New York, March 30 (RHC)-- Cuba has demanded at the UN that deciding and deploying peacekeeping operations be carried out under the strict observance of principles in the Charter of the United Nations.

In statements at the UN Security Council's open high-level debate on actions to improve UN peacekeeping operations, Cuba's Permanent Representative Anayansi Rodríguez stressed that the role in designing policies and strategies related to peacekeeping operations should continue to lie with the UN General Assembly and that its Special Committee for those operations should be the only forum with a mandate on the peacekeeping issue.

The Cuban UN representative recalled that peacekeeping operations are not a substitute for solution to the root causes of conflicts.  She called for the observance of the guiding principles established for carrying out the peacekeeping missions, such as consent by the parties, impartiality and the use of force only in self-defense.

Ambassador Anayansi Rodríguez also demanded that peacekeeping operations be guided by respect for the sovereignty, territorial integrity, political independence of the states and the non-intervention in their internal affairs.