Five African peacemakers share their stories

24, 25, and 26 January 2012, Geneva, Switzerland
AFRICA-GENEVA CONFERENCES - Africa at the heart of global issues

The international community can no longer neglect the importance of Africa and its rising geopolitical weight. The reinforced global focus on Africa emerges as a result of the continent’s history, its youthful population, its agricultural potential and natural resources that increasingly attract different governments, multinational companies, and transborder political movements. At the same time, the region suffers from significant tensions and violence that have led the United Nations to intervene, on many occasions, with a view to promoting conflict prevention and resolution.

In Focus: Five African peacemakers
Africa’s transformation was often accompanied by spiraling violence prompting the international community’s interventions. It is important, however, to shed light on the crucial - and often neglected - role that different personalities of African origin played and continue to play in the area of peacemaking. The University of Geneva, in cooperation with UNITAR, wishes to provide an ideal platform to five African peacemakers who have made a distinguished and courageous career at the highest level within the United Nations. As an institution dedicated to the promotion of academic research and dialogue, the University of Geneva plans therefore to launch conferences featuring the respective experiences of these five personalities who have closely worked not only with political leaders in confict zones, but also with the Heads of State and Government of several African countries, and the decision makers of interstate organizations such as the African Union, the League of Arab States, the UN Economic Commission for Africa, etc. Taking place in Geneva, an international city and a host to numerous negotiations, these conferences will help to reveal the critical peacemaking and peacekeeping work carried out away from the international capitals. These five African peacemakers will for the first time discuss with the public their successes and failures, as well as share their visions of how their countries and their home continent as a whole might evolve in the coming decades.

On this occasion, five African peacemakers, including the Executive Director of UNITAR, having served with the United Nations or regional organizations will, for the first time, share their stories, as well as their visions of how their countries and their home continent as a whole might evolve in the coming decades.

The conferences will take place in the auditorium “Piaget”, Uni Dufour, University of Geneva, on 24, 25 and 26 January 2012, from 7.00 to 8.30 pm. The working language of this conference is French.

Programme:

TUESDAY, 24 JANUARY
Diplomatie pyromane, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah,
former Special Representative of UN Secretary-General and President of the Center for Strategy and Security for the Sahel Sahara (Centre4s)

ONU: calmer le jeu tant qu’il est temps, Issa Diallo,
former Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General and former UN Under-Secretary-General
Followed by an open discussion moderated by Angelique Mounier-Kuhn, Le Temps

WEDNESDAY, 25 JANUARY
Des orages qui annoncent le printemps africain, Mohamed Sahnoun,
former Deputy Secretary-General of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), former UN Under-Secretary-General for Africa, and President of the Caux Forum for human security

Une sahélienne de l’ONU au coeur des bouleversements à l’est de l’Europe, Aminata Djermakoye,
former Chief of Protocol at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, and Director of Administration at the UN Office at Geneva
Followed by an open discussion moderated by Anik Schuin, RTS

THURSDAY, 26 JANUARY
Regards croisés: «Ethique personnelle et multilatéralisme au service des faiseurs de paix», Carlos Lopes, UN Assistant Secretary-General, Executive Director of UNITAR and Director of the UN System Staff College (UNSSC), jointly with Issa Diallo, Aminata Djermakoye, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah et Mohamed Sahnoun
Followed by an open discussion moderated by Michel Beuret, RTS