Iran firmly rejects NATO cooperation with UN peacekeepers - Irna

Iran firmly rejects NATO cooperation with UN peacekeepers - Irna

Iran has strongly rejected the idea of using NATO forces by the United Nations where it is necessary to carry out rapid reaction operations, it was reported here Tuesday.

Iran's representative to the UN Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations, Hossein Maleki, said at the committee meeting on Monday that the world body had to observe principles embodied in its charter when it needed to launch peacekeeping operations worldwide.

Maleki's remarks came during the annual session of the UN's Peace Committee in New York where he put forward Tehran's principled stances on UN peacekeeping operations.

The envoy stressed that before any peacekeeping operation was to be undertaken by the world body it had to obtain the consent of all belligerent parties, and was obligated to prevent the use of force, observe neutrality, and respect the right of territorial integrity and political independence of all countries.

Referring to the idea put forward by a number of UN members of using North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces in UN rapid reaction operations, Maleki said he was strongly opposed to the deployment of NATO forces in UN peacekeeping operations.

"World states can participate in UN peacekeeping operations by contributing their national forces and there is no need to use forces of regional organizations outside the UN framework including NATO," Maleki said.

Moreover, he asked UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to look into cases of UN peacekeepers being mistreated in countries of their mission.

Maleki also urged Annan to investigate alleged offenses of UN peacekeeping troops in countries of their mission including reported cases of financial and moral misbehavior.

The Iranian envoy noted that investigations into UN peacekeeping forces' misbehavior as well as financial and managerial problems were within the powers of the UN General Assembly and outside the scope of functions of the UN Security Council.

Maleki also urged the United Nations to increase its budget for peacekeeping operations so that there would be no need to use forces of regional organizations outside the world body.

In any case, he said that if the UN were to cooperate with regional organizations (such as NATO), operations had to be tightly controlled by the world body and conducted under the UN flag.

Maleki also said that Tehran was ready to cooperate with the UN in peacekeeping operations in addition to current cases of cooperation with the body.

He suggested that UN set up regional training centers to train forces of countries that are sent to serve as UN peacekeepers.