In February, Major General Kristin Lund, Practitioner in Residence at PRIO, attended seminars in both Mali and the Netherlands. In 2014 Lund became the first woman Force Commander in UN history as the Force Commander of the United Nations Forces in Cyprus (UNFICYP). In 2017 Lund was appointed Head of Mission of the UN Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO) in Jerusalem.
In Mali, from the 17th to the 20th of February Lund was a keynote speaker at a forum on ‘People and Development’ with the theme Women, Peace, and Security: A look at the practices and the state of implementation of resolution 1325. Firstly, Lund spoke about the Nordic Women Mediators(NWM) network, which she has been a member of since 2015. Lund addressed both the goals and work of the network, which is to enable women mediators and peacebuilders to advance the inclusion and participation of women in all stages of peace processes, as well as to strengthen women’s participation in peace processes at all levels.
Lund was then asked to speak on her own experience of being the first woman Force Commander and Head of Mission in UN history. Lund highlighted how, as a leader, it is necessary to take action to move gender higher up on the agenda in both a political and a military environment. Lund described how this is complicated and must be a dynamic process depending on the complexity of the situation and environment. Furthermore, Lund also visited the Norwegian Embassy in Bamako, UN Women, the SSR- Commission, the Norwegian military and police personnel deployed to MINUSMA, DSRSG MINUSMA, Ecole de la Maintien de la Paix and the Norwegian Church Aid.
From the 24th to the 26th of February, Lund attended three different seminars in the Netherlands. On the 24th Lund spoke at the Ministry of Defense in Den Haag, and on the 25th she attended a lecture at the Military College in Breda. At both events she spoke about regional tensions in the Middle East and her own experience as the Head of Mission in UNTSO.
Leading up to the 20th anniversary of UN Security Council Resolution 1325, a series of events on conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) and UN Peace Operations are being held in New York, Oslo, and the Hague. As part of this series, Lund spoke at a seminar titled United Nations Peace Operations Addressing CRSV: The Role of Member States and UN Peacekeepers. The event was held in combination with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Embassies of Rwanda, Norway, and Bangladesh in the Netherlands. At this event Lund spoke about being a UN leader in complex environments and preventing, responding to, and mitigating CRSV.
