Working towards and African peacekeeping capability: Key issues, challenges and dilemmas in Darfur

The most violent and devastating conflicts on the African continent have notably been intra-state in nature: conflicts with considerable peacekeepingconsequences for regional and international organisations. To this end, it iscommonly accepted that there is a pressing need for African and other role-playersto register progress on the need to address, manage and resolve the conflicts on thecontinent.These issues are of great importance to the African continent, especially since the establishment of the African Union (AU) in Durban, South Africa, July 2002 was inter alia inspired by the desire to “promote peace, security and stability on the continent”. 1 The AU Constitutive Act – in stark contrast to the ‘noninterference’ principle that underpinned the former OAU since 1963 – establishes in Article 4(h) the right of the Union to intervene in a member state pursuant to a decision of the Assembly (of heads of state or government) in respect of grave circumstances, namely war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. 2 The Constitutive Act of the AU furthermore provides for action to “…promote and defend African common positions on issues of interest to the continent and its peoples”, and it paves the way for “…the establishment of a common defence policy for the African continent”. 3 Importantly, the African Heads of State and Government also agreed on the creation of an AU Peace and Security Council which, like its UN counterpart, would be in a position to deploy multinational contingents to conflicts when peace and security on the continent were threatened.