Dealing with new dynamics of post-war violence: The Role of United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) during July 2016 crisis

During the last years peacekeeping operations have largely increased, especially in Africa. They are becoming complex operations due to a numbers of factors such institution building prejudges state-building; cultural gaps; bureaucracy; global economy crisis; and appearance of new dynamics of violent conflicts. Currently, most peacekeeping operations are multidi-mensional, which means that their tasks is not only focus on the maintenance of peace and security, but also in protecting civilians; assisting in the political process; protecting and pro-moting human rights; and assisting in restoring the rule of law; therefore, it includes compo-nents of peacebuilding and peacekeeping. In a multidimensional operation both peace oper-ations activities are interrelated and this nexus also created conflict between each other. UNMISS is a multidimensional peacekeeping operation that carry out peacekeeping and peacebuilding activities in a fragile country and with a history of violence. This study seeks to explore, analysing a violent conflict during July 2016, how UNMISS contribute to peacekeeping and peacebuilding in the complex context of post-war violence in South Sudan by analysing a violent conflict, by looking from three different perspectives: its mandate implementation; the situation in the host country and the actual resources and capabilities. The methodology used in this study is basically qualitative approach in-depth through primary and secondary data. A key finding of this research is that the peculiarities and circumstances (including contextual and operational factors), in which UNMISS oper-ates, makes it difficult to fulfill its tasks and; therefore, it affects the achievement of its short -term and long-term goals peacebuilding in South Sudan.