Need more women in peacekeeping: US ambassador to UN

New Delhi: US Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power on Friday lauded India's contribution to the UN peacekeeping operations and called for more women to play important roles in such missions.

"India had longer peacekeeping tradition than any other country," she said, pointing out that India has contributed the highest number of troops to the peacekeeping forces.

Power said women must play a bigger role in peacekeeping, but making that happen would have to be turned from a "nice to do" job to a "need to do" job.

"We need to do it... Every time there is a peace process going on, women are just in token roles." 

Power also lauded India's Right to Information Act, 2005.

"Right to Information is very powerful act," the ambassador said, noting that penalising government officials for not giving information was a strong provision.

Power was speaking at the Women in the World summit here.