President John Dramani Mahama has urged the United Nations (UN) to strengthen its partnership with the regional economic communities such ECOWAS.
The President made the call in his address at the Munich Security Conference (MSC) in Germany.
The Munich Security Conference, which brings together leaders worldwide, is a crucial platform for dialogue on international security.
President Mahama reiterated that peacekeeping doesn’t work in every circumstance; stating that there were circumstances where the UN could not restore peace, because there was a violent situation taking place.
“I remember with ECOWAS when we had the Liberian Civil War, it took ECOWAS to form the ECOWAS Monitoring Group, (ECOMOG), to go in while fighting was taking place, secure the port area, inject ECOWAS forces in there, and protect civilians, and push back the rebels and create a safe zone,” he said.
“It’s very difficult to insert a UN force into a situation like that. So, I do think that partnerships with RECs are important, and we must bring those closer.”
President Mahama said for instance, right now, three of Ghana’s neighbors, the Sahelian countries (Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger), were breaking away from ECOWAS to form their own alliance.
This, he said was because of the Islamist-jihadists insurgency that was taking place.
“We could do a multinational joint task force, but our economies require those resources for health care, for education, and to provide other social services for our people,” the President said.
“And so, unless we got resources from an organization like the UN or the AU, it makes it difficult for us as a regional organization to make any intervention”.
He underscored the need for stronger partnerships going forward between the Regional Economic Communities and the United Nations.
Source: GNA
The post President Mahama urges UN to strengthen partnership with Regional Economic Communities appeared first on Ghana Business News.
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