On Sunday, 4 June, West African leaders met in Monrovia for the 51st Summit of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). On this occasion, they commended the peace efforts of the organisation’s member states whose armed forces have intervened in The Gambia (ECOMIG) and Guinea-Bissau (ECOMIB), while warning against the multiple threats to the region’s stability. During the summit, at which Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf handed over the reins to her Togolese counterpart Faure Gnassingbé, the heads of state made several strategic decisions. Read on

The UN Security Council has established 30 March 2018 as the end the UN peacekeeping mission in Liberia (UNMIL), which has been deployed in the country since 2003. Since its arrival, the mission has: accompanied the country’s political transition, supported the process of national reconciliation and, more recently, contributed to the fight against the Ebola epidemic. Read on

An ambitious flagship project, the long-awaited construction of a trans-African gas pipeline connecting Nigeria via Morocco to Europe, might finally advance. The project was officially announced in December 2016 during a visit of King Mohammed VI to Nigeria. The 4 000 km pipeline will run along the Gulf of Guinea countries and will help create industrial hubs, and thereby will also boost regional economic integration beyond the energy sector. Read on

In Liberia, 42 000 candidates took the exam that is common for all of the region’s English-speaking countries for entrance into West African universities, but only one person managed to score at the level required to move on to university. This massive underperformance has revealed the flaws in the country’s education system, which is experiencing a shortage of teachers and suffers from a lack of basic educational facilities. Read on