UN peacekeepers start new fiscal year on tight budget

United Nations peacekeepers begin the fiscal year today on at tight budget. Although peacekeeping programs are funded by a coalition of member states, the upcoming US budget proposes to half Washington’s contribution to the UN, which normally makes up almost a third of the organisation’s annual budget.

Spending on UN peacekeepers will be reduced from $8.2 billion to roughly $7 billion in the coming year in anticipation of cuts. This reduction will be accompanied by closing missions in the Ivory Coast, Haiti and Liberia—states which have been deemed stable enough to support their own security governance, despite ongoing threats to peace and security.

Recently proposed counter-terrorism UN operations in Sub-Saharan Africa have also lost their funding, highlighting inconsistencies between the Trump administration’s anti-ISIS rhetoric and distaste for long-term investment. Similar countering violent extremism initiatives across the Muslim world, including community-building and youth engagement programs from Bangladesh to Sudan, fear the loss of the UN’s “state-building” funds and now expect to fend for themselves.