avoiding too much political interference in military matters, saying that things could go awry because of the dual key decision-making.
Masood Khan proposed closer involvement of the principal troop contributors, which include Pakistan, in the elaboration of the concepts of operations and the operational plans, as also in the drafting of missions' mandates.
He pointed out that the countries in the Security Council that decide on the mandates were not necessarily the ones which contribute troops.