Recognizing the need to move promptly on UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's recommendations for preventing and resolving conflicts in Africa (see article Report explores conflict's causes, remedies), the Security Council unanimously decided on 28 May to form an ad hoc working group of all Council members to prepare specific proposals for action by September 1998. The Council emphasized the urgency of the issue for Africa and the world as a whole, expressing grave concern that "the continuation of armed conflicts in the continent threatens regional peace, causes massive human displacement, suffering and poverty, perpetuates instability and diverts scarce resources from long-term development."
A comprehensive response to Africa's complex and interrelated security and development challenges is needed, the Council said, urging the General Assembly and other UN bodies, regional organizations, the international financial institutions and member states to consider Mr. Annan's recommendations and take appropriate actions of their own. It likewise agreed with his proposal to convene ministerial level sessions of the Security Council every two years, beginning this September, to assess progress in promoting peace and security in Africa.
Photo: UNICEF / Betty Press
The deep concern of UN member states with Africa's security situation was highlighted a month earlier, on 24 April, when the Council held a day-long open discussion on the Secretary-General's report. Overwhelmingly, the participants, including Security Council members and dozens of other ambassadors and permanent representatives, agreed with Mr. Annan's affirmation that, with sufficient political will from both Africa and the international community, "peace and development in Africa can be given a new momentum." These discussions, followed by Mr. Annan's 28 April-10 May tour of eight African countries (see article Annan in Africa says justice necessary to heal wounds), were intended, in part, to help galvanize the necessary political will and forge agreement on priority actions.
Africa itself is keen to seriously attack the problem, asserted Zimbabwean Ambassador Machivenyika Tobias Mapuranga, speaking on behalf of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). "Africa will not be found wanting in political will and commitment to seize the opportunities that may be presented, for...the development and welfare of Africa are primarily the responsibility of the Africans themselves," he said. An essential element in that commitment, added Uganda Ambassador Semakula Kiwanuka, has been the emergence in Africa of "a new political leadership that is championing democracy, human rights and good governance."
The ambassadors of Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania and several other African countries nevertheless noted the serious constraints of resources and capacities confronting African peace efforts. "Africa alone does not have the answers," said Tanzanian Ambassador Daudi N. Mwakawago. They urged the more developed countries to support Africa's initiatives, in particular the OAU Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution.
A number of the Security Council's permanent members, including the US, UK, and France, agreed on the need for greater support for African peacekeeping and conflict-resolution efforts. Ambassador Bill Richardson reported that the US has over the past several years contributed more than $10 mn for the OAU's crisis management centre in Addis Ababa and for training and equipping a 100-man rapid deployment observation force. France announced that this year it will spend $40 mn on strengthening African peacekeeping capacities.
Acknowledging that the Security Council had not acted quickly enough to head off previous crises, including in Sierra Leone and Congo-Brazzaville, the UK's Permanent Representative, Sir John Weston, emphasized: "Fear of the financial costs of intervention cannot be allowed to become our guiding principle.... Intervention can be difficult and dangerous, but it can often be unavoidable if we are to prevent humanitarian catastrophes and the insidious spread of instability."
Many delegates voiced strong agreement with the Secretary-General's proposals to control the illicit flow of arms into conflict areas. Among other measures, Mr. Annan had recommended national legislation to criminalize violations of Security Council arms embargoes, the compilation and publication of information on arms traffickers, and greater African participation in the UN Register of Conventional Arms (only seven African countries currently do so).
Among other participants, Cameroon's Ambassador Martin Belinga Eboutou specifically endorsed the proposal to compile and publish the names of "merchants of death" who traffic in arms, urging the international community to help put an end to such "illegal and deadly activities." Ambassador António Monteiro of Portugal stressed that arms collected at the end of one conflict should not end up being used in another, affirming that the UN had a role to play in ensuring that such weapons are destroyed. Mr. Hisashi Owada, Japan's Permanent Representative, said that the UN Register of Conventional Arms, which was created in 1991 at the initiative of Japan in collaboration with the European Union, should be supplemented by regional registers, especially in Africa.
Mr. Owada, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata and a number of others touched on the complex problems of delivering humanitarian relief in the midst of conflict. Many echoed Mr. Annan's stress on the importance of separating refugees from combatants and providing special assistance to countries hosting large numbers of refugees.
Numerous speakers also addressed the economic and social factors that influence political stability in Africa, agreeing with the strong emphasis in the Secretary-General's report on understanding conflicts' complex roots and seeking comprehensive solutions.
Mr. Mapuranga, on behalf of the OAU, questioned whether higher economic growth rates signal an "African renaissance," when poverty remains widespread, education and health spending have declined and unemployment is growing. "We have on our hands cases of African countries whose economic statistics are improving, and are even impressive, but are not matched by an improvement in the conditions of living of the bulk of the African people," he said. And just as such circumstances tend to breed conflict, Mr. Mapuranga added, "it is also true that the seed of democracy cannot germinate, let alone thrive, in the soil of mass poverty, illiteracy, hunger and disease."
Many African speakers, but also a number from donor and creditor countries, agreed that much greater effort is needed to ease Africa's financial plight. Ambassador Khiphusizi J. Jele of South Africa, speaking for the 14-nation Southern African Development Community, called on bilateral and multilateral creditors to pursue "more vigorous and effective methods" to eliminate Africa's "unsustainable debt burden," and on donors to "rethink and reverse the decline in ODA [official development assistance] levels."
