African Union Mission In Sudan Research Articles

The African Union and Peacekeeping in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities

Africa continues to suffer from outbreaks of conflict, with evidence pointing to an increasing number of violent armed incidents. The establishment of the African Union (AU) heralded (or so it was hoped) a new era in how African conflicts are managed and resolved. Since 2003, the AU has mandated a number of peace support operations including the African Union Mission in Burundi (AMIB), the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), and the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), as a means to manage conflicts on the continent. In more recent times, the organization has also authorized three operations dealing with non-state armed groups namely the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), Boko Haram and the Sahel Region Jihadists. Whilst some of these peace support missions recorded successes in meeting their mandates, generally all of them faced or are facing a number of challenges including funding, and logistical inadequacies among others. At the same time, the AU’s engagement in peacekeeping in Africa has occasioned opportunities for the organization including: increasing its capacity building in the area of conflict prevention, management and resolution; adoption of initiatives like “Silencing the Guns” aimed at lessening the outbreak of conflicts; and establishing its own funding mechanisms on how to support its mandated and authorized peace support missions among others.

Mind the Gap: Civilian Protection and the Politics of Peace Operation Design

ABSTRACTProtecting civilians from conflict and atrocities has become a major focus of governments, the UN, and activists. Yet peace operations—the main policy instrument for directly shielding civilians from violence—vary widely in how well they are designed to do so. One much-maligned problem is a gap between a force's ambitions to protect civilians and its physical resources for doing so. Missions plagued by these ambitions–resources gaps gesture toward protecting civilians but are not designed to do so effectively. They can also worsen civilian suffering. This article explores the politics behind these gaps, focusing on the role of powerful states—especially major Western democracies—in creating and facilitating them. It argues that ambitions–resources gaps represent a form of organized hypocrisy that helps political leaders balance competing normative and material pressures to protect civilians while limiting costs and risks. Case studies of France's Operation Turquoise in Rwanda and US support for the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) in Darfur support the argument.

The Role of the Netherlands in the European Framework for an International Response on Darfur during its Presidency in 2004–2005

In this article, we discuss the role of the Netherlands with respect to the Darfur crisis during 2003–2005. From the moment the crisis broke out, the Netherlands was active as a major donor and tried to facilitate political solutions. During the period January 2004–July 2005, it functioned as the (acting) presidency of the Council of the European Union and was therefore involved in creating a common EU position. We discuss how policy was made while observing internal (domestic) and external (international) influences. We conclude that the Netherlands was partially successful in establishing a more active EU position regarding Darfur. However, we also find evidence that, eventually, the EU has lagged behind the response of the UN Security Council, despite being a major donor to emergency relief and the African Union mission in Sudan.

The Role of the Netherlands in the International Response to the Crisis in Darfur

We discuss the role of the Netherlands in the crisis of Darfur during 2003-2005. The Netherlands was active as major donor and tried to facilitate political solutions since the breakout of the Darfur crisis. During the period July-December 2004 it acted as EU President and was as such involved in creating a common EU line. Additionally, it acted as EU representative in Khartoum for an extended period, while several Dutchmen were at high positions at the EU and UN. We discuss how policy was made and which domestic actors had influenced its foreign policy. Subsequently, we see how its foreign policy worked through international politics, especially within the EU. We conclude that the Netherlands was partially successful in establishing a more active EU position regarding Darfur. However, we also find evidence that eventually the EU has lagged behind the response of the UN Security Council, despite being a major donor to emergency relief and the African Union mission in Sudan.

Converging Around Global Norms? Protection of Civilians in African Union and European Union Peacekeeping in Africa

ABSTRACT This article analyzes the degree of convergence between the doctrines on the protection of civilians in peacekeeping between the African Union and the European Union and their translation into practice. We have found that in term of doctrines themselves both the African Union and European Union have aligned their understandings of protection of civilians to a significant degree with that of the United Nations, taking up increasingly similar positions on the permissible and required degree of robustness of peacekeeping missions. This may indicate that a layered system of global security governance based on strong and connected regional security organizations could be both effective and legitimate. However, when assessing convergence on the practical level by analyzing the extent to which both regional organizations have applied these norms in the Darfur conflict (African Union Mission in Sudan and European Union Force Chad/Central African Republic) and, more recently, the African Union in Somalia, we noticed that convergence remains fragile and does not necessarily convert into increased effectiveness on the local level. This should, therefore, serve as a warning sign that the convergence of doctrines should not be confused with convergence in practice or with greater effectiveness.

Cooperating for peace and security or competing for legitimacy in Africa? The case of the African Union in Darfur

The 21st century has witnessed institutional transformations at the regional and sub-regional levels to address peace and security challenges in Africa. At the centre of this transformation process is the creation of the African Union and its security organ, the Peace and Security Council (PSC), which has the mandate to maintain peace, security, and stability in Africa. Since its inception in 2004, the PSC has been the central arbiter of violent and non-violent conflicts in Africa. The PSC authorised its first peacekeeping mission, the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), to monitor the N'djamena Humanitarian Ceasefire Agreement between the government of Sudan and the main rebel movements, the Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M) and the Justice and Equity Movement (JEM) in Darfur. The PSC mandate has opened an avenue for interregional security cooperation with the United Nations and other organisations, including the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. This article discusses this important development in continental politics of the AU with reference to the Darfur conflict. Drawing on insights from the constructivist approach to international relations, the author discusses two interrelated questions. First, what are the factors that drive Security Council and PSC cooperation on Darfur? Second, what are the challenges for this cooperation in the promotion of peace, security, and justice in Darfur and other parts of Africa? The author argues that Darfur provides an opportunity to the AU to assert its legitimacy and authority while cooperating with the Security Council.

African Union’s Intervention in Sudan

IntroductionAfrican Union (AU) since its creation has witnessed large scale violence and conflict in several member countries.1 Although violent conflicts in Africa are not new, they have drawn special attention due to the fact that they are more intense and extensive in scope, highly destructive, as civilian populations were targeted deliberately. It has produced large number of civilian victims, refugees and displaced persons. There have been gross human rights violations in these conflicts. Furthermore, owing to the fragility of African state boundaries, some intra-state conflicts have spilt over the borders and exerted pressure on neighbouring countries. For instance, the war in southern Sudan claimed more than two million lives. Violence in Africa has taken various forms ranging from genocide, as in Rwanda and Darfur beginning from 2003 till date, to interpersonal violence. Besides extremism in brutality, armed conflicts in Africa have also been characterised by warlordism, targeting of vulnerable groups, such as children, women and refugees, using children as soldiers, state sponsorship of violence, and war economies. In such situations a prompt and efficient regional organisation was required. AU as a regional organisation has shown proactiveness to solve violence and conflicts in Africa.Darfur Crisis emerged at the same time that AU was created. Moreover, the negotiations for peace to end two decades of civil war in the south was also reinvigorated. Thus, Sudan has provided an opportunity for AU to solve the crisis and establish itself as a major regional organisation. The African Union (AU) has been admirably engaged in the Darfur Crisis but has proved ineffectual, hindered by poor resources and a weak political will. Since 2004, the African Union's efforts have included the negotiation of a ceasefire, the deployment of a peacekeeping operation, the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), and the mediation of a peace agreement between the belligerents in the Darfur War.This article examines the overall role of the African Union as a negotiator for peace, as a peacekeeper and one that would end the conflicts in Darfur. It also discusses the role of AU as a facilitator of comprehensive peace agreement between the Sudanese Government and the Southern Sudanese Government. African Union since its inception has acted to bring peace and stability in Africa. Such actions have been strongly reinforced by 'African solution for African problems'. It views the Sudanese crisis from this perspective as well. But even after six years of active involvement in Sudan and particularly in Darfur AU has failed to bring sustainable peace, end to the atrocities and human rights violation against the civilians nor has it been able to disarm the 'janjaweed tribal militias'.2Background to Sudanese ProblemsThe Sudanese crisis is unique to the AU. It is the largest country in Africa in terms of area. And since independence it has been suffering from an acute crisis of national identity. In this war of national identity, millions of people have perished and more than 5 millions have been displaced. The Sudanese Government has faced a violent response from the regional rebel groups in the south, east and west. These rebels are at war with the government demanding a share in resources, self autonomy and equal rights as Sudanese.Presently, Sudan has the dubious record of the largest number of internally displaced people in the world. It is the result of civil war in southern Sudan and the Darfur conflict. A peace agreement was concluded to the former cause in 2005. At the same time Darfur conflicts erupted.The Darfur Conflict is one among the many conflicts arising out of the historical grievances of discrimination inflicted by the Government of Sudan. The present crisis emerged in early 2003 when non-Arab rebels from Darfur, frustrated with attacks on their land and convinced that their interests were not being represented in the ongoing peace talks between Khartoum and the southern rebels, launched a guerrilla war on government forces (ICG, 2004, I). …

Peacekeeping, Regime Security and ‘African Solutions to African Problems’: exploring motivations for Rwanda's involvement in Darfur

Rwanda is not a traditional provider of troops for peacekeeping missions, yet since 2004 it has been the second largest contributor to both the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) and its successor the hybrid African Union–UN Assistance Mission in Darfur (UNAMID). This paper analyses some of the key motives for Rwanda's contribution to these missions, situating its actions within a wider framework in which African states benefit in specific ways from being seen to contribute to ‘African solutions to African problems’. Highlighting changing narratives on Africa's role in international security, I argue that Rwanda's ruling party has been able use its involvement in peacekeeping to secure its position domestically and to attract or retain the support of key bilateral donors. I briefly explore the implications of these dynamics for Rwanda's political development, suggesting in conclusion that the focus on building military capacity for peacekeeping purposes may contribute to future African, and Rwandan, security problems as much as to potential solutions.

Back to the Future?

As the crisis in Darfur drags on - a crisis that has consumed the lives of 400,000 people and displaced two million more since 2003 - the international community's response to the tragedy faces increasing scrutiny and criticism. In particular, two internationally sanctioned military operations, the hybrid United Nations African Union Mission in Sudan (UNAMID) and its predecessor, the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), have received considerable negative attention. These forces, mostly drawn from African states, are noted for their inability to hold the Sudanesegovernment-backed Arab militia - the Janjaweed - at bay, to protect ordinary Darfurians, and to sustain the humanitarian space that would allow for relief efforts by nongovernmental organizations and the United Nations to proceed. Several variables have contributed to these weaknesses: a shortage of readily available and well-trained troops, a lack of appropriate communications and transportation equipment, insufficient funding, a poor management structure at the strategic and operational levels, an overly constraining mandate, and, not surprisingly, poor morale among the troops. Compounding this predicament has been the intransigence of the Sudanese government and the antagonism of the different Darfurian rebel movements.In hopes of putting more, or more effective, boots on the ground, several proposals have been made in recent years. They range from intervention by the major powers - possibly from NATO and the European Union - to the development of a United Nations standing force, to the creation of a genocide prevention division within the US army. However, military overstretch of key western states already occupied in Afghanistan and Iraq, strategic indifference, the time required to develop special military units, and concerns about casualty tolerance have collectively blunted these options.In light of the inability or undesirability of further using state militaries, one proposal has been to seek a nonstate solution to the crisis by relying upon the international private security industry. The logic is that higher calibre, better organized, and more effective forces can be taken from the private sector. In particular, proponents such as Max Boot of the influential Council on Foreign Relations and Steve Forbes, the editor of Forbes and a past seeker of the US presidency, look back to the 1990s and cite the activities of Executive Outcomes, a now defunct South African-based firm, as conclusive proof that private security companies could play a catalytic role in bringing peace and stability to Darfur.1 The seeming attraction of the Executive Outcomes example is that in its operations in Sierra Leone from 1995 to 1997, it brought to heel the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), an organization with murderous intentions similar to those of the Janjaweed, given its penchant for terrorizing civilians with amputations and summary executions. As well, from 1993 to 1995, Executive Outcomes, through its contract with the Angolan government, was instrumental in bringing the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) to the negotiating table, which resulted in the subsequent creation of the Lusaka protocol. What is more, in both cases Executive Outcomes was willing to do what the United Nations could not - sides, take casualties, deploy overwhelming force and fire pre-emptively.2The objective here is not to delve deeply into Executive Outcomes' exploits; that has been done thoroughly elsewhere.3 Instead, this article argues that employing the historical Executive Outcomes example as the template for success in contemporary Darfur is faulty for three reasons. First, it ignores how the company drew upon, supported, and interacted with other armed actors of a type not readily available in Sudan. Second, it does not recognize the sensitive nature of the mercenary issue in Africa specifically, and how states generally have approached the application of nonstate violence. …

The Responsibility To Protect and the Conflict in Darfur: The Big Let-Down

This article discusses the international response to the conflict in Darfur from 2003 onwards in order to explore some of the key challenges related to implementing the responsibility to protect (R2P). First, we show that the debates on R2P in connection to Darfur translated into little more substantive action than the pragmatic decision to deploy peace operations with mandates that included civilian protection, as suggested by the African Union (AU) Mission in Sudan (AMIS), and later by the hybrid UN—AU Mission in Darfur (UNAMID). Second, we argue that the international response to Darfur illustrates three major challenges to R2P implementation. These are: political limitations inherent in the R2P framework; moral dilemmas emerging from military action; and tactical challenges, as exemplified by the struggles faced by the AU and the UN in Darfur. We conclude that the international failure to offer meaningful protection in Darfur highlights the need for continued caution and critical analysis of the ways in which R2P is conceptualized and implemented.

AMIS in Darfur: Africa's litmus test in peacekeeping and political mediation

This article aims to look at the Darfur conflict within the framework of conflict resolution and peacekeeping under the African Union. The operational effectiveness of the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), which was mandated to deal with the conflict, is critically examined. In addition to analysing the adequacy of the mandate attention is focused on the critical issues of finance, logistics and, most importantly, politics as it relates to the AU-led mission. The article concludes that efforts to operationalise the efforts the African Union's peace and security architecture, including the African Standby Force, are steps in the right direction but with enormous challenges.

The African Union's evolving role in peace operations: the African Union Mission in Burundi, the African Union Mission in Sudan and the AfricanUnion Mission in Somalia

The African Union has been operational for close to five years now and it is appropriate to reflect on whether its peace and security architecture will achieve its objectives. In 2002, the AU adopted the Protocol on Peace and Security, which launched the creation of the Peace and Security Council, the African Standby Force, the Continental Early Warning Mechanism and the Panel of the Wise. This architecture is designed to oversee the successful implementation of the AU's peacemaking, peacekeeping and peacebuilding initiatives. This article assesses the evolving role of the AU in peace operations. It argues that given the youthfulness of its institutions, the AU has made a significant effort to conduct peace operations, notably in Burundi. However, the limitations of its fledgling institutions have been exposed in the complex humanitarian situation in the Darfur region of Sudan and in Somalia. Ultimately, it is too early to pass a definitive judgment on the AU's peace operations since the paradigm shift in attitudes that the AU is attempting to bring about, and the institutions that it has developed to do so, have to be given the opportunity to work.

Darfur and the failure of the responsibility to protect

When official representatives of more than 170 countries adopted the principle of the ‘responsibility to protect’ (R2P) at the September 2005 World Summit, Darfur was quickly identified as the test case for this new doctrine. The general verdict is that the international community has failed the test due to lack of political will. This article argues that the failure is real but that it is more fundamentally located within the doctrine of R2P itself. Fulfilling the aspiration of R2P demands an international protection capability that does not exist now and cannot be realistically expected. The critical weakness in R2P is that the ‘responsibility to react’ has been framed as coercive protection, which attempts to be a middle way between classic peacekeeping and outright military intervention that can be undertaken without the consent of the host government. Thus far, theoretical and practical attempts to create this intermediate space for coercive protection have failed to resolve basic strategic and operational issues. In addition, the very act of raising the prospect of external military intervention for human protection purposes changes and distorts the political process and can in fact make a resolution more difficult. Following an introductory section that provides background to the war in Darfur and international engagement, this article examines the debates over the R2P that swirled around the Darfur crisis and operational concepts developed for the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) and its hybrid successor, the UN–African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), especially during the Abuja peace negotiations. Three operational concepts are examined: ceasefire, disarmament and civilian protection. Unfortunately, the international policy priority o bringing UN troops to Darfur had an adverse impact on the Darfur peace talks without grappling with the central question of what international forces would do to resolve the crisis. Advocacy for the R2P set an unrealistic ideal which became the enemy of achievable goals.

Special issue on health care simulation

Health-related issues continue to be global challenges. Both developed and developing nations are struggling with ways to provide affordable access to health services. The threat of global epidemics including HIV, SARS and the spread of other diseases worldwide threaten to undo decades of gains in life expectancy. Poverty and political unrest breeds new diseases that are rapidly spread around the globe. At the same time the organization and delivery of health services are increasingly complex and costly. Papers in this issue demonstrate the power of simulation in addressing these challenges. Computer simulation has become state of the art in many areas and its use is still growing. Two trends can be observed. First, the conceptual scope of both simulation software and models is becoming broader and more flexible. This allows investigators to combine several modelling approaches in the same application. For example, agentbased models allow researchers to combine technical as well as behavioural aspects of systems. Second, partly as a result of the first trend, we see the use of computer simulation increasingly being applied in areas where there used to be reluctance to use this approach, e.g., in policy modelling. The first three papers address health care policy issues. Pasdirtz examines the issue of control of health care expenditures in the US. State-space models of the US health care system and the US economy were developed, estimated with time series data for the late twentieth century and analyzed using modern control theory. The results suggest that control strategies designed to contain health care costs need to be targeted at health care capital investment, prices for physicians’ services and prescription drugs. Policies directed purely at cutting costs in general or increasing efficiency are likely to have little effect. The paper by Anderson and others reports the construction of an agent-based model that has been used to study humanitarian assistance policies executed by governments and non-government organizations (NGOs) for the health and safety of refugees. An experimental design was used to study the relationships among five factors: basic needs, food and water, sanitation, medical resources and security. The simulation demonstrates the critical role of security in providing for the health and well-being of refugees. The importance of security was highlighted in the recommendations that Amnesty International made regarding the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS). A major strength of the model is that it allows policy makers to incorporate specific characteristics of refugees and the governmental and nongovernmental organizations that are providing humanitarian aid to the camp. Policy simulations are valuable because of their ability to facilitate training and feedback concerning potential impact of decisions. In the real world policy decisions may have serious consequences. Policy simulation models are useful because they accelerate creation of scenarios, allow rapid changes in parameters, and provide a test bed for concepts and strategies. In the present application, policies can be examined to see how refugee communities might respond to alternative courses of action and how these actions are likely to affect the health and well-being of the community. The third paper in this issue demonstrates the value of simulation as a tool to analyze policies designed to contain Health Care Manage Sci (2007) 10:309–310 DOI 10.1007/s10729-007-9031-x

Still playing dice with lives: Darfur and security council resolution 1706

This article examines the recent Security Council Resolution 1706 authorising UN peacekeeping in Sudan, in the context of the deteriorating humanitarian crisis in Darfur. It assesses the African Union Mission in Sudan and elaborates on the reasons for its current fatigue and failure. It interrogates the proposed mandate of the UN force, the organising principles and rules of engagement and, sadly, the Realpolitik that continues to derail efforts at ending the genocide. It urges the global community, in particular the Security Council permanent members, to unite their efforts and compel the government of Sudan to accept UN deployment in order to save the dying and end the tragedy in Darfur.

Regional Organisations and the Maintenance of International Peace and Security: Three Recent Regional African Peace Operations

The leitmotiv of this article is the recommendation by the High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change that authorisation from the Security Council should in all cases be sought for regional peace operations. It discusses the legal basis for such operations, and three recent regional peace operations are analysed in detail: African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS), Economic Community of West African States in Cote d'Ivoire (ECOFORCE) and Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa in the Central African Republic (FOMUC). This article concludes that the practice with respect to these operations does not support a requirement of Security Council authorisation, where there is consent of the parties or, it appears, the government of the host state alone.

Military responses to mass killing: The African union mission in Sudan

This article explores the role that military force might play in responding to the mass killing of civilians, through a discussion of the international response to the crisis in Darfur, Sudan. It contends that international society supported a weak military response in Darfur that left civilian protection to a hopelessly small, under-funded and unprepared African Union force. The first section provides an overview of the possible military options available to international society to respond to instances of mass killing. The second discusses the military response to the Darfur crisis, which came primarily in the form of the African Union's Mission in Sudan (AMIS). The third section offers a preliminary assessment of AMIS in terms of its international legitimacy, its effectiveness in achieving its mandate and its ability to foster stable peace in Darfur. The conclusion reflects upon the extent of change in international society's response to the mass killing of civilians since the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

The African Mission in Sudan: Darfur dilemmas

For much of the past two years, the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) has managed to achieve a semblance of stability in much of Darfur, which has been reflected in the improvement of humanitarian conditions. At the same time, the mission has come under serious international pressure to respond appropriately to the deteriorating security situation on the ground by enhancing its presence and effectiveness. Subsequently, following the decisions of the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC), AMIS has undertaken two successive enhancements. Although the last enhancement exercise was remarkably successful, it could not be considered complete without the provision of the outstanding personnel and logistics by both member countries and the international partners. Meanwhile, serious challenges continue to undermine the mission's effectiveness and its prospects, not the least of these obstacles being adequate funding. At present, the mission is in a dilemma with respect to its mandate, engaging with the parties, partners, implementation of the N'sDjamena Humanitarian Ceasefire Agreement (HCFA), and the way forward, as the AU is now almost totally dependent on external donations to sustain its Darfur operations. This article therefore explores the way forward in all these thematic areas in order to make appropriate recommendations.

Canada as an international actor in Sudan

Extracted from text ... African Security Review 15.1 Institute for Security Studies It may seem counterintuitive that Sudan should be the major foreign policy priority for Canada that it is. Historical linkages are not strong; the Sudanese ethnic community in Canada is small in number and trade volume over the years has been small. Yet, Canada plays an internationally recognised role in support of building peace in Darfur. Canada is one of the top three international donors in support of the African Union's Mission in Sudan (AMIS) to resolve the confl ict in Darfur, with support totalling over $218 million1 since September 2004. It ..

PRIVATE MILITARY FIRMS IN AFRICA

fictional scenario in which a private military firm (PMF), in response to a genocide unfolding in the shadow of international inertia, steps forward with an offer to secure safe havens for refugees. Fiction moved a step closer to reality recently when the United States pledged more than US $200 million in the form of private contracts in support of the African Union Mission in Sudan. In August of this year, Lieutenant Colonel Michael Bittrick, the US State Department’s deputy director of regional security affairs for Africa flew to Addis Ababa to work out the details of an agreement by which two private firms, Dyncorp Corporation and Pacific Architects and Engineers will provide housing, office equipment, transport and communications equipment in support of African Union troops. Although the nature of the support is logistical and may therefore seem innocuous, it nonetheless enables scarce military resources to be concentrated where they are most needed. True to the new mantra of north-south peacekeeping collaboration, it also spares the donor country the risk of putting its soldiers’ lives at risk in a conflict that is, for the moment, of marginal interest to its foreign policy goals. This is not the first time that the support of a multi-national peacekeeping force has been contracted out to PMFs. Firms such as Lifeguard provided security for the staff of humanitarian agencies in Sierra Leone, the PMFs Pacific Architects and Engineers and ICI Oregon supported ECOMOG forces in West Africa and currently both UNMIL (Liberia) and UNAMSIL (Sierra Leone). More than a decade ago, the American firm Brown and Root (now Kellogg, Brown and Root, employed in support of American troops in Iraq) was contracted by the US Department of Defence to support American military peacekeeping interventions (a time when the US still sent troops on African peace missions) in both Somalia and Rwanda. There has been great deal of involvement of the sector in protecting infrastructures and industries in conflict areas, as well as in supporting governments in the training, equipping and restructuring of armed forces, intelligence gathering, ad infinitum. Private military firms are as pervasive in Africa as security problems themselves. According to the watchdog organization Public Integrity, there are few African states that have not, at some time or another, engaged the services of a private military firm in some capacity, either in the handling of crises or more often, in the more mundane training, support and equipping of armed forces. Furthermore, the transmutations and permutations of companies, some of which have been remained in place before, during and after conflicts, defy static typologies. PRIVATE MILITARY FIRMS IN AFRICA Rogue or regulated?