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Security Council calls for wide-ranging steps to ensure lasting peace in West Africa

Security Council calls for wide-ranging steps to ensure lasting peace in West Africa

Security Council
The disarmament and reintegration of former combatants, an end to the threat from the illegal trafficking of small arms and light weapons, and much stronger national institutions and civil society groups are just some of the necessary steps that West Africa must take if peace is to consolidate across the region, the Security Council said today.

In a statement read out by Nana Akufo-Addo, Foreign Minister of Ghana, Council President for August, the 15-member body underlined the importance of the United Nations’ new Peacebuilding Commission in helping countries emerging from conflict to achieve lasting peace and stability.

The statement also urged the UN, the African Union (AU) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to integrate their efforts and to maximize their resources so that peace initiatives in the region are given the best possible chance to succeed.

Voicing concern about the threat posed by the continuing illegal trafficking of small arms and light weapons, the statement called on all States in the region to ratify a pact limiting the sale and distribution of small arms and light weapons.

But it stressed that “a comprehensive and coordinated manner” is required if West African countries are to consolidate peace and promote security and economic development.

The presidential statement followed an open debate in which almost three dozen speakers – including Secretary-General Kofi Annan and his Special Representative for West Africa Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah – addressed the Council on peace consolidation in the region.

Mr. Annan told the Council meeting that all too often the international community’s hard-won achievements in ending wars are reversed or undermined because of its frequent response to post-conflict situations – a “shortage of funds, lack of international coordination, and a tendency to leave too soon.”

He said West Africa is not taking advantage of its rich natural resources and fulfilling its economic and social potential because of “grave and widespread shortcomings of governance,” as well as a lack of political stability and prosperity.

The Secretary-General added that the region’s problems must be tackled holistically, given that “insecurity has no respect for national boundaries.”

But he pointed to an accord signed by Nigeria and Cameroon in June, ending a decades-long dispute over the border region of Bakassi, as proof that the UN can help countries of the region to make progress on the road towards stability.

Noting that nearly 60 per cent of its population is under the age of 30, Mr. Ould-Abdallah told the Council that this demographic fact must be considered by the international community when devising solutions to problems in West Africa.

Many of these young people, he said, are unemployed and have little hope of finding jobs, given they have few skills and are emerging from a period where the region’s wars have been their chief employers.

Mr. Ould-Abdallah said the next 12 months will be a crucial period for the region, as national elections are due in Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Senegal, Mali and Sierra Leone among others.