2. The UN exhibited widescale incompetence in Bosnia and Somalia, placing the interests of its soldiers before those of civilian populations subjected to massacre and terror. The peacekeeping forces exhibited inertia and indecision while the combatants, notably the Serbs, proceeded with massacres and atrocities, bombings of civilians, food blockades, selective destruction of villages and neighbourhoods, arbitrary jailings, torture, systematic rape and summary executions. UN forces looked on while aid workers were challenged and attacked by various militias in Bosnia. The continuing suffering in Muslim enclaves, supposedly under the protection of UN peacekeeping forces, underlined the feebleness of UN peacekeeping operations.
2. In 1993 there was no clear and universally accepted definition of the the role of UN peacekeeping missions. UN forces increasingly found themselves thrust into intractable civil wars where none of the world's powers are willing to venture by themselves. Simultaneously the basic concepts of peacekeeping were being rapidly revised and expanded in ways that led to doubts and clashes on the ground. UN peacekeepers have traditionally gone in after a cease-fire agreement to observe a dividing line or to monitor compliance with written agreements. In the new policy of "peace enforcement" troops are sent into hostilities to try to move the parties towards peace or to bring humanitarian relief.