MMUN Simulation 2018 Background Guide Peacebuilding Commission 1
Table of Contents Introduction to the Committee 3 History 3 Committee Background 4 Mission Statement 5 Topic Overview 5 Resolving the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Venezuela 5 Topic A: Resolving the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Venezuela 6 Introduction 6 History and Description of the Issue 6 Current Status 8 Block Positions 9 Sources 11 2
Introduction to the Committee The Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) is an intergovernmental advisory body that supports peace efforts in conflict affected countries, and is a key addition to the capacity of the International Community in the broad peace agenda. History The Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) is one of the new entities created by the reform process initiated during the 60th session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, as part of the 2005 World Summit Outcome. The PBC was inaugurated on June 2006, with the inclusion of Burundi and Sierra Leona as first cases of the Commission, as previously requested by the Security Council, in order to develop a country-specific model aiming to contribute to the implementation of the post-conflict tasks in each of both countries. The new environment and challenges brought by the post September 11 system of international relations spurred the Secretary-General Kofi Annan to seek for new proposals and solutions in order to reform certain sensitive area of the UN system. This approximately was the mandate of the High Level Threat Panel. Annan announced the membership of the 16-member Panel in a letter, dated November 3, 2003, addressed to the President of the General Assembly, Julian Robert Hunte (Saint Lucia). Mr Anand Panyarachun, former Prime Minister of Thailand, was appointed to chair the high-level panel on global security threats and reform of the international system. The Panel was asked to analyse and assess future threats to peace and security and to evaluate existing approaches, instruments and mechanisms, including the organs of the UN system. In this view, the Panel was specifically asked to: Examine today's global threats and provide an analysis of future challenges to international peace and security; Identify clearly the contribution that collective action can make in addressing these challenges; 3
Recommend the changes necessary to ensure effective collective action, including but not limited to a review of the principal organs of the United Nations. The final report of the High-level Panel, named "A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility," set out a number of recommendations to address problems and issues in six main areas of concern on which the multilateral system should concentrate its action now and in the decades ahead: war between States; violence within States (civil wars, gross violations of human rights and genocide); poverty, infectious diseases and environmental degradation; nuclear, radiological, chemical and biological weapons; terrorism; and transnational organized crime. Considering the second point, the analysis of the panel identified "a key institutional gap: there is no place in the United Nations system explicitly designed to avoid State collapse and the slide to war or to assist countries in their transition from war to peace." Since the United Nations should be able to act coherently and effectively from preventive action through post-conflict peace-building, the panel recommended to establish a Peacebuilding Commission as a subsidiary body of the Security Council itself. As it is stated in the report, "the core functions of the Peacebuilding Commission should be to identify countries which are under stress and risk sliding towards State collapse; to organize, in partnership with the national Government, proactive assistance in preventing that process from developing further; to assist in the planning for transitions between conflict and post-conflict peacebuilding; and in particular to marshal and sustain the efforts of the international community in post-conflict peacebuilding over whatever period may be necessary". Committee Background The United Nations Peacebuilding Committee () was created by the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council in December 2005. The committee works towards 4
creating strategies for peacebuilding and post-conflict recovery. It also serves as a bridge between other relevant UN bodies trying to solve the conflict in order to increase the overall coordination and efficiency of the strategies. It advocates for conflicted nations, with their consent, in order to bring the international community s attention to issue. The provides a comprehensive approach to peacebuilding that focuses on security, development, and maintaining human rights in the region. Mission Statement The committee s goal is to promote and establish peace in post-conflict nations, as well as to achieve peace in nations currently experiencing conflict. As delegates, you should immerse yourself in global affairs and provide insightful solutions to restore peace. We hope this experience will make you conscientize about the effect each of us have in the society we live in. As chairs, we hope this simulation will aid in forming future leaders who will successfully run our nations. Topic Overview Resolving the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Venezuela Venezuela is in the midst of an unprecedented economic and political crisis marked by severe food and medicine shortages, soaring crime rates, and an increasingly authoritarian executive. Critics of President Nicolas Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Chavez, say Venezuela s economic woes are the fruit of years of economic mismanagement; Maduro s supporters blame falling oil prices and the country s corrupt business elites. Critics are accusing President Nicolas Maduro of moving towards a dictatorship, and want him to resign. But Maduro argues the opposition is conspiring with foreign entities, specifically the US, to destabilise the country. 5
Topic A: Resolving the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Venezuela Introduction The crisis in Venezuela is the socio economic and political crisis that Venezuela has undergone since Hugo Chávez's tenure and which extended over the years into the current presidency of Nicolás Maduro. It is the worst economic crisis in Venezuela's history. He is the successor of Hugo Chavez, the president that implemented the socialist model in Venezuela. In 2016, opposition lawmakers took a majority in the legislature the National Assembly for the first time in nearly two decades. However, the Maduro government has taken steps since to consolidate the president s power, holding heavily disputed elections to replace the legislature with a constituent assembly comprised entirely of government supporters. Maduro s actions, which have been met with massive protests and international condemnation, threaten to delegitimize the results of the 2018 presidential election. History and Description of the Issue Chavez, a former military officer who launched an ill-fated coup in 1992, was elected president of Venezuela in 1998 on a populist platform. As a candidate, he railed against the country s elites for widespread corruption, and pledged to use Venezuela s vast oil wealth to reduce poverty and inequality. Chavez, whose rhetoric often drew inspiration from Simon Bolivar, the Venezuela-born revolutionary of the nineteenth century, aimed to align Latin American countries against the United States. He led the formation of ALBA, a bloc of socialist and leftist Latin American governments, and established the Petrocaribe alliance, in which Venezuela agreed to export petroleum at discounted rates to eighteen Central American and Caribbean states. Chavez also greatly expanded the powers of the presidency. Shortly after he took office, voters approved a new constitution that allowed him to run for another term, removed one chamber of Congress, and reduced civilian control over the military. In 2004, two years after he was briefly removed from office in a coup, Chavez effectively took control of the Supreme Court by expanding its size and appointing twelve justices. In 2009, he led a successful referendum ending presidential term limits. Chavez remained popular among the country s poor throughout his 6
presidency, expanding social services including food and housing subsidies, health care, and educational programs. The country s poverty rate fell from roughly 50 percent in 1998, the year before he was elected, to 30 percent in 2012, the year before his death. Maduro, who narrowly won the presidency in 2013, pledged to continue his former boss s socialist revolution. I am ensuring the legacy of my commander, Chavez, the eternal father, he said after the vote. The state-run petroleum company, Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA), controls all the country s oil exploration, production, and exportation. As global oil prices fell from $111 per barrel in 2014 to a low of $27 per barrel in 2016, Venezuela s already shaky economy went into free fall. That year, GDP dropped 10 to 15 percent and inflation soared to an all-time high of 800 percent. By late 2017, revenue had dropped by $100 billion and the country owed some $150 billion to foreign creditors while it held just under $10 billion in reserves. Many critics fault the Chavez government for squandering years of record oil income and accuse PDVSA of gross mismanagement and cronyism. In 2017, more than fifty employees associated with the national oil industry had been arrested on charges of corruption and embezzlement in recent months. In November of that year, Maduro appointed military general and loyalist Manuel Quevedo to the helm of both PDVSA and the oil ministry, prompting accusations of undemocratic consolidation of power. Venezuela s economic crisis is marked by soaring inflation and shortages of food, medical supplies, and staples like toilet paper and soap. Experts say the government s strict price controls, which were meant to keep basic goods affordable for the country s poor, are partly to blame. Many manufacturers in the country cut production due to limits on what they could charge for their goods. Another policy contributing to the country s economic problems are currency controls, first introduced by Chavez in 2003 to curb capital flight. By selling U.S. dollars at different rates, the government effectively created a black market and increased opportunities for corruption. A business that is authorized to buy dollars at preferential rates to purchase priority goods like food or medicine could instead sell those dollars for a significant profit to third parties. In December 2017, the official exchange rate was ten bolivars to the dollar while the black market rate was more than nine thousand bolivars to the dollar. Experts say widespread expropriations have further diminished productivity. Transparency International, which ranks Venezuela 166 out of 176 on its perceived corruption index, reports that the government controls more than five hundred companies, most of which are operating at a loss. Observers have characterized the situation in Venezuela as a humanitarian crisis. In 2016, the Venezuelan Pharmaceutical Federation estimated that 85 percent of basic medicines were unavailable or difficult to obtain. Hospitals lack supplies like antibiotics, gauze, and soap. Infant mortality in 2016 increased 30 percent and maternal mortality 65 percent over two years prior, according to government figures. Diseases like diphtheria and malaria, previously eliminated 7
from the country, have reemerged. Poverty has also spiked. In 2016, a local university study found that more than 87 percent of the population said it did not have enough money to buy necessary food. Another study found that 30 percent of school-aged children were malnourished. According to a 2016 report from Human Rights Watch, the Maduro administration has vehemently denied the extent of the need for help and has blocked an effort by the opposition-led National Assembly to seek international assistance. Poverty and lack of opportunity are exacerbating Venezuela s high rates of violence. In 2016 Venezuela experienced its highest-ever homicide rate at 91.8 homicides per 100,000 residents, according to the Venezuelan Violence Observatory, an independent monitoring group. (The U.S. rate, by comparison, is 5 per 100,000.) Maduro s administration has deployed the military to combat street crime, but rights groups and foreign media have reported widespread abuses, including extrajudicial killings. The humanitarian crisis has spilled across Venezuela s borders with the number of Venezuelan asylum seekers more than doubling from 2016 to 2017. Thousands of desperate people have crossed into neighboring Colombia and Brazil, while others have left by boat to the nearby island of Curaçao. By some estimates, as many as 150,000 Venezuelans left the country in 2016 alone. Current Status In September 2016, Venezuela s electoral authority ordered the opposition to suspend a campaign to recall the president. The following month, the Supreme Court stripped the National Assembly of powers to oversee the economy and prevented the release of eighty political prisoners, including opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez. In March 2017, the judicial branch briefly dissolved the National Assembly. The court revised its order days later following an international outcry, but kept the legislature in contempt. A week later the government barred opposition politician Henrique Capriles, who narrowly lost to Maduro in the 2013 presidential election, from running for office for fifteen years. On July 30, Maduro s government held an election to replace the National Assembly with a constituent assembly that would have sweeping authority to rewrite the country s laws and constitution. Supporters of Maduro won all 545 seats, an outcome disputed by the opposition and independent observers. Maduro s Socialist Party won 17 of 23 gubernatorial elections in October and nearly 90 percent of mayoral elections held two months later. The races were condemned as neither free nor fair by the U.S. State Department and boycotted by the three main opposition parties over allegations of electoral fraud. In retribution, Maduro banned the opposition from participating in the 2018 presidential race. Maduro s consolidation of power threatens to delegitimize the results of the upcoming presidential election. Internationally arbitrated talks between the Maduro administration and the Democratic Unity Roundtable which primarily seeks a guarantee of fair elections have yet to 8
yield results. More than 130 people have been killed and 4,800 arrested in clashes between police and demonstrators since early April. In response, the government issued an indefinite ban on all protests. Government security forces have attacked, detained, or expelled journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. In 2017, Venezuela became one of two countries in the Western Hemisphere, along with Cuba, to be rated as not free by Freedom House. Block Positions United States The Trump administration says Maduro is behaving like a dictator trying to circumvent Venezuela's democratic institutions. The United States should involved in Venezuelan affairs for various reasons, and in fact they have an enormous leverage in the bilateral relationship. This nation is Venezuela s largest trading partner, and the main customer for its only significant export, oil(about 750,000 barrels a day). Cutting ties and/or been involved in a major conflict with them can really hurt Venezuela s economy. The members of the leadership would presumably not suffer their personal coffers are full but ordinary Venezuelans would experience unimaginable new levels of penury. The United States has imposed new sanctions on 13 senior Venezuelan officials, turning up the heat on the beleaguered government of Nicolás Maduro as opposition activists launched a 48-hour strike in protest against an upcoming vote they say will mark the end of democracy. Colombia Colombia is one of the neighbor countries with Venezuela, and one that has been affected deeply by it. Thousands of venezuelans flee to Colombia escaping the crisis their country is facing. Some 25,000 people cross the Simón Bolívar International bridge into Colombia every day. The crisis in Venezuela has triggered another one in Colombia, as the country struggles to adapt to its new role as a destination for migrants and refugees. There are currently an estimated 300,000 Venezuelans in Colombia, according to UNHCR statistics published in July this year. Colombia announced that it would grant temporary status to over 150,000 Venezuelans who entered the 9
country legally before 25 July but overstayed their visas. They will be permitted to work and have access to social services. An estimated 100,000 who crossed illegally will not have access to the new measure. Cuba The Financial Times has reported that Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos had flown to Cuba on a mission to convince Havana to support a regional diplomatic push to staunch Venezuela s growing crisis. Cuba and Venezuela became close allies in the late 1990s under the respective leaderships of Fidel Castro and his younger disciple Hugo Chavez, both now deceased. Their close personal and political relationship resulted in extensive Venezuelan aid to the Caribbean island and a shared strategy for promoting Latin American unity against U.S. influence in the region. Mexico The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Mexico expressed their willingness to contribute through diplomatic channels and in good faith to the peaceful solution of the crisis, with full respect for the sovereignty and the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. He added that in recent months, the Government of Mexico has expressed concern about growing violence and the deterioration of the democratic order in Venezuela, always urging the Government of the Republic and the various political actors to build an exit peaceful crisis. Argentina Hundreds of Venezuelans are making the 3,000-mile journey to Argentina every week, and that number is likely to increase amid the ongoing economic and social turmoil in the socialist nation, Argentine President Mauricio Macri said. They are very welcome, he said of the new arrivals. Just as Venezuela received Argentines who went into exile, or were forced into exile, during the dictatorship [1976-1983], we are receiving Venezuelans. The UN High Commission for Refugees opened up an office in Riohacha, in northeastern Colombia, to aid migrants, both Colombian and Venezuelan, who are entering the country with humanitarian needs and in need of international protection, the agency said. 10
Nicaragua The President of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, said that Venezuela will be victorious against alleged attacks by the Organization of American States (OAS). The Government of this country supports the constituent Assembly promoted by Venezuela. Some members of the Assembly of Nicaragua support Venezuela and claim that interventionism only worsens the political crisis in the nation's South. The Ambassador of Venezuela in Nicaragua, Javier Arrué, points out that his Government has declared war to interventionism. The Government of Nicaragua also supports the dialogue process promoted by Venezuela to form a National Assembly constituent (ANC) which will look for a solution to the problems facing this South American nation. Brazil Venezuelan crisis is spilling in Brazil, brother country to the west. Thousands have gone to Brazil, many entering via the border that Venezuela shares with the Brazilian state of Roraima. The unprecedented influx of Venezuelans is straining Roraima s already overburdened public health care system and clogging Brazil s system for processing asylum applications. Brazil is struggling to meet the urgent needs of Venezuelans who are victims of a humanitarian crisis. More than 12,000 Venezuelans have entered and stayed in Brazil since 2014, according to official sources. The number of Venezuelans moving to Brazil has increased more than five-fold from 2014, reaching 7,150 during the first 11 months of 2016. In March, the Brazilian National Council of Migration, which is part of the Ministry of Labor, approved a resolution to grant Venezuelans two-year residence permits, a move that could ease pressure on the overwhelmed Brazilian asylum process if adequately implemented. Sources United Nations Peacebuilding Commission. (n.d.). Retrieved November 13, 2017, from http://www.un.org/en/peacebuilding/ Peacebuilding Commission. (2017, July 22). Retrieved November 13, 2017, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/peacebuilding_commission Renwick, D. (n.d.). Venezuela Is in the Midst of an Unprecedented Crisis. Retrieved December 17, 2017, from https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/venezuela-crisis 11