Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations

Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations

Statement by First Deputy Permanent Representative Dmitry Polyanskiy at UN Security Council Briefing on peace and security in Africa

Mm. President,

At the outset let me welcome you in the Chair of the Security Council and wish to you and to your team every success in the month of November. We are also thankful to our South African colleagues for their excellent Presidency in the Council in the month of October.

We thank our today’s briefers – First Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, as well as Permanent Observer of the African Union to the United Nations Fatima Mohammed for the information they shared about the results of joint “solidarity visit” of the two organizations to the Horn of Africa. We believe such trips are effective as they fully reflect the commitment of the Secretariats of the United Nations and the African Union to elaboration of shared approaches to most complicated African problems.

The Horn of Africa is living through a vital period of its history which opens ways to solve inter-State contradictions, restore direct contacts between countries. On 11 October the Nobel Peace Prize for 2019 was awarded to Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali for his efforts in Ethiopian-Eritrean settlement and normalizing the overall situation in the region. It proves that the events in these countries are of paramount importance.

We also take note of continuing process of normalization at the track Eritrea-Djibouti. The situation in border areas remains stable. We know that progress in bilateral interaction has slowed down. However, solution to this issue is to be found in the realm of dialogue with prospective mediation of regional powers, Ethiopia in the first place. In general, this file does not pose threat to international peace and security any longer. We see no need to keep it on the Security Council agenda.

The situation in Somalia remains turbulent. What causes greatest concern is intensifying activity of “Al-Shabaab” in central and southern Somalia. We believe the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) remains the key instrument to counter “Al-Shabaab”. Taking into account the uneasy humanitarian situation, we plan to continue our assistance to Somalia and Somalian refugees in neighboring countries by means of making earmarked contributions to relevant funds of the World Food Programme of the United Nations (UN WFP). We will also set forth training of Somalian civil service personnel which is funded from the national budget.

We commend normalization of the situation in Sudan. A constitutional declaration has been signed, Prime-Minister has been elected and transitional government has been formed. The task of the global community now is to help with economic restoration of the country.

We support the call of Amina Mohammed to lift the unilateral restrictive measures against this country that are still in effect.

We notice positive developments in the situation in South Sudan. However there still remains a time issue with building a transitional government by 12 November as  stipulated by the renewed peace agreement. We hope sides to the conflict will take extra effort to solve this problem within the agreed terms.

Mm. President,

We agree that resolving issues of peace and security in the region should be sustained by efforts to enhance social and economic development of these countries. We give a positive assessment to the coordinated work of UN bodies at this track. Issues of economic development are an inalienable priority part of relations between our country and the States of the continent, what was once again proven by the first Russia-Africa summit that was convened in October in Sochi. Being a donor for global development, Russia provides support to African partners via bilateral and multilateral channels. Part of this work is accomplished at the cost of earmarked contributions to international assistance programs for Africa. Recently the Government of Russia made a decision to increase our voluntarily annual contributions to the WFP that I mentioned earlier by an additional package worth 10 mln USD. These funds will be annually transferred to the WFP fund to support Africa. Other measures are under consideration at the moment.

Thank you.