By: Mohamed J. Bangura
Sierra Leone’s Minister of Youth Affairs, Ibrahim Sannoh, has called for stronger regional cooperation to place young people at the centre of peacebuilding and conflict prevention across the Mano River Union region.
Minister Sannoh made the call at a United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) side event in New York titled “Rooting and Rising: Liberia’s Vision for Youth, Peace and Security.” The event focused on the role of young people in sustaining peace and advancing the Youth, Peace and Security (YPS) agenda.
Commending Liberia for convening the event and developing its ten-year vision for Youth, Peace and Security, Minister Sannoh said Liberia and Sierra Leone share more than a border.
“Liberia and Sierra Leone are bound not only by geography but by history, history marked by the scourge of war, by fragility, and by the painful lessons of conflict,” he said.
He stressed that excluding young people from national and regional decision-making processes could undermine peace and development, noting that young people must be given meaningful opportunities to participate in decisions that shape their future.
Drawing on the legacy of Nelson Mandela, Minister Sannoh said today’s generation has a responsibility to create conditions in which young people can inherit societies defined by peace, opportunity and inclusion rather than instability.
He cited Sierra Leone’s hosting of the first Mano River Union YouthConnekt Summit in Freetown earlier this year as an important demonstration of regional commitment to a common youth agenda.
According to him, the summit reinforced the principle that sustainable peace depends on inclusion, cooperation, solidarity and shared responsibility.
For the Mano River Union region, Minister Sannoh identified three interconnected priorities: preventing conflict through meaningful youth inclusion; building resilience through education, skills and innovation; and strengthening peacebuilding by recognizing young people not merely as beneficiaries, but as leaders and partners in development.
Quoting former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Minister Sannoh said empowered young people can become key agents of development and peace.
He also highlighted Sierra Leone’s contribution to the global Youth, Peace and Security architecture, noting that Sierra Leone and Guyana co-penned United Nations Security Council Resolution 2807 in December 2025.
He said the resolution came a decade after landmark Security Council Resolution 2250, which established the Youth, Peace and Security agenda, and provides a framework for strengthening international coordination on youth, peace and security.
At the national level, Minister Sannoh outlined several initiatives being advanced by Sierra Leone, including the completion of a comprehensive Status of Youth Report, the finalization of the country’s first Youth Development Cooperation Framework, and progress towards a National Action Plan on Youth, Peace and Security, which is currently undergoing regional validation.
He also highlighted the expansion of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) centres of excellence, as well as efforts to strengthen youth participation in governance, peacebuilding and community development.
According to Minister Sannoh, these national interventions are being strengthened through regional cooperation and the shared commitment of Mano River Union countries to ensuring that the region’s youthful population becomes an asset for peace and development.
Concluding his three-minute intervention, Minister Sannoh invoked the words of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., emphasizing that peace must be pursued not only as an outcome but also through peaceful and inclusive means.
He said Liberia and Sierra Leone have an opportunity to transform the painful lessons of their past into a shared platform for the future by turning “fragility into strength, scars into lessons, and youth into the architects of a peaceful future.”
The side event formed part of activities surrounding the 81st United Nations General Assembly and highlighted the continued international focus on the Youth, Peace and Security agenda, as well as the growing recognition of young people as critical actors in conflict prevention, peacebuilding and sustainable development.