In light of the approaching tenth anniversary of the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), the Peace and Security Council (PSC) of the African Union (AU) on 6 September 2016, authorized the AU Commission to begin the process of producing “a comprehensive lessons learned exercise, which will identify progress made, challenges encountered and more importantly recommend options on the way forward in the future of AMISOM, including the Mission Exit Strategy.” This request was re-iterated during the 649th meeting of the AU PSC on Somalia, on 23 January 2017, where PSC members requested the finalization of the ten-year lessons learned study.
It is against this background that AMISOM and the Peace Support Operations Division, convened a lessons learned workshop on AMISOM, from 9 to 10 March 2017, in Nairobi, Kenya. The summary of recommendations that emanated from this workshop are presented below across four levels namely: political, strategic, operational and exit strategy in accordance with the AU methodology on lessons learned studies in peace support operations.
