The Hague, 25 May 2004

OPCW Commemorates Africa Day

Africa Day was established by a resolution of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) on the day of the OAU's constitution on 25 May 1963 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Four decades later, with the adoption and entry into force of the Constitutive Act, the new African Union was officially launched in Durban, South Africa in July 2002. This historic Conference also adopted Decision AHG/Dec. 181 (XXXVIII) on the Implementation and Universality of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). That Decision welcomed the recommendation for an effective implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention in Africa and encouraged the call to achieve the universality of the Chemical Weapons Convention in Africa.
In July 2003, OPCW Director-General, Mr Rogelio Pfirter, attended the African Union’s Summit in Maputo, Mozambique. Since July 2003, five African States have joined the OPCW: Sao Tomé and Principe, Cape Verde, Libya, Chad and Rwanda. The OPCW now includes 41 African States.

The OPCW commends the African Union for its unwavering support for effective implementation of multilateral treaties, including the CWC, as well as the African regional conventions contributing to arms control, disarmament, the prevention of terrorism, international cooperation and economic development, in achieving peace and security on the African continent.

African States have played a pivotal role in the successful negotiation, and subsequently the implementation, of the CWC. Since the Entry into Force of the CWC on 29 April 1997, African States have shared the responsibility of the Convention’s equitable and effective global implementation through their dedicated participation in the work of the OPCW’s policy-making organs, including holding the chairmanship of both the Executive Council and in the Conference of the States Parties to the CWC.
OPCW Director General Pfirter renewed the OPCW’s call for the Convention’s universality in Africa: “On this Africa Day, we observe the unwavering commitment, vision and solidarity applied over more than four decades that has brought forth the African Union. The OPCW also recognizes the invaluable contribution Africa has made, and will continue to make, in ensuring the advancement of our common purpose: to achieve peace and security by ridding the African continent of this category of weapons of mass destruction, while promoting the developmental benefits to be derived from peaceful chemistry. With the African Union’s indispensable support, we are confident that Africa will achieve universality and will become a chemical weapons free region.”