The STATESMAN - vendredi 28 mai 2004
African Regional Peace Keeping operations are crucial - Gen
Diarra
By Peter Adofo-Asante
THE Deputy Military Advisor of the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations (UNDPKO), Brig Gen Elhadji M. Kandji, has said African regional peacekeeping operations are crucial in complementing the UN's role of managing conflicts on the continent.
He noted that in crises situations where the UN is not in a position
to deploy troops rapidly enough, as it happened in Liberia and in
Cote d'Ivoire, the standby peacekeeping bodies would complement the
UN's efforts in conflict resolutions.
Brig Gen Kandji made this observation at the end of the political
session of the five-day Recamp IV Seminar organised by the Ghana
government in Accra yesterday. He, therefore, stressed the need for
the UN to continue to jointly work with other international donors
and partners to help Africa develop her military capacity.
Brig Gen Kandji observed that the seminar has provided the
participants with the requisite techniques in fashioning out an
efficient strategy to confront conflict situations in Africa.
The UN, he said, is ready to provide full support to the African
Union (AU), the other sub-regional organisations and individual
African member states in the establishment of an African stand-by
Force and also use diplomacy, dialogue and possibly confrontational
means to control conflict on the continent.
Such an assistance would also include reinforcement of AU strategic
headquarters capacity, the training of Headquarters Staff Officers,
information sharing, mission Planning and documentation.
The Deputy Executive Secretary for Political Affairs, Defence and
Security of ECOWAS, Gen Diarra, observed that the recommendations
forwarded by groups to map ways of identification, modalities to
confront conflict resolution and the consolidation of nations after
war situations are useful.
This, he explained, would assist in the strategic conference to be
held at the ECOWAS Secretariat in Abuja from June 7 to 11 this year
for a report to be presented to the ECOWAS Defence and Security
Commission on July 17.