In November, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) will assume the role of chairing the African Union (AU) Peace and Security Council (PSC). This is the first time that the DRC will be at the helm of steering AU’s highest standing peace and security policy making organ.

The Provisional Programme of Work (PPoW) for the month, envisages seven substantive sessions. Except for one session that focuses on Libya, all sessions are dedicated to thematic issues. One of the sessions that may take the form of a seminar is envisaged to take place in Kinshasa, DRC. The PPoW also envisages holding the 16th Retreat of the PSC on the Review of its Working Methods from 5 to 6 November in Djibouti, which previously hosted the 5^th PSC retreat on its working methods from 9 to 10 February 2013. The PSC will also host the 15^th consultative meeting with the European Union’s Peace and Security Committee. Except for one session that will be held at ministerial level, all sessions are expected to take place at ambassadorial level.

While some of the activities including the session on Libya draw on the annual indicative program of work and the proposal from the Department of Political Affairs, Peace and Security, the DRC is responsible for crafting the agenda of at least four of the sessions. One theme that seems to run through the agenda items of the PPoW is the deliberate attempt at putting a spotlight on some of the key tools and elements of the African Peace and Security Architecture.

On 1 November the PSC holds its first session on the customary annual thematic agenda scheduled for November, namely youth, peace, and security. It was in November 2018 that the PSC decided to hold a session on youth, peace and security on an annual basis. This year marks the 5^th year since the establishment of this agenda as a standing agenda in the indicative annual program of work of the PSC. The previous session emphasised the need for the AU Commission to conduct a comprehensive assessment of implementing the continental framework for youth peace and security, identifying challenges and providing recommendations for the way forward. This session may present an opportunity for the Council to follow up on the progress made in undertaking the assessment of the framework. A development that may also be of interest for this session is the appointment of the new cohort of AU Youth Ambassadors for Peace (AYAPs) and the 1^st cohort of the AU network of African Youth on conflict prevention and mediation, WiseYouth representing the five regions of Africa. The most recent interaction of the PSC with the AYAPs was on the sidelines of the annual consultative meeting with the UNSC, during which the AYAPS shared the report of the five regional consultations and the continental consultation they undertook on the New Agenda for Peace and Youth in Africa.

The PSC will travel on 4 November to Djibouti for the 16^th retreat on its working methods scheduled to take place on 5-6 November. Some of the working methods issues that are expected to feature during the retreat include ways of addressing denialism that impedes engagement of the PSC including it being seized with new situations, the increasing dominance of national interest in agenda setting and decision-making, lack of follow-up and implementation of PSC decisions, negotiation over draft outcomes of PSC sessions through the silencing procedure and the mismatch between the expanding workload of the PSC and the technical capacity for backstopping the workload which affects at times logistical issues such as timely circulation of working documents.

On 11 November, the PSC is scheduled to have its second session dedicated to the theme of ‘Challenges and Lessons Learned in Strengthening Mediation Efforts to Resolve Conflicts in Africa.’ Mediation is one of, if not, the most important tools in the AU peace and security toolbox for peacemaking after the eruption of conflicts/crises. To this end, it has put in place various mediation arrangements including the creative High-level Panels leveraging the influence and gravitas of former statespersons and/or senior diplomats, special Representatives/Special Envoys of the AU Commission Chairperson and ad hoc committees of leaders of member states. It has also put in place a mediation unit as part of the AU Department of Political Affairs, Peace and Security. During the past two decades, the AU has deployed on its own or in coordination with RECs/RMs and the UN from Liberia and Sierra Leone in West Africa to Burundi in the Great Lakes and still carries mediation in various settings. While some of the mediation processes have registered success, in other instances they have run into challenges. Some mediation processes run into difficulty due to a lack of mediation strategy and/or technical infrastructure critical to their effective functioning as well as poor recording of lessons learned from various mediation processes. AU mediation also at times has fallen victim due to the absence of robust and factually grounded conflict analysis for informing mediation processes and the proliferation of mediation processes, leading to fragmentation. At times, mediators lack the skills and temperament to establish trust on the part of all parties and to mobilise solid political consensus and diplomatic and other support from AU member states. Currently, the AU runs mediation processes in Sudan through the AU high-level panel and in Eastern DRC through the Luanda process. As such, in addition to interrogating these various issues affecting AU mediation, this session also affords an opportunity to examine how the changing nature of conflicts involving the surge of terrorist groups and geopolitical tensions affect mediation and why AU is not deploying or late in deploying mediation in some conflict situations, particularly in conflicts implicating the involvement of member states. It is expected that based on such reflection, the session will help outline how to strengthen and upscale the effectiveness of mediation in view of the increase in conflicts on the continent.

On 12 November, the Council will hold its first and only country-specific session for the month to consider the situation in Libya. In 2024, the PSC has shown limited engagement with Libya compared to previous years. While the PSC held two sessions on Libya in 2023, this is the first and perhaps the only session. However, the AU ad hoc committee of heads of state and government on Libya, chaired by Congo, held a summit-level meeting on Libya on 5 February 2024, in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo in preparation for the launch of the national reconciliation process anticipated to be convened on 28 April 2024 in Sirt, Libya.  In 2022, the PSC proposed a field mission to Libya, which could have facilitated more tangible engagement, but this plan was never implemented. Some decisions that the Council may address during the session include the relocation of the AU Liaison Office (AULO). An assessment mission was conducted in 2023 to evaluate the technical and logistical aspects of the relocation, leading to the adoption of a roadmap to expedite the process. Another key focus may be transitional justice within the reconciliation process, the proposed reconciliation conference, and plans to hold general elections through the formation of the 6+6 Joint Committee, which aims to establish an electoral framework for the elections.

While the AU has played a marginal role in the Libya peace process with the UN and European actors taking the lead, it has shown interest in facilitating a national reconciliation process. Earlier plans for the convening of this AU-facilitated national reconciliation conference, such as the one slated for 28 April 2024, failed to materialise for various reasons, including disagreement between the two rival governments. In apparent attempt to resuscitate the national reconciliation conference, the AU undertook a mission to Libya from 8-11 October led by the current AU Chairperson, Mohamed Ould Cheikh Ghzouani accompanied by AU Commission Chairperson, Moussa Faki Mahamat and a representative of Denis Sassou Nguesso, President of Congo, Chairperson of the High-Level Committee of Heads of State Government of the AU on Libya. In her address to the UN Security Council on 9 October 2024, Officer in Charge/Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General to Libya Stephanie Koury, pointed out that the national reconciliation process remains stalled due to lack of consensus. The session slated for 12 November offers the platform for getting updates on the outcome of this mission to Libya and whether any progress made for realising the call of the February 2024 summit of the AU Committee of Heads of State and Government on Libya for the Libyan ‘Presidential Council to establish as soon as possible the National Commission for Reconciliation.’

The next session of the PSC is scheduled for 15 November and will be on the theme of ‘Comparative review of the functioning of the UNSC Sanctions Committee and PSC Sanctions Sub-committee.’ This session draws attention to yet another tool in the peace and security toolbox of the AU, whose use is generally confined to situations of unconstitutional changes of government. In proposing this session, a key part of the plan is to prob AU’s extant norm on sanctions and the experience of the continental body in using investigation into (and sanctioning) for punishing acts of a state violating AU member states community norms. This session also aims at learning lessons from the best practices of the UN in terms of the process that is followed for investigating and determining violations and imposing sanctions against such violations as well as the mechanisms that are used for monitoring and enforcing such sanctions with a view to tailor processes and mechanisms adapted to the needs and realities of the AU. Considering that currently the focus of the AU sanction regime is on unconstitutional changes of government, expanding the scope of the sanctions regime to cover breaches of other AU norms is expected to attract some attention during the session.

On 19 November, the PSC will hold its session on the theme of the ‘Implementation of the DDR and PCRD Programmes for the Consolidation of Peace, Security, and Socio-Economic Activities: Challenges and Way Forward.’ While some success was registered in implementing DDR and peacebuilding in pursuit of peace agreements in countries such as Liberia, Sierra Leone and Burundi, in other cases such as Central African Republic, DRC and South Sudan lack of effective implementation of DDR processes has impeded peace processes and, in some cases, threatened relapse of some of these countries back to conflicts. This is one of the themes advanced by DRC that aims at probing the experience from these and various other settings in Africa in DDR and post-conflict reconstruction and development (PCRD) programmes, including AU’s role in facilitating such programmes and the lessons from these experiences. Of particular interest for this session is how to go beyond the signing of ceasefire agreements or peace agreements with a security component and advance implementation of DDR and PCRD measures to prevent risks of relapse of post-conflict countries back to conflict. The session also offers an opportune platform to put a spotlight on the role of AU’s PCRD policy and lessons from AU’s experience in initiating and implementing PCRD programmes. It is expected that, among others, the UN Peacebuilding Commission will present a briefing during this session which may be held in the form of a seminar. Envisaged to be convened in Kinshasa, the DRC, this event is also expected to facilitate engagement between the PSC and various Congolese stakeholders including the Minister of Foreign Affairs, relevant Committees of the Parliament and members of Civil Society as well as the media.

On 22 November, the Council will hold its 15^th Annual Joint Consultative Meeting between the PSC and EU PSC in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. For two consecutive years, the two Councils have struggled to adopt a joint communique capturing the outcome of their deliberations due to a lack of agreement on one issue that emerged in 2022.  The centre of contention has been on the inclusion of a language on the war in Ukraine. Understandably, member states of the EU feel strongly about what may be considered to be the first major war in Europe since World War II. While AU member states may share the view that the invasion of one country by another and the breach of the sovereignty of one country by another is contrary to the UN Charter and international law and don’t support the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, they lack a common AU position to enable the PSC on adopting any measure against this particular breach of international law. While the position of the reluctance of AU member states on joining the AU and others in taking measures against Russia is informed by various considerations, one of the major factors is the belief on the part of many member states that this war is in the main a geopolitical war reminiscent of the cold war. Since the Cold War was not actually cold when it played itself on the African continent but led to hot wars, there are many who are weary of being caught up in the crossfire of confrontation between major powers.   However, aside from the issue of Ukraine, the two Councils share common interests in many peace and security matters. The last session focused on various regions, including the Sahel, the Horn of Africa, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). During this year’s meeting, the Councils are likely to also address these and various other files. These include addressing critical country files that are high on the agendas of both the AU and EU, such as the Sahel region, Sudan due to ongoing escalations in conflict, and Somalia with a focus on the transition from the AU Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS) to AU Support and Stabilisation  Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM).

The next session of the PSC, slated for 26 November, will be a briefing on the Continental Early Warning and Security Outlook. This follows the previous session of the PSC in April 2024, which underscored the ‘imperative of a robust and fully functional Continental Early Warning System (CEWS) to effectively pre-empt and mitigate conflicts and expressed concern about challenges to conflict prevention. In light of the focus of DRC’s chairship of the PSC for the month on interrogating the state of the efficacy of various AU tools and structures for conflict prevention, management and resolution, this session presents another opportunity to deliberate on the institutional and political challenges militating against the CEWS and the inability of mobilising early action up on being cognizant of early warning signs and engaging in conflict prevention proactively including through the deployment of preventive diplomacy.

Building on the language agreed to in the joint communique of the 18^th Annual Consultative meeting between the AU PSC and UNSC, the Council on 28 November will hold a ‘Discussion on enhancing mechanisms for curbing illegal exploitation of natural resources by armed and terrorist groups in Africa.’ While the conversation in New York primarily centred on the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), it is clear that the role of exploitation of natural resources in conflicts is a pervasive issue affecting many regions across the continent, including in the Sahel, Sudan, DRC, and Mozambique. This session presents an opportunity for the Council to have a focused engagement on this issue and identify how extraction of minerals and other natural resources is used for financing conflicts, the channels used for illicit trade in such resources and the web of actors involved in creating a war economy centred on natural resources.  While this session may not lead to the adoption of specific policy outcomes, it can serve as an opportunity for identifying the elements of the policy issues in respect of which the PSC may develop comprehensive strategy and specific policy action tailored to specific conflict situations.

On 28 November, the PSC will hold its ministerial level and the last session of the month. Expected to build on insights from the various sessions held during the course of the month, this session will be held under the title ‘Discussion on experiences and lessons learned in the implementation of PSC mandate in line with the AU Constitutive Act and PSC Protocol.’ Apart from reflecting on the implementation of the PSC mandate in general, this session may focus particularly on whether and why the PSC and the AU as a whole struggle to engage in tensions between AU member states and in upholding some of the fundamental principles of the AU that become threatened in the context of inter-state tensions and conflicts. The goal is to ensure that the Council and member states recommit to the key principles outlined in the AU Constitutive Act and the PSC protocol.

In addition to the foregoing activities, the PPoW envisages in the footnote the participation of the Chairperson of the PSC in COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan from 13 to 16 November. Depending on the outcome of the UN Security Council Meeting on the report of the UN Secretary-General on Somalia and ATMIS, the PSC may also hold a session on this file.