Resistance to a planned UN intervention brigade for Democratic Republic of Congo could hold up a Security Council vote approving the first "targeted offensive operations" by UN troops, diplomats said Thursday. A draft resolution has been sent to the 15 council members setting out the unique mandate for the proposed force as part of a new drive by UN leader Ban Ki-Moon to bring peace to the strife-torn region.

The United States is taking aim at "excessive" business class air travel by UN staff as it presses a campaign to restrain the global body's multi-billion dollar budget. Complaints by the United States and other cash-strapped western nations have been bolstered by revelations that nearly three quarters of the money spent on air fares at UN headquarters goes on business class. That is "clearly unjustifiable," said Joseph Torsella, the US envoy who since 2011 has been leading a US war on "waste" at the UN.

The Philippines said Thursday it would keep its contingent of United Nations peacekeepers in the Golan Heights, after Syrian rebels held 21 of them hostage for three days last week. "The Philippine contingent to the UNDOF (UN Disengagement Observer Force) would remain stationed in the Golan Heights to perform its obligation in the name of peace," foreign department spokesman Raul Hernandez told reporters. "The Philippines, as a founding member of the UN, remains fully committed to the UN mandate of promoting peace and security."

The United Nations is likely to vote next month on a peacekeeping force for Mali, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Tuesday. "We will move from the current framework... to a new diplomatic set-up, a peacekeeping operation which would probably be voted in April and implemented two months later," he told the National Assembly's foreign affairs committee. He said the UN force could comprise up to 10,000 troops. Fabius said the operation "will be overseen by the UN and be funded by the UN, something which will obviously have a number of consequences for us".