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Africa: Annan Conflict Report
Africa: Annan Conflict Report
Date distributed (ymd): 980423
Document reposted by APIC
+++++++++++++++++++++Document Profile+++++++++++++++++++++
Region: Continent-Wide
Issue Areas: +political/rights+ +economy/development+ +security/peace+
Summary Contents:
This posting contains a press release summarizing UN Secretary-General
Kofi Annan's report on conflict in Africa, and excerpts from his remarks
on presenting the report to the UN Security Council. The full report can
be found at http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/afrec/sgreport.
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15 April 1998
Press Release SG/2045 SC/6501
NEW REPORT OF SECRETARY-GENERAL EXPLORES CAUSES,
POTENTIAL CURES OF CONFLICT IN AFRICA
Note: For further information, contact:
Editor, Africa Recovery, Department of Public Information,
New York,
Tel: 212-963-6856; Fax: 212-963-1334;
e-mail: email: lone@un.org.
NEW YORK, 16 April (Africa Recovery Section, DPI) -- In perhaps his
most important political report to date, United Nations Secretary-General
Kofi Annan has analysed in remarkably candid terms the causes of conflict
in Africa. In the report, Mr. Annan also proposes a comprehensive set of
far-reaching, "realistic and achievable" measures designed to
significantly reduce political tensions and violence within and between
Africans States.
The report, which the Security Council had requested and will take up
for in-depth deliberation at possibly ministerial level on 24 April, comes
against a backdrop of significant political and economic achievements on
the continent, and the emergence of leaders with confidence in Africa's
ability to chart a path to peace and higher levels of development. These
recent successes have sparked renewed international interest in Africa,
and as such, the report has the potential to secure wide African and international
support at a time when, the Secretary-General observes, efforts to break
with past patterns "are at last beginning to succeed".
The Secretary-General's recommendations derive strength in significant
part from the candour with which his report analyses causes -- and responsibility
-- for conflict in Africa.
"By not averting these colossal human tragedies [as in Rwanda,
Somalia and Liberia]", says the Secretary-General, "African leaders
have failed the peoples of Africa; the international community has failed
them; the United Nations has failed them". Repeatedly, the Secretary-General
calls on all concerned to "summon the political will" to produce
positive change in Africa.
"The United Nations stands ready to play its part", Mr. Annan
declares. "So must the world. So must Africa."
Africa today must more than ever look at itself, the Secretary-General
asserts, given the renewed momentum in the continent's quest for peace
and greater prosperity. However, he adds, African efforts need stronger
international support politically, as well as in the economic area, where
greater debt relief and market access for more diversified African exports
are crucial to ensuring the higher living standards that promote stability.
In what is one of the most concise and authoritative primers on the
causes and cures for African conflict, the report notes that 14 of the
continent's 53 countries were afflicted by armed conflict in 1996 alone,
and over 30 wars have occurred in Africa since 1970, mostly within States.
These accounted for "more than half of all war-related deaths worldwide"
and caused over 8 million people to become refugees, returnees and displaced
persons.
While no transgressors are named, the report goes on to say that even
in this post-cold-war period, foreign interests continue to play a large
role in sustaining some conflicts in the competition for oil and other
African resources.
African States are not spared either: even as he pays them tribute for
their growing peacekeeping and mediation efforts, the Secretary-General
points out that the role some of them play "in supporting and sometimes
even in instigating conflicts in neighbouring countries must be candidly
acknowledged".
In focusing on the various actors who help to fan conflict, Mr. Annan
strongly criticizes international arms merchants as being among those "who
profit from conflict in Africa". He recommends that Member States
pass legislation making the violation of Security Council arms embargoes
by individuals or corporations a criminal offence under their national
laws. Although public identification of arms merchants has been difficult,
the Secretary-General asserts that possibly no other single initiative
would do more to help combat the flow of illicit arms to Africa. The report
asks the Security Council to address this issue as a matter of urgency,
including how the United Nations might support the compiling, tracking
and publicizing of such information.
At the same time, while recognizing the rights of States to provide
for their own defence, the Secretary-General calls upon African States
to reduce their purchases of arms and munitions to below 1.5 per cent of
gross domestic product (GDP), and to commit themselves to a zero-growth
policy for defence budgets for a period of 10 years.
He notes the "long-term distortions" in Africa's political
economy and the authoritarian legacies of colonialism which helped produce
the "winner-takes-all" and highly personalized forms of governance
seen in parts of the continent. With the frequent lack of peaceful means
to change or replace leadership and the "often violent politicization
of ethnicity", Mr. Annan says conflict becomes virtually inevitable.
Turning to the United Nations itself, Mr. Annan calls for a reversal
of the international community's "great reluctance in recent years
to assume the political and financial exposure associated with deploying
peacekeeping operations". Memories of the Somalia experience "continue
to hobble" the Organization's capacity to respond swiftly and decisively
to crises; and within Africa, the lack of forceful United Nations action
to stop the genocide has had a "particularly harsh" impact, leading
to the tendency of some African governments to marginalize the United Nations
from political involvement in regional affairs. The "horrifying suffering
of the Rwandan people sends the clear and unmistakable message that the
international community must never again tolerate such inaction",
the Secretary-General asserts.
The Secretary-General urges Member States to provide renewed and better
coordinated support for early and decisive action to prevent or resolve
conflict in Africa. He says United Nations peacekeeping could achieve much
if "deployed with a credible deterrent capacity, equipped with appropriate
resources and backed by sufficient political will". Mr. Annan calls
for support for regional and subregional initiatives, and strongly encourages
Member States to contribute to the United Nations and Organization of African
Unity (OAU) Trust Funds for conflict prevention and peacekeeping. "Such
support is necessary because the United Nations lacks the capacity, resources
and expertise to address all problems that may arise in Africa", he
says. "It is also desirable because wherever possible the international
community should strive to complement rather than supplant African efforts
to resolve Africa's problems."
He says Africa must demonstrate the political will to rely upon political
rather than military responses to problems, protect democratic channels
for pursuing legitimate interests and expressing dissent, and respect and
legitimize political opposition. Africa must also take good governance
seriously, ensuring respect for human rights and the rule of law, strengthening
democratization and promoting transparent and accountable public administration.
"Unless good governance is prized, Africa will not break free of the
threat and the reality of conflict which are so evident today."
Mr. Annan urges governments in conflict situations to consider appointing
special mediators or special commissions to build confidence and recommend
practical solutions. He also calls for the establishment of "contact
groups" of interested countries or a "special conference"
in conflict and post-conflict situations, as done in the case of Liberia.
Sanctions should also be better targeted, since "in some cases, the
hardship imposed on the civilian population is greatly disproportionate
to the likely impact of the sanctions on the behaviour of the protagonists".
Mr. Annan suggested the use of sanctions aimed at decision makers and their
families, including the freezing of personal and organizational assets,
as well as restrictions on travel.
Turning to the international community, Mr. Annan said development aid
should be "restructured, focusing on high-impact areas and on reducing
dependency". He notes that after more than 40 years of technical assistance
programmes, 90 per cent of the $12 billion a year of technical assistance
is spent on non-African consultants, despite the availability of African
experts in many fields. In this light, Mr. Annan urges donors to make sure
that "at least 50 per cent of their aid to Africa is spent in Africa".
Mr. Annan calls for "new sources of funding", as well as "better
use of existing resources and the enactment of trade and debt measures
that will enable Africa to generate and better reinvest its own resources".
He says the next meeting of the Group of Eight leading industrialized countries
should consider eliminating trade barriers to African products. He also
calls for deeper reduction of Africa's "unsustainable" external
debt -- $328.9 billion in 1995 -- which would promote and reinforce economic
reforms. Such relief should be structured "in ways that will not undermine
Africa's future capacity to attract investment, but will instead enhance
that capacity by lifting past burdens from present operations", the
Secretary-General adds.
Regional and subregional integration processes should be strengthened,
the Secretary-General says, calling on the United Nations system (including
the Bretton Woods institutions), along with intergovernmental organizations
such as the European Union, to reinforce African countries' own efforts.
He also calls for "a hard look" at the important international
initiatives aimed at promoting peace and development in Africa. These include
the United Nations New Agenda for the Development of Africa in the 1990s
and its implementing component, the United Nations System-wide Special
Initiative on Africa, the Tokyo International Conference on African Development,
and Commitment 7 of the Copenhagen Declaration on Social Development, concerning
economic, social and human resource development of Africa and the least
developed countries.
Key Recommendations
The Secretary-General's key recommendations include the following:
On arms and arms trafficking:
- United Nations Member States should pass laws enabling prosecution
in national courts of violations of Security Council arms embargoes.
- The Security Council should urgently consider how the United Nations
might help compile, track and publicize information on arms trafficking.
- African governments should reduce purchases of arms and munitions to
1.5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), and maintain zero-growth
on defence budgets for the next decade.
On sanctions:
- Economic sanctions are too often a blunt instrument, and should be
better targeted, for example, by freezing the assets of decision makers,
their organizations and their families and through restrictions on travel.
- Combatants should be held financially liable to their victims under
international law, where civilians have been deliberately targeted; international
legal machinery should be developed to help find and seize the assets of
the transgressors.
On refugees:
- An international mechanism should be established to help host governments
maintain the security and neutrality of refugee camps. Such camps should
be located away from borders; combatants should be separated from genuine
refugees.
On structural adjustment:
- The Bretton Woods institutions should consider providing "peace-friendly"
structural adjustment programmes.
- Conditionalities must not be antithetical to a peace process; donors
should not cut off funds from a weak government making good-faith, popularly
supported efforts to implement peace agreements.
On development assistance:
- Aid should be restructured to focus on high-impact areas (rural water
supply, basic education, primary health) and to reduce dependency.
- Donors should strive to ensure that at least 50 per cent of their aid
to Africa is spent in Africa.
- New sources of funding are required from donor countries.
On debt and trade:
- The scope of the Highly Indebted Poor Countries initiative of the World
Bank and International Monetary Fund should be greatly expanded, since
only four African countries have so far met its conditions.
- All creditors should convert into grants all remaining official bilateral
debt of the poorest African countries.
- Creditors should consider clearing the entire debt stock of the poorest
African countries, as requested by the OAU.
- The next summit of the Group of 8 industrialized countries should consider
eliminating trade barriers to African products.
On the Security Council
- The Security Council should meet every two years at ministerial level
to assess efforts undertaken and actions needed to support peace and development
in Africa.
- The Council should consider convening, within five years, a summit-level
session for the same purpose.
On international business practices:
- Countries implementing the Convention Combating Bribery of Foreign
Public Officials in International Business Transactions should set a timetable
for early enactment of national legislation.
- The OAU should draw up by the year 2000 an African convention on the
conduct of public officials and the transparency of public administration.
16 April 1998
Press Release SG/SM/6524 SC/6503
SECRETARY-GENERAL SAYS PROPOSALS IN HIS REPORT ON AFRICA
REQUIRE NEW WAYS OF THINKING, OF ACTING
Following is the text of Secretary-General Kofi Annan's statement
delivered this morning at the Security Council
(excerpts only)
...
The report that I present today is guided, above all, by a commitment
to honesty and clarity in analysing and addressing the challenge of conflict
in Africa. For too long, conflict in Africa has been seen as inevitable
or intractable, or both. It is neither.
Conflict in Africa, as everywhere, is caused by human action, and can
be ended by human action. This is the reality that shames us for every
conflict that we allow to persist, and emboldens us to believe that we
can address and resolve every conflict that we choose to confront. ...
No one -- not the United Nations, not the international community, not
Africa's leaders -- can escape responsibility for the persistence of these
conflicts.
Indeed, colossal human tragedies have taken place in Africa over the
last decade -- tragedies that could and should have been prevented. Not
enough was done to address the causes of conflict. Not enough was done
to ensure a lasting peace. Not enough was done to create the conditions
for sustainable development. ...
Today in many parts of Africa, efforts to break with these past patterns
are at last beginning to succeed. It is my aspiration that this report
add momentum to Africa's renewed quest for peace and greater prosperity.
The report strives to do so by offering an analysis of Africa's conflicts
that does justice to their reality and seeks answers in their sources.
It strives to do so by proposing realistic and achievable recommendations
which, over time, may reduce if not entirely end Africa's conflicts. And
it aims to summon the political will of Africans and nonAfricans alike
to act when action so evidently is needed -- the will without which no
level of assistance and no degree of hope can make the difference between
war and peace in Africa.
The sources of conflict in Africa are as varied and complex as the continent
itself. In this report, I have sought to identify the kinds of actions
that most effectively and most lastingly may address those conflicts and
resolve them.
The significance of history and of factors external to Africa cannot
be denied. But more than three decades after African countries gained their
independence, there is a growing recognition among Africans that the continent
must look beyond its colonial past for the sources and the solutions to
its current conflicts.
The proposals that I set forth today require, in some cases, new ways
of thinking about conflict in Africa. In others, they require new ways
of acting. Whether in peacekeeping, humanitarian assistance or post-conflict
peace-building, genuine and sustainable progress depends on three critical
factors: a clear understanding of the challenge; the political will to
respond to that challenge; and the resources necessary to provide the adequate
response.
Equally important is the understanding that peace and development remain
inextricably linked -- one feeding on the other, enabling the other and
securing the other. The renunciation of violence as a means of gaining
and holding power is only the beginning. Then must follow a renewed commitment
to national development founded on sober, sound and uncorrupted economic
policies. ...
Good governance is now more than ever the condition for the success
of both peace and development. It is no coincidence that Africa's renaissance
has come at a time when new and more democratic forms of government have
begun to emerge and take root. ...
Africa is an ancient continent. Its lands are rich and fertile enough
to provide a solid foundation for prosperity. Its people are proud and
industrious enough to seize the opportunities that may be presented. I
am confident that Africans will not be found wanting -- in stamina, in
determination or in political will.
Africa today is striving to make positive change, and in many places
these efforts are beginning to bear fruit. In the carnage and tragedy that
afflicts some parts of Africa, we must not forget the bright spots or overlook
the achievements that have been made. What is needed is for those achievements
to grow and multiply throughout Africa.
Three areas deserve particular attention. First, Africa must demonstrate
the political will to rely upon political rather than military responses
to problems. Democratic channels for pursuing legitimate interests and
expressing dissent must be protected, and political opposition respected
and accommodated in constitutional forms.
Second, Africa must summon the political will to take good governance
seriously -- ensuring respect for human rights and the rule of law, strengthening
democratization and promoting transparency and capability in public administration.
...
Third, Africa must enact and adhere to the various reforms needed to
promote economic growth. ...
Political will is also needed from the international community. Where
the international community is committed to making a difference, it has
proven that significant and rapid transformation can be achieved. With
respect to Africa, the international community must now summon the will
to intervene where it can have an impact, and invest where resources are
needed.
New sources of funding are required, but so too is a better use of existing
resources and the enactment of trade and debt relief measures that will
enable Africa to generate and better reinvest its own resources. Concrete
steps must be taken and I have made a number of concrete recommendations
towards this end.
Let us never forget that it is the persistence of poverty that is impeding
the full promise of peace for all of Africa's peoples. Alleviating poverty
must be the first aim of all our efforts. Only then -- only when prosperity
and opportunity become real -- will every citizen, young or old, man or
woman, have a genuine and lasting stake in a peaceful future for Africa
-- politically, economically and socially. ...
The time is long past when one could claim ignorance about what was
happening in Africa, or what was needed to achieve progress. The time is
also past when the responsibility for producing change could be shifted
on to other shoulders. It is responsibility that we all must face. ...
This material is being reposted for wider distribution by the Africa
Policy Information Center (APIC), the educational affiliate of the Washington
Office on Africa. APIC's primary objective is to widen the policy debate
in the United States around African issues and the U.S. role in Africa,
by concentrating on providing accessible policy-relevant information and
analysis usable by a wide range of groups individuals.
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