Robin Edward Poulton

Peace is Possible Robin Edward Poulton

After thirty years of civil war, the 1992 Paris Peace Accords ended fighting in Cambodia - but not yet peace. Cambodia remained full of firearms, explosives and warring factions. Every Khmer Rouge village was armed and fearful. This is the story of how we disarmed the Khmer Rouge, persuading them to give up their firearms in exchange for development projects. Then we burned the weapons so that they could never be re-used .... and so that the population would believe that peace had really come to stay. Exchanging Weapons-for-Development is now a common peace strategy. We invented it in Cambodia with European Union and United Nations support. Disarmament is an art, involving political brinkmanship and economic development. Soldiers are needed to register and store and destroy armaments, and to reassure other soldiers, but peace involves the police and the population: most especially the women and children who are the primary victims of war. Soldiers can agree a cease-fire, but soldiers do not negotiate peace. Women make peace. We discover in the Cambodian story that children love brightly coloured balloons, while women hate firearms because they threaten lives and increase domestic violence. This book is especially valuable for peace practitioners. Its checklists will help adapt lessons learned in Cambodia to Security Sector Reform projects elsewhere, using Weapons-for-Development or installing Weapon Management systems. If you enjoy a well-written story about peace, this book is for you.