UN peace operations review may struggle to deliver for Africa
The review report reflects some of Africa’s demands, but major challenges threaten the implementation of its recommendations.
Published on 03 September 2026 in
ISS Today
By
Meressa K Dessu
Senior Researcher and Training Coordinator, ISS Addis Ababa
The long-awaited United Nations (UN) Secretary-General’s report on the review of UN peace operations has generated considerable interest. These operations and peacekeeping in particular, face a chronic funding crisis and reduced support from member states, host nations and regional actors.
The 22 July report has specific implications for Africa. The continent hosts about half of all UN peacekeeping operations and faces acute conflicts, including in Sudan, the Sahel, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Somalia.
However, implementing its 15 priorities and 47 recommendations will not be easy. A key obstacle is that the new UN Secretary-General, who takes office in January 2027, may not prioritise the call to reset UN peace operations. This has been a recurring trend at the UN and helped explain the limited implementation of the much-acclaimed 2015 High-Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations report.
Funding shortages, the lack of agreement on the UN’s role in a fracturing multilateral order, and bureaucratic bottlenecks in the UN system also threaten the uptake of the report's recommendations.
The review report recognises the need to address longstanding limitations in UN peace operations, especially peacekeeping, that are directly relevant to Africa. It targets gaps such as civilian protection and mandate overload, and reinforces the centrality of African regional actors, proposing mechanisms that could reshape peacekeeping on the continent.
The report has specific implications for Africa, which hosts about half of all UN peacekeeping operations
Civilian harm from conflict is a major challenge in Africa, exacerbated by mission transitions that leave security gaps when national capacity has not been sufficiently developed before peacekeepers withdraw. The abrupt termination of the UN Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan in 2023, for example, created a security vacuum and led to extensive violence against civilians.
The report reinforces civilian protection as a mission-wide priority integral to planning, setting mandates, execution and resourcing.
It notably reinforces two of Africa’s longstanding demands. One is the importance of implementing Resolution 2719 (2023), which provides for 75% financing for UN-mandated and African Union (AU)-led operations through assessed contributions from UN member states. The other calls for a more just and representative multilateral system, including a more representative UN Security Council.
The critique of overloaded, unrealistic and ill-suited mandates has been a recurring theme across UN peace operations, including in Africa. For example, the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) operated without a counter-terrorism mandate despite the threat posed by violent extremists and insurgents in the country.
The report advocates for mandates focused on political and security tasks where the UN has a comparative advantage, with time-bound objectives, clear end states and realistic resource alignment. It promotes lighter, more mobile footprints suitable for volatile theatres and emphasises continuous adaptation of the mandate to evolving contexts.
The report fails to resolve the dilemma around who should undertake peace enforcement and counter-terrorism
The Secretary-General’s report has provoked criticism for being less ambitious than the circumstances call for, avoiding accountability and also for problematic internal dynamics within the UN Secretariat.
From Africa’s perspective, further limitations are evident.
The report fails to adequately address the ‘crisis of consent’, which has arisen because host governments increasingly have greater say over missions. MINUSMA’s 2023 withdrawal, due to pressure from Mali’s military junta, is the most conspicuous case, while other missions in the DRC and Somalia also struggled due to inconsistent support from their host nations.
The report attempts to address this by proposing formal agreements among the UN Security Council, Secretariat and host states that clarify mutual responsibilities and define the mission’s purpose. As some have already noted, the effectiveness of this approach is questionable, as it prioritises host states’ interests in mission operations.
The report also fails to resolve the dilemma around who should undertake peace enforcement and counter-terrorism, reiterating that these are ‘beyond the scope’ of UN peacekeepers and peace operations. This is a critical missed opportunity to outline how regional actors, such as the AU and regional economic communities, can collaborate with ad hoc coalitions such as the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) in the Lake Chad Basin.
Nor does it engage with the debate on whether neighbouring countries should participate in peace operations. Some African-led missions, such as MNJTF, have demonstrated that geographic proximity can be an asset for swift crisis response.
UN member states’ failure to pay assessed contributions threatens even modest implementation
For all its merits, the formidable obstacles facing the report’s reset agenda undermine its chances of execution. Analysts suggest that the lack of an implementation and follow-up mechanism increases the risks. The new Secretary-General will also likely make fresh proposals to revitalise peace operations.
A much larger threat to implementation is geopolitical fragmentation. Member states say they are committed to UN peace operations as a collective measure to address international security challenges. And yet concrete action on specific files, such as the Sahel, Sudan and the eastern DRC, remains limited, not least due to divisions within the Security Council.
One clear manifestation of this inconsistent commitment is the prevailing funding crisis, which has led to the repatriation of thousands of peacekeepers, including from UN missions in Africa, since late 2025. Budget cuts (nearly US$0.5 billion for peacekeeping and US$96.3 million for special political missions) are incompatible with the report’s call to align mandates with resources. Member states’ failure to pay assessed contributions threatens even modest implementation.
Even so, given that most UN peacekeeping missions are in Africa, regional and continental decision makers must engage with the report’s findings.
The report could shape AU proposals on complementarity between African peace initiatives and UN operations. It should, for example, inform ongoing efforts to implement the Strategic Review of the African Standby Force, and discussions on financing and partnerships. The AU should also assess the report to prepare for engagements with the UN’s new leadership.
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