Part 2: Still playing a key role in South Sudan, meet Brigadier Best
Brigadier Best is the Force Chief of Staff deployed to South Sudan in the United Nations Headquarters. He told us about his role and the situation in this north African country
At the beginning of the year, after four years, the UK Task Force in South Sudan returned home UN Peacekeeping mission in South Sudan. Despite the return of the British Army, the UK is still making an impact on the UN mission headquarters in Juba.
Here is part two of our interview with one of the Brits making an impact in the sub-Saharan country, South Sudan.
What does the United Nations do to protect civilians?
“One of the biggest pillars if you like of our mandate — there are six main pillars to the United Nations — is protecting civilians, and rightly so during the conflict. And it’s still absolutely a requirement now, and one of the aspects we intervene to protect civilians on a daily basis, but you might recall the protection of civilian sites, certainly, the UK components up in Bentiu but also Malakal will focus on some of the protection of civilian sites, and often we had a number of these sites around the country which are co-located with some of the UN camps. Because that’s where the civilians fled to during the various cycles of violence, and at its height, there was probably 200,000 civilians refugees in these UN camps, and they developed into a thing called protection of civilians at the site.
We are at an interesting time at the moment, so those sites are about to transition to government-run IDP camps (Internally Displaced Person camps) and there are many of those around the country. But the key point being is we’re transitioning those camps from UN-protected and UN-run to government-run, where we will continue to provide the humanitarian aid to those people.
On that wider point about a population of 11 million people, seven million of those required humanitarian assistance on a daily basis, and probably about four-and-a-half million of those people within the country are food insecure or acutely food insecure, which means that they don’t know where their next meal is coming from. So, that requirement absolutely remains, however, the positive thing is because to those civilians on those sites is not the same as it was, we’ve assessed that we can slowly transition those to government control which is a really positive side, and hopefully over time it will encourage those people to return to their former home locations or indeed return to what they see now as safe locations.
So that’s a big thing around protecting civilians and that’s very much a positive of the direction that South Sudan is going at the moment, albeit a relatively fragile piece, and particularly the protection of women and vulnerable people, which was also a focus of that protection of civilian sites.”
What about Conflict-Related Violence in the region?
“I think conflict-related sexual violence still remains a very big issue within South Sudan and an absolute focus for the UN efforts in terms of protecting people, the UN, I think is particularly well equipped in terms of the female representation. There is a real focus on gender and that’s not only within how we operate but also in the values that we uphold, and the help we try to give to the South Sudanese. So it’s an absolute focus and must be because those levels of conflict-related sexual violence remain far too high.”
What does the force actually look like, in terms of nations involved?
“It’s a really fascinating force. There are around 15,000 personnel, making it the biggest UN peacekeeping operation in the world.
Therefore, it’s probably representative of those nations that contribute most to UN peacekeeping operations around the world. It’s got a very heavy African element to it, and rightly so, and also a large Asian element to it as well. In outline, there are, certainly for the troop contingents — so those people that form the battalion’s and the engineer companies — the four troop bodies, there are about 34 different contingents for the troops, and that’s representative of about 14 different nations. But then when you look at the staff officers,
individuals in various parts of the force headquarters, whether that be at the force level or indeed the sector level. That’s made up of 63 different nations, so you can imagine what that brings to an organisation.”
How have you found working in the United Nations mission headquarters?
“I think we’re, from a UK perspective and from a NATO perspective, we’re used to a big part of the headquarters. When we go on operations, you prepare for those operations together, you deploy together, you recover together.
Within these UN missions, certainly with the staff officers, you are selected, you do a little bit of preparation in your home country to ensure that you’re competent to go, and then you get parachuted into the various headquarters, and you’re pretty much straight into the job that you’re doing.
It can be really challenging, depending on how well you know that mission that you are going into, and you’ll probably have a superficial understanding of it, so it can be really challenging. For my role within that, where I am the Chief of Staff and you’re trying to bring these people together and turn that direction into effective operations on the ground can be really challenging. But really interesting.
I say interesting because we all know diverse teams are probably the most effective once you get them up to a level of being a team so it’s that challenge to get that teamwork and those cultures working together but once they do work together, the output is fantastic and better because you have got all those different perspectives.”
Can you tell me the importance of the UN mission in South Sudan?
“With still a significant portion of the nation being at risk, it remains as important as ever that the UN continues to support the development of the country. Whilst the cycle of violence that South Sudan has had since 2013, the last major cycle of violence was in 2018, and it’s been subject to an agreement, so I think inter-governmental political violence is relatively stable.
But what we see is a huge increase in inter-communal violence, which is up probably more than 300% even at this time last year.
So the nature of the conflict has evolved and it’s only become more complex, therefore the role of the UN and the role of the force component within the UN remains as critical as ever in terms of protecting civilians, but also in terms of facilitating humanitarian aid to people in the country.
With a population of around about 11 million with 7 million of those people requiring humanitarian assistance and four-and-a-half million of those in dire food insecurity not knowing where their next meal comes from. So, that integrated mission where you protect the population, you provide humanitarian support whilst at the same time, try to develop this both fragile piece by both developing the government and all elements of good governance and security sector reform that forms a part of that.
Hopefully, you can change this fragile peace into something that is longer lasting, but I would highlight it does remain fragile so the UN will be required for a time yet I suspect.”
Final thoughts from yourself?
“Mmm… other that what we have already covered, we will continue — I would have thought for the foreseeable future — to have a small but carefully targeted contribution to the mission here in South Sudan irrespective of where our focus is elsewhere within the world or within Africa. Because this remains a priority.
Lastly from me, I am sure I will be joined along with my other UK counterparts out here in sending our very best wishes and love back to all our families back in the UK. These are relatively long and challenging deployments, we range here from between 9 and 12 months, and certainly, in these difficult times for everybody living with Covid, that’s been a particular challenge for the mission out here in order to manage its people through and even to sustain itself within the country and certainly, we’ve had some UK officers out here who have just returned after 9-months without any rest or recuperation.
Therefore not having had the opportunity to see their families, which I think is one of the realities of the current situation with this pandemic, which makes it even more challenging, but the contribution to the mission absolutely remains and I know its particularly valued from our presence out here.”
