Humanitarian Civil-Military Coordination (UN-CMCoord)

United Nations Humanitarian Civil-Military Coordination (UN-CMCoord) is necessary to promote humanitarian principles, and protect humanitarian operating space, in humanitarian response operations where both humanitarian/civilian and military actors are present.

Defined as the essential dialogue and interaction between civilian and military actors, OCHA is the focal point for UN-CMCoord within the United Nations system, providing the international community with the development and facilitation of guidelines on the use of Military and Civil Defence Assets (MCDA), a dedicated UN-CMCoord training programme, humanitarian support to military simulation exercises and deployable expertise.

OCHA plans, mobilizes and coordinates UN-CMCoord emergency response tools in support of Humanitarian Coordinators and humanitarian assistance operations. It promotes UN-CMCoord guidelines, deploys skilled humanitarian civil-military coordination officers and implements the CMCS training and exercise programmes.

Policy and Guidelines

Interaction between the humanitarian/civil community and the military (domestic and/or foreign forces) ranges from coexistence to cooperation. The role of UN-CMCoord is invaluable in avoiding competition, minimizing inconsistency and when appropriate pursuing common goals between these actors. 

UN-CMCoord underscores the importance of coordination as a shared responsibility, to include:

• Joint planning;
• Information sharing; and
• Task division, where practicable, between the humanitarian/civil and military communities.

These principles are underpinned by a set of internationally developed and agreed (non-binding) Guidelines. CMCS is the custodian of the “Oslo” and “MCDA Guidelines” on the use of military and civil defence assets in natural, technological and environmental and in complex emergencies respectively. OCHA also supports the development of country specific Guidelines.

Support to Military Simulation Exercises

Selected simulation exercises with a focus on humanitarian civil-military interaction, are supported from the initial planning phase through to physical delivery in order to ensure relevant and realistic humanitarian exercise play is included. In addition, OCHA coordinates participation on behalf of the humanitarian community, both within and outside OCHA, to procure appropriate humanitarian participation. 

At times, OCHA and other humanitarian organizations are unable to provide direct support to prioritized exercises, but in these cases assists the exercise organizers in sourcing appropriately qualified consultants.