ENGLISH language classes for displaced women are now part of the standard offerings of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in conflict-ravaged Darfur, thanks to the crop of Jamaicans who were stationed there in 2008.

Darfur, situated on the western edge of Sudan, North Africa, has, since 2003, been the scene of violent clashes between rebels and government forces primarily over the unequal distribution of wealth between Africans and Arabs in the country. More than 400,000 people have been killed in the conflict and several thousands of men, women and children have been left homeless or displaced.

In line with its mandate to promote international peace and stability, the UN set up two peacekeeping missions in the area: African Union/ United Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur (UNAMID) and the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS). Eleven Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) members were deployed to UNAMID between 2008 and February of this year. Nine members, including five women, are however currently deployed to UNMIS.

“It is one of my biggest achievements,” says detective sergeant Nora Peters of the English classes.

Peters, a 17-year veteran of the Jamaica Constabulary Force who only recently returned to Jamaica from peacekeeping duties in Darfur, told the Sunday Observer the initial idea was hers but that her contingent commander deputy superintendent Oberlene Smith-Whyte and the rest of the Jamaican team worked on developing it.

They started the project in Tawilla, the village in which they were stationed, but the UNAMID soon adopted it for use in other areas.

The idea, Peters said, was born out of the realisation that Sudan was “a man’s world”.

When I just got there I was angry everyday because of how they treat women. For example, they (men) will open the door for other men but not for a woman.”

“I realised that a lot of men were being employed [by the UN] as language assistants but I only saw one woman (among them). I think it is because it is mostly men who go to school, so as gender officers we thought of how we could uplift the lives of women so we set up language classes for them,” she said.

While in Darfur, Smith-Whyte, Peters, and the remaining three females assigned there that year, went to Kenya to be trained as gender officers in order to put more emphasis on women and children affected by the conflict.

As gender officers, they established a gender desk at the local police station, from which they were able to assist female victims of crimes, who would otherwise not have made reports to the station’s all-male staff.

Another strategy the Jamaicans used to build trust and encourage relationships with the displaced women was to host “cook days” where the peacekeepers, as far as possible, prepared meals popular in their home countries, and served the women.

Sergeant Ava Lindo’s work also focused on women. She was deployed to Liberia for a year and a half from July 2004 to January 2006 and did a lot of work trying to interest women to join the local police force to fill positions best suited for women.

“Woman Corporal Marva Wilson and I were part of the recruitment team at the time so both of us went into communities and schools and gave talks to encourage young girls that were aspiring, now that the UN was doing something new with the police service, to (become part of the organisation),” Lindo said.

At the time, Liberia was emerging from a 14-year civil war in which women had been severely traumatised, both physically and emotionally. The UN’s mission was to disarm and demobilise the rebels, then reintegrate the suffering into a restructured society.

“And so as part as the restructuring process was training because they were looking at retraining the police persons that they had there persons.”

Lindo said she had to pull from deep within her to be able to mentor torn, distrusting, depressed women, but she’d do it again in a heartbeat. She found it fulfilling, she says, both on a professional level where she saw her mentees grow and develop, and on a personal level.

And that is the goal of peacekeeping, according to Sergeant Mark Goffe, who was deployed to Timor-Leste, formerly East Timor.

“Peacekeeping is about capacity building and leaving a country better than the way we found it,” he said.

To this end, he said his Jamaican team members undertook training of police in the conflict stricken countries on to do “international policing”, to include taking statements and writing reports.

“We may have been small in number but we played a significant role in Timor-Leste,” says Goffe. “If there was anything that couldn’t get done, they (UN peacekeepers from other countries) asked the Jamaicans.”

Goffe was assigned to the former East Timor for one year between August 2007 and August 2008. He said his job was made easier by the fact that he was Jamaican. “When you tell then you’re Jamaican it’s like they know you already… They can’t speak English but they can sing Bob Marley songs,” he said, laughing.

But why would a law enforcement agent leave Jamaica, with all its ills, to foster peace in a far away land?

“We are here as Jamaicans and we cannot single-handedly handle everything that needs to be handled. In recent times we realise that we have gone back to the (International Monetary Fund). Can we do it by ourselves? No. I think we need help from outside agencies and international bodies and so we of course sourced some help.

“In the same way there are other people who are yearning and who are in more critical situations than we are in so if we can give service, we should. No man is an island, no man stands alone,” reasoned Lindo.

“The JCF’s mantra is service. Service is not limited to the coast of Jamaica so for me, in that aspect of it, I go wherever I shall serve,” she added.

Peters and Goffe had similar views. They just wanted to broaden their influence and their ripples of service.

Goffe, who is assigned to the Passport, Immigration and Citizenship Agency in Jamaica, thinks the experience has made him better at his job. In fact, all three former peacekeepers the experience has made them better law enforcers by exposing them to and making them become tolerant of other people and their cultures. They have also said their sojourn in Sudan, Timor-Leste, Liberia and Lebanon have taught them to be more appreciative of life in Jamaica where things like having a shower, sitting down rather than squatting when using the toilet, eating meals that comprise foods other than green bananas only, and not having to walk miles in the desert to fetch firewood, are taken for granted.

The International Day of UN Peacekeepers was observed on Saturday May 29 under the theme ‘Haiti Standing’ in memory of those who lost their lives while serving as peacekeepers, especially the 96 serving in the United Nations Stabilisation Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) when the January 12 earthquake struck.

In a ceremony at the Hilton Kingston hotel a day earlier, the Government of Jamaica, through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade formally recognised and saluted the contribution of Jamaicans who have served as UN peacekeepers over the years.

More than 110,000 men and women from 120 countries around the world currently serve as peacekeepers in 16 missions. Of the total number of volunteers, Jamaica accounts for 20 spread across three missions – Sudan, Timor-Leste and Haiti.