Peace & Security Council Report

The November 2024 Peace & Security Council Report examines the African Union's (AU) efforts to integrate climate change into security frameworks, the strategic direction of Africa's foreign policy, the outcomes of the AU's first G20 Summit, and the coordination between the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) and the UN Security Council (UNSC).

• The African Union is developing the Common African Position on Climate, Peace, and Security (CAP-CPS), which is expected to be adopted at the AU summit in February 2025. This position is based on the Africa Climate Security Risk Assessment (ACRA) launched in August 2024, which provides empirical data on climate security risks across north, central, west, east, and southern Africa. The CAP-CPS aims to integrate climate change into peacebuilding and provide a unified global voice for Africa, though its success depends on member states' political will and the ability to balance continental unity with the need for context-specific national responses.
• The report suggests that Africa's foreign policy should shift from seeking broad common positions to an introspective strategy that prioritises internal development and peace. It argues that addressing internal challenges first—such as conflicts in Sudan, Ethiopia, Libya, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo—would better enhance the continent's geopolitical agency. The report recommends a standardised, binding legal protocol for transparency and project execution guidelines for all foreign investors and sovereign loan agreements in Africa.
• The AU's first G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro largely aligned with the AU's six key priorities: inclusive growth, reforming the global financial architecture, food security and agriculture adaptation to climate change, a just transition, promoting trade and investment, and enhancing health. While the Rio Declaration addressed low-cost financing for low-carbon transitions and the creation of a 25th Chair at the International Monetary Fund Executive Board for sub-Saharan Africa, it lacked an explicit call for permanent seats for Africa on the UN Security Council and gave only tangential attention to peace and security.
• The partnership between the AU PSC and the UN Security Council (UNSC) is characterized by significant imbalances in power and capacity, as well as divergent approaches to decision-making; the PSC operates on consensus while the UNSC is driven by individual member state positions. A critical gap exists in the structure for PSC input into UNSC deliberations, often leading to misaligned calendars and differences on mission leadership, such as with the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali.
• Eight African Regional Economic Communities (RECs) launched a common digital platform for information sharing on 20 July 2024 in Accra, Ghana. The report questions the necessity of this platform, suggesting it may duplicate the functions of the Inter-regional Knowledge Exchange Platform (I-RECKE) and AU-REC mid-year coordination meetings. There is a concern that a REC-exclusive platform could create silos and undermine the AU's continental integration mandate as defined by the 1991 Abuja Treaty.

APA

Soumahoro, M., Mahdi, M., Mkumbeni, K., Atta-Asamoah, A., Fabricius, P., & Cilliers, J. (2024). Peace & Security Council Report. Institute for Security Studies. https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/pages/1737614529401-psc-report-174.pdf

Chicago

Soumahoro, Moussa, Maram Mahdi, Kgaugelo Mkumbeni, Andrews Atta-Asamoah, Peter Fabricius, and Jakkie Cilliers. Peace & Security Council Report. Institute for Security Studies, 2024. https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/pages/1737614529401-psc-report-174.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{soumahoro2024peace, author = {Soumahoro, Moussa and Mahdi, Maram and Mkumbeni, Kgaugelo and Atta-Asamoah, Andrews and Fabricius, Peter and Cilliers, Jakkie}, title = {{Peace \& Security Council Report}}, institution = {Institute for Security Studies}, year = {2024}, month = nov, url = {https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/pages/1737614529401-psc-report-174.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }