'Silencing the guns': Toward a united, prosperous and peaceful Africa

The African Union’s short-term goal of ending all conflicts on the continent by 2020 and long-term vision of building a united, prosperous and peaceful Africa by 2063 are both no easy feat.

So how does the regional organization — to which all African states except Morocco belong to — plan to accomplish this, and at the same time develop a regional framework to implement U.N. human rights principles on doing business in Africa?

We asked Salah Hammad, a senior human rights expert with the AU’s Department of Political Affairs, on the sidelines of the 2014 Annual Democracy Forum in Gaborone, Botswana. The forum was co-organized by the government of Botswana and the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, a Stockholm-based intergovernmental organization focused on policy development, analysis and support for global democracy.