The Panel of the Wise of the African Union (AU) is a structure with great potential to become one of the pillars of the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA), Moroccan Minister of Foreign Affairs Nasser Bourita said Friday in Rabat.
“As the security situation in several regions of Africa is alarming, the role of the Panel of the Wise is undeniably gaining in importance and relevance,” said Bourita who took part, by video conference, in the 1142nd ministerial meeting of the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC), on the “Role of the AU Panel of the Wise in promoting peace, security and stability in Africa”.
Welcoming the opportunity offered by this meeting to shed light on the work done by the Panel of the Wise, the Minister expressed his confidence in the primordial place that should be given to the actions of the Group.
Bourita, who highlighted the Group’s contribution to Africa’s stability efforts within the framework of a vision combining prevention, anticipation and foresight, said that its initiatives, within one year, in Chad, Burkina Faso, Guinea and Mali, as well as its support for the AU High Representative for the Horn of Africa and its interaction with other mechanisms, are to be commended.
This contribution marks the Group’s willingness to communicate and coordinate its action with the PSC, he added, stressing the importance of consultation and coordination that must be “systematic” between the PSC and the Group.
“This issue has already been the subject of previous decisions,” said Bourita, calling on the Secretariat to make this exercise an institutionalized deadline, biannually included in the Council agenda.
In addition, he said that an important exercise of reflection remains to be conducted to refocus the Group’s mandate on all issues affecting Africa, specifying that these are energy, food, health, climate or strictly security issues and this, in a logic of the nexus Peace-Security-Development as promoted by the “Tangier Declaration” of October 2022.
The Group must respect the AU documents and resolutions in the way it monitors situations and in the comments it makes regarding certain regional disputes, the Minister noted.
Bourita noted, with satisfaction, the overlap between the activities of the Group and the central themes on which the Kingdom is actively involved at the continental scale.
He cited, in this sense, the example of capacity building of the Commission in the field of election observation, where Morocco has organized the 1st training cycle, in Rabat, in May 2022.
Bourita also recalled the organization by the Kingdom, during its presidency of the PSC in October 2022, of a meeting devoted to the central theme “Women, Peace and Security”, and its co-organization, on the sidelines of the last ordinary Summit, of a Side-Event on the theme “Climate Change, Women, Peace and Security”.
These are all areas of common interest that could pave the way for a promising interaction between Morocco, the PSC and the Panel of the Wise, he said.