U.S pledges funding support for AU missions

The United States (U.S) Ambassador to the United Nations (UN), Linda Thomas-Greenfield, has expressed her country’s commitment to provide reliable funds in support of African Union (AU) peacekeeping missions.

She indicated that the US Government is working with Ghana and other countries in the Security Council to get a resolution over the line, adding that it will also provide reliable support from the United Nations.

“We are working closely with Ghana and other countries in the Security Council to come up with a resolution that will support AU peacekeeping, that will provide reliable funding for the AU, reliable support from the United Nations that might be able to support logistics, equipment, capacity-building for AU troop; and this is something that we are committed to seeing come to fruition,” she emphasised.

Ms. Thomas-Greenfield announced this during an interview session with the Executive Director of the West Africa Centre for Counter-Extremism (WACCE), Mataru Mumuni Muqthar, on the topic ‘African Leadership, Peace and Security’ at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTIC).

In a speech delivered prior to the interview session, she emphasised that the U.S. as an international community, has the responsibility to finance and empower AU missions to address threats as well as “invest in resilient, open and transparent governance that can prevent and withstand security risks, not simply respond to them”.

She further extolled the steps taken by her country through the UN systems and bilateral partnerships to advance African peace and security, adding that since the beginning of the Biden-Harris administration, the U.S has invested US$6.5billion to support security, democracy, human rights, and governance on the continent.

Focusing on the role of the AU in ensuring peace within the continent, she noted that the union can play a critical role in galvanising countries to address destabilising issues happening internally in countries that the UN does not have the capacity or the mandate to address.

She explained that this is possible because many of the peacekeeping operations across the world constitute more African peacekeepers and as such, the capacity and the capabilities exist on the continent.

Narrowing it to Ghana, she described it as a “net exporter of peace” that has played a critical role in stabilising the region. Additionally, she mentioned that the leaders of the country have worked tirelessly to raise African perspectives and concerns at the UN Security Council by deploying thousands of troops to serve in UN peacekeeping missions in Africa to enable peaceful transitions of power, a free press, and resilient democratic processes, serving as a model for others.

While Ms. Thomas-Greenfield applauded the country for its contributions toward peacekeeping, she indicated how some leaders of other countries are doing otherwise, describing their decision as short-sighted.

“Some leaders in other countries have taken the opposite track. They’ve chosen to turn their backs on the international system to consolidate power for themselves at the expense of the rights, freedoms and prosperity of their own people and have also isolated themselves and their populations from regional institutions like ECOWAS and the AU, and global ones like the United Nations. They have rather turned to actors like the Wagner Group that shows conflict, exploitation and destruction for profit,” she bemoaned.

In response to the relevance of the UN peacekeeping to Africa, she affirms that UN peacekeeping missions have not been perfect and this is why they constantly look at efforts at reform. Meanwhile, she reechoed that in order for a peacekeeping mission to work, they require host country support and backing.

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