Obstruction and intimidation of peacekeepers: How armed actors undermine civilian protection efforts
| DOI | 10.1177/0022343318800522 |
| Date | 01 March 2019 |
| Author | Allard Duursma |
| Published date | 01 March 2019 |
| Subject Matter | Research Articles |
Obstruction and intimidation
of peacekeepers: How armed actors
undermine civilian protection efforts
Allard Duursma
The Center for Security Studies (CSS), ETH Zu
¨rich
Abstract
While recent research focuses on why conflict parties attack peacekeepers, little attention has been given to other
types of resistance against peacekeeping missions, such as intimidation and obstruction. It is argued in this article that
one reason why peacekeepers are obstructed and intimidated is that armed actors that target civilians want to
maintain the operational space to carry out attacks against civilians and want to prevent peacekeepers from mon-
itoring human rights violations. A spatially and temporally disaggregated analysis on resistance against peacekeepers
in Darfur between January 2008 and April 2009 indeed suggests that the intimidation and obstruction of peace-
keepers is more likely to take place in areas with higher levels of violence against civilians. The findings hold when
taking into account the non-random occurrence of violence against civilians through matching the data. Finally,
anecdotal evidence from other sites of armed conflict than Darfur suggests that resistance against peacekeepers in
these cases is also likely to be related to the targeting of civilians. This suggest that in order to be effective in
protecting civilians, peace missions should not only be robust as highlighted in previous research, but peace missions
should also develop an effective strategy to deal with armed groups that try to prevent peacekeepers from fulfilling
their mandate.
Keywords
Darfur, intimidation, obstruction, peacekeeping, resistance, violence against civilians
Introduction
Recent research has begun to address what explains vio-
lent attacks on peacekeepers (Fjelde, Hultman & Lind-
berg Bromley, 2016; Salverda, 2013). However, little
attention has been given to other types of resistance
against peace missions, such as the intimidation and
obstruction of peacekeepers. In this article, I argue that
intimidation and obstruction are used strategica lly by
armed actors that want to prevent peacekeepers from
fulfilling their mandate. While the mandate of peace-
keeping missions can include many different focal
points, a prominent aspect of most contemporary peace-
keeping missions is the protection of civilians (Hultman,
2013). However, armed actors try to undermine a peace-
keeping mission’s ability to protect civilians through the
obstruction and intimidation of peacekeepers. Intimida-
tion can instil fear into peacekeepers, making them
reluctant to move to areas where civilians are targeted.
An explicit threat to use violence is thus a fundamental
characteristic of intimidation. Refusing peacekeepers
access to areas where civilians are targeted naturally also
prevents peacekeepers from protecting civilians; and,
crucially, it prevents peacekeepers from gathering infor-
mation on human rights abuses. This article investigates
how violence against civilians influences the intimidation
and obstruction of peacekeepers.
Consider the following examples of sabotage efforts of
peacekeeping activities in the Darfur province in Sudan.
On 30 October 2014, Sudanese government troops car-
ried out attacks against the civilian population of the
town of Tabit in North Darfur. Several civilians were
Corresponding author:
duursma.allard@gmail.com
Journal of Peace Research
2019, Vol. 56(2) 234–248
ªThe Author(s) 2018
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/0022343318800522
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