He said African peace sup­port operations had significantly increased and diversified, with institutions like the Economic Community of West African State (ECOWAS) and the African Union (AU) playing important roles collaboratively.

That, he said, reflected both the “protracted nature of the crises confronting the continent and the proactiveness of the Af­rican institutions in responding to those challenges.”

Mr Ghassim, also the Head of the United Nations Multidi­mensional Integrated Stabilisa­tion Mission in Mali (MINUS­MA), made the remarks at the opening of a two-day seminar in Accra, at the Legon Centre for International Affairs and Diplo­macy (LECIAD), University of Ghana.

On the theme: ‘The Evolu­tion of African Peace Operations and Best Practices for Future African-led Peace Support Op­erations,’ the seminar focuses on the AU and African-led PSO’s partnerships with the UN and other international partners and whether the AU and PSOs should seek UN assessed contributions, among other discussions.

Mr Ghassim said building on the experience gained over the past decades, African institutions could make a meaningful contribution to the promotion of peace and securi­ty on the continent.

He said the factors that drove violence – many of which were linked to governance – needed to be addressed.

The Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General not­ed that the AU, with the support of the UN, could address those challenges by building on its rich normative and policy framework on governance.

Mr Ghassim said the continued involvement of African institutions in the deployment of PSOs and in the promotion of security cooper­ation was all the more important as terrorism and violent extremism remained prevalent in large parts of Africa.

He said the AU and its regional mechanisms, given their willingness to deploy in situations where peace had not really been fully restored, had a distinct comparative advan­tage that needed to be leveraged by the international community.

“Hence the importance of ad­vancing the agenda of the financing of African-led PSOs through UN assessed contributions. I do hope that the ongoing efforts to this end will succeed,” he said.

“We need to have a variety of tools to address the nature of Afri­can conflicts,” he emphasised.

According to him, it was important that African institutions and the UN do not focus only on large operations, but also on other more flexible cooperation modalities, as exemplified by the Nouakchott Process and the Accra Process.

Major General Richard Addo Gyane, Commandant, KAIPTC, one of the collaborators of the seminar, said the evolution and constant change of the nature of conflicts in

Africa reflected the challenges that African-led agencies faced in dealing with contemporary insecu­rities.

He said the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) of the AU and the Regional Econom­ic Communities (RECs), and the Regional Mechanisms (RMs) had played key roles through preventive diplomacy to ensure that internal political tensions and disputed elections did not escalate into vio­lent conflicts with the potential to undermine the peace and stability of the continent.

He said while forging part­nerships with the UN and other bilateral partners was critical for sustaining peace operations, a true assessment of the impact of Afri­can-led agencies must also reflect its short falls.

Maj Gen Gyane stated that African-led agencies dealing with security challenges were constantly being eroded by multiple gover­nance failures on the continent, including the issues of poverty, unemployment and corruption, radicalisation, violent extremism, and terrorism on the continent.

The KAIPTC, Maj Gen Gyane assured, would continue to collab­orate with the AU and all partners through training, research and academic education to ensure the sustainability of African-led agen­cies in the promotion of peace and security on the continent.

Professor Emmanuel Debrah, Director, LECIAD, said Africa was making progress towards sus­tainable development and regional cooperation, albeit challenges persisted.

The Director of LECIAD said Africa’s unique geopolitical landscape demanded tailored ap­proaches and innovative strategies through collaborative discussions to cultivate deeper understanding of the complex dynamics at play.