October 2, 2024
We appreciate the briefings by Assistant Secretary-General Martha Pobee, Special Representative of the Secretary-General Parfait Onanga-Anyanga and the Permanent Observer of the African Union to the United Nations, Fatima Kyari Mohammed.
The Russian Federation welcomes the comprehensive strengthening of the strategic partnership between the United Nations and the African Union. Given the spread of drivers of instability and armed conflicts in Africa, well-coordinated and effective work of the two organizations is of paramount importance for millions of people.
The main focus of cooperation between the UN and the AU is on enhancing the existing partnership for responding to threats to peace and security on the African continent. A lot has already been accomplished in recent years. African countries, with the support of the UN and the international community, have taken comprehensive measures to optimize crisis management tools, including prevention and response, preventive diplomacy and mediation, good offices and confidence-building measures. Africans have proven in practice that their readiness and capability to use these mechanisms to fight crises on their soil, as they have a better grasp of the situation, enjoy greater public trust and have greater operational potential. The collective task of the UN members is to fully support these efforts without imposing on national governments any ‘recipes’, divorced from reality and from local specifics.
We believe it is critical to continue our work so as to strengthen the partnership between the UN Security Council and the AU Peace and Security Council. The partnership is underpinned by the recognition that the Security Council bears primary responsibility for the maintenance of peace and security, as well as an understanding of how the United Nations and the African Union’s efforts complement each other, harnessing their comparative advantages on the basis of the UN Charter. We share the Pan African organization’s desire to make the dialogue between the Councils more concrete and more lively, and to align their agendas on African issues. We believe that greater consideration of African interests could be enhanced by democratizing the ‘penholdership’ within the Security Council, including by a more active involvement of the African Three (A3) in drafting documents on those relevant territorial files where the tone is currently set by external actors. This redistribution would help us to avoid situations where a former colonial power directs the work on crafting ‘products’ regarding peoples it used to exploit.
Equally flagrant situations occur when such ‘penholders’ are in charge of sanction files, especially when they add to sanctions illegal unilateral restrictions. Russia’s principled position against any restrictive measures taken in circumvention of the UN Security Council is well known to all present.
Our assessment indicated that many of the Security Council sanctions regimes currently in force are at odds with the actual situation and thwart the plans of national governments in the area of state building and the establishment of effective armed forces and security structures. We are convinced that this mechanism should be used to facilitate the work of the countries in the region. We recall that the African Union has repeatedly stated its position in favor of lifting restrictions on the States of the continent, including the unilateral ones.
Madam President,
As a permanent member of the Security Council, we urge our colleagues to develop clear and realistic mandates for United Nations peacekeeping operations and special political missions. We underscore the need to ensure painstaking control over their implementation. When adopting mandate resolutions and Council decisions on issues of peace and security in Africa, we regularly coordinate our efforts with the A3. The AU’s consolidated position has been taken into serious consideration when determining our approach in the context of recent discussions regarding the parameters for transforming the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia and the provision of United Nations assistance to the SADC forces in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
We are convinced that the AU can do better on this track. Deployment of the new AU Support and Stabilization Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM) will be an important milestone in the history of African peacekeeping.
AUSSOM will continue to stabilize the situation in Somalia and the region, where Al-Shabaab still poses a serious threat. Unfortunately, despite the imminent launch of AUSSOM, a tangible solution to the problem of funding for the Mission is yet to be seen.
An important step in the development of African peacebuilding should be the practical realization of the potential laid down in the UN Security Council Framework Resolution 2719. The key conditions for success in this endeavor are as follows: consensus among the Africans themselves, especially in the region, support of the Council, and the unambiguous consent of those states on whose territory these forces are to operate. It is important that Africans have enough political space to define the practical parameters for countering threats, whatever forms of funding they receive from external actors. They should also be able to act independently and without being subjected to behind-the-scenes pressure from western, extra-regional powers, which tend to pursue merely their own national interests when dealing with Africa.
We are convinced that strengthening the capacity of the African Union through interaction with UN structures is the key to success in ensuring stability in Africa. Peace and security there are important not only for Africans themselves, but also for the sustainable development of all continents and peoples.
We are willing to have meaningful and effective cooperation with our African colleagues during the upcoming joint activities between the two Councils this October.
Thank you.