Ghanaian gets UN job to maintain ceasefire between Israel and Syria

The United Nations has appointed a former National Coordinator of the National Disaster Management Organisation of Ghana to head the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF).

UNDOF ‘s mandate is to maintain ceasefire between Israel and Syria; Supervise the disengagement of Israeli and Syrian forces; and Supervise the areas of separation and limitation, as provided in the May 1974 Agreement on Disengagement.

Major General Francis Vib-Sanziri’s appointment was announced Saturday by the UN Secretary General António Guterres. Maj. General Vib-Sanziri succeeds Major General Jai Shanker Menon of India, who completed his assignment on 30 September.

Since joining the Ghanaian Armed Forces in 1985, the new Force Commander has had a distinguished military career at national and international levels.

Having served as Director-General of the International Peace Support Operations at the General Headquarters of the Armed Forces since April 2017.

He also served as Assistant Director, Ghana Army Operations (1996-1998), Deputy Head of the Ghana Military Academy (2002-2004), Commanding Officer of an Infantry Battalion (2004-2009), Director for International Peacekeeping Support Operations in 2009.

Maj. General Vib-Sanziri was also the Army Secretary at the Army Headquarters between 2010 and 2011. In 2014, he was appointed Director-General for Joint Operations, General Headquarters. He served as Director-General of the National Disaster Management Organization from 2015 to 2017.

Major General Vib-Sanziri’s extensive peacekeeping experience includes deployments to the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in 1988 and 1991, United Nations Assistance Mission in Rwanda (UNAMIR) in 1993 and 1994 and the United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) in 2007.

He also served with the Economic Community of West Africa States Monitoring Group in Liberia in 1990, in Sierra Leone, in 1999 and 2000, and, subsequently, with the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL).

From 2011 to 2014, he served as a strategic military planner in the Department of Peacekeeping Operations at the United Nations.

Major General Vib-Sanziri holds a master’s degree in military art and science from the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, in the United States, a post-graduate certificate in public administration from the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration and a Bachelor of Arts degree in geography and rural resource development from the University of Ghana.

He is a graduate of the Nigerian Armed Forces Command and General Staff College, Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College and the United States Army Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.