Dr Issaka Souaré

Dr Issaka K. Souaré was an Associate Senior Researcher working with SIPRI’s Sahel and West Africa Programme. With about 20 years of work experience on peace and security issues, his current work focuses on conflict and peace as well as governance dynamics in Africa. Issaka is also a member of the Expert Advisory Group of the Peace treaty initiative of the Madrid-based Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT), a Senior Research Associate at the Department of Politics and Global Studies at Rhodes University in South Africa and a visiting lecturer at the General Lansana Conté University-Sonfonia in Conakry, Republic of Guinea.

Prior to joining SIPRI in July 2021, Issaka served for five years on the UN Standby Team of Senior Mediation Advisors and for about three years as Special Adviser to the African Union High Representative for Mali and the Sahel based in Bamako, after a stint as Expert on Early Warning and Preventive Diplomacy at the AU Commission in Addis Ababa. He also worked at the Pretoria office of the Institute for Security Studies from 2007 to 2012. During his time with the UN, Issaka was deployed in support of UN representatives and special envoys in several countries around the world to offer them operational advice on dialogue facilitation and mediation, and to co-facilitate training workshops in mediation for several UN missions, including in Iraq, Somalia and South Sudan. During his tenure at the AU, he was extensively involved in the Mali peace processes and their follow-up from 2013 to 2016 and served as resource person/advisor with the AU High-Level Panel on Egypt in 2014.