Generate text that refutes this claim: The increasing effectiveness of the African Union  The African Union has been taking a much more active stance in preventing and resolving conflict. Since 2003 responsibility for peace in Africa has been with the Peace and Security Council. This body has authorised AU interventions in Somalia, Sudan, Burundi, and the Central African Republic. [1] The African Union is not the only organisation engaged in peacekeeping; the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has also been actively engaged in peacekeeping, having been deployed in numerous conflicts since the 1990s, most recently in Mali where they took part alongside French forces in defeating an Islamist insurgency. [2]  The AU is also boosting its collective capacity to respond to crises creating the African Standby Force made up of five regional brigades of 4000 soldiers. This force, when complete, will enable rapid deployment anywhere in Africa so helping to prevent crises becoming full scale wars. [3]  [1] ‘Peace and Security Council’, peaceau.org, 23 July 2013,   [2] News24, ‘Ecowas urges members to send troops to Mail’, 23 October 2013,   [3] Cilliers, Jakkie, ‘The African Standby Force An update on progress’, Institute of Strategic Studies, March 2008,
africa politics warpeace house believes african union can meet its pledge
Increasing the number of peacekeeping missions does not always mean that the result will be peace; clearly if there is a need for peacekeeping or even more so combat troops then peace has broken down. The United Nations has almost 70,000 peacekeepers deployed in Africa ,yet new conflicts and crises keep erupting; in 2013 there were new conflicts in Mali, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic. In the case of Southern Sudan this is despite there being 7500 UN peacekeepers in the country. [1]  [1] Raghavan, Sudarsan, ‘Record number of U.N. peacekeepers fails to stop African wars’, Washington Post, 4 January 2014,