UN Secretary-General António Guterres has informed the Security Council of his intention to appoint Senegalese diplomat Khassim Diagne as the new Special Representative and Head of the UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP). Diagne, who currently serves as Acting UN Resident Coordinator for Development and Humanitarian Affairs in Mali, will replace Canadian Colin Stewart, whose four-year mission on the island came to an end.
Diagne brings more than three decades of experience in international relations, with senior posts at the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, as well as peacekeeping assignments across Africa and the Americas. He has also served as Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General in West Africa and the Sahel, and in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He holds postgraduate degrees in Literature from Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar and International Relations from Tufts University’s Fletcher School, and is fluent in English, French, and Wolof. Security Council members are not expected to raise objections to his appointment.
As he departs, Stewart leaves behind a mixed legacy familiar to many of his predecessors. “The four years I’ve been here, there’s been no process. We’re not even talking about what that process should look like,” he told Politis in an exit interview. While noting that not a drop of blood was shed between opposing forces under his watch, he described efforts towards a political settlement as “several miles away from the foot of the mountain.”
Stewart warned of the dangers should UNFICYP’s presence be questioned. “If the UN were to leave, the distrust is so high that each side would fear the other side was going to take advantage, fill the vacuum, move forward and seize something in the buffer zone,” he said. Such a scenario, he added, would almost certainly lead to immediate conflict.
