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The first United Nations peacekeeping operation was authorised by the Security Council in May 1948. An initial group of 36 unarmed military observers arrived in the Middle East to supervise a fragile truce in the first Arab-Israeli war. These were the first UN peacekeepers. More than half a century later, there have been 52 other UN peacekeeping operations, involving hundreds of thousands of military personnel in the now well recognised blue helmets. Importantly, 40 of these operations have been undertaken in the last twelve years. 14 and currently on-going. During these years 1,580 peacekeepers have been killed on duty and the UN's peacekeeping operations have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Peacekeeping is a technique, pioneered and developed by the UN, which defies simple definition. Peacekeeping operations have traditionally involved the deployment of primarily military personnel from different countries, under UN command, to help control and resolve armed conflict between hostile parties. Recent years however, have seen major changes in the global political landscape which have brought changes in the number and nature of conflicts brought before the UN.

The post-cold war period has been characterised by a proliferation of civil wars and other armed conflicts within States, threatening international security and causing massive human suffering. Peacekeeping, initially developed as a means of dealing with inter-State conflict, has been increasingly applied to intra-State conflicts and civil wars. Today's conflicts frequently take place between multiple armed factions with different political objectives and fractured lines of command. Peacekeepers have, as a consequence, found themselves in situations where ceasefire agreements are ignored, where consent to the UN's presence is called into question, and where government and State institutions have ceased to function or have broken down. Actions by irregular forces or militias, which ignore or wilfully violate humanitarian norms have complicated the peacekeeper's task.

The United Nations has no army and so each new peacekeeping operation must be designed from scratch, once authorised by the 15-member Security Council. At least nine votes in favour are required and any decision is subject to a veto by any of the Council's five Permanent Members (China, France, the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States). The costs are usually apportioned between the UN and member states, who also contribute troops, supplies, transportation and other equipment. The five Permanent Members pay the largest share of peacekeeping costs because of their special responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. The total cost of all UN peacekeeping operations in 1998 was some $907 million - equivalent to less than 0.2 per cent of global military spending.

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