United Nations: India has called for expeditiousaction to evolve a peace building process that would assist needy countrieswith funding, mobilise donor support and design policies to consolidate peace.

The painful history of the post-world war years illustratesthe fragility of peace in post-conflict societies, said Nirupam Sen, India'spermanent representative to the United Nations, citing Nietzsche  peaceis an interregnum between two periods of war.

"To reiterate the metaphor of steering, if 31 pilotsargue over a ship's steering wheel, the ship will only run aground," hesaid asking member countries to expeditiously find common ground on the role ofthe Peacebuilding Commission (PBC).

"In India'sview, that common ground lies in recognizing that the goal is to assistcandidate countries with funding, mobilise donor support and design policiesthat would consolidate peace," Sen said.

"It was thus self-evident that the PBC is not merelyabout donors of money and recipients, but also about provision of advice andpolicy support, both through 'learning by example' and through assistance indesigning policies based on the specificities of the society concerned,"he said.

Since one size clearly does not fit all and what works in asmall and more homogeneous country may not in a large and fractured state, Sensaid it is important to focus on whether resources are going to the mostimportant place - institution-building.

"We also believe that there is no gainsaying the factthat the lead actor in any post-conflict peacebuilding instance must be thenation concerned," he said.

"We believe that we need to renew our focus and ourcommitment to the larger cause of assisting the candidate countries that arebefore us. We need to listen more closely to their concerns and react withgreater dispatch to their requests,"he said.

"If we do so, in a manner that most directly addressestheir concerns, we will not only be able to assist the states concerned in theprocess of post conflict peace consolidation, but would have also demonstratedthe efficacy of this new mechanism that the PBC is" Sen said.

"This would have beneficial effects ranging from a moreresult-oriented discourse within the PBC, to greater donor willingness toassist not only the candidate countries themselves, but also to fund the PBC,"he said.

In India'sview "the 'teething troubles' of which we are wont to speak, can beaddressed once we place the larger picture and the overarching goal beforeourselves," Sen concluded.