Formed Police Unit (FPU)

The majority of Police Officers serving in United Nations peacekeeping operations are deployed as part of a Formed Police Unit (FPU). An FPU consists of approximately 140 Police Officers, trained and equipped to act as a cohesive unit capable of accomplishing policing tasks that individual Police Officers could not address. Well-trained FPUs can operate even in “high-risk” environments. FPUs have three core duties: public order management, protection of United Nations personnel and facilities and support to such police operations that require a concerted response but do not respond to military threats. FPUs were deployed for the first time in the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) and in the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) in 1999. In both missions the United Nations had full responsibility for enforcing the law and dealing with threats to public order. Since then, the deployment of FPUs has increased from nine units in 2000 to 71 authorized FPUs in 2016, with over 10,000 Police Officers.