African Union urges UN support for peacekeepers
ADDIS ABABA, June 15 (Reuters) — The African Union will demand immediate financial and logistical support for its peacekeepers from U.N. Security Council ambassadors visiting its headquarters in Ethiopia on Saturday, an AU official said.
Fifteen envoys are due in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa on the first leg of a trip that will also take them to Sudan, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Democratic Republic of Congo.
Assane Ba, an AU spokesman, said the continental body would call for increased support for peacekeeping missions it is carrying out on behalf of the United Nations in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region and chaotic Somalia’s capital Mogadishu.
“The U.N. Security Council has the primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security,” Ba told Reuters in an interview on Friday.
“It is expected to provide continued and increased support … and to enhance significantly and rapidly the resource base of the Pan-African organisation which is acting on its behalf.”
Lack of funds meant African troops deployed in Darfur had not been for three months at a time, Ba said, while African nations that had offered to send soldiers to support Somalia’s interim government had so far been unable to do so.
Top of the agenda for the Security Council ambassadors will be efforts to get a hybrid UN/AU peacekeeping force into Darfur, where some 200,000 people have died in four years of violence.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called Sudan’s acceptance on Tuesday of a large force for Darfur “a milestone”, but U.N. envoys acknowledge challenges on command structures and finding enough soldiers.
URGENT APPEALS
The hybrid force — made up of 23,000 troops and police — is not expected to be deployed until next year, when it would shore up a beleaguered AU force of 7,000 soldiers already there.
On Somalia, the ambassadors are expected to hear urgent appeals for funds to help Africa send troops to reinforce 1,600 Ugandans patrolling in Mogadishu, where they have been targeted by Islamist insurgents battling the interim government.
Also high on the agenda will be the border dispute between Ethiopia and Eritrea, where U.N. peacekeepers are manning the frontier after a 1998-2000 war that killed some 70,000 people.
In a June 8 letter to the Security Council, Ethiopia’s government said it accepted a 2002 border ruling by an independent commission “without precondition”, but said Eritrea had made implementation of that decision impossible.
Bereket Simon, a special adviser to Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, told Reuters the letter only reinforced the government’s long-held position that more talks were needed.
“Any other interpretation does not indicate a new Ethiopia policy,” he said in Addis Ababa on Friday.
Speaking in Asmara, Eritrean presidential adviser Yemane Ghebremeskel said Ethiopia’s letter changed nothing.
“It is a transparent game of semantics,” he told Reuters. “They use the words ‘without precondition’, but the precondition (to negotiate) is there … the basic content has not changed.”
(Reuters)
YihHon Alewei
African Union urges UN support for peacekeepers
When and where African are going to estabish themselves!
I am really astonded when I always hear the negative news about Africa. Africa is the second largest continent of the world with many more natural resources, and it had been administered poorly by it’s people. It is absolutely a shame for African leaders to always seek help from other world bodies like EU, UK and the US.
They need to estabish themselves before seeking help from the outside world. Conflicts like Ethiopian – Eriteria border, Darfur crisis, DRC, LRA and many more problems haven’t been solved by African leaders.
What kind of leadership are they exercising? Do they care about their poeple? Why the leaders used force against their own people? What are the effects leaders expect out of the conflict? Are they doing the right thing to tackle poverty and diseases? What about their selfishness, is it going to help African to have bright future? What about military rule, is it benefiting the African countries?
African leaders should have to learn from the past, the conflict in North-South Sudan which left two million people dead, DRC, Rwanda and Ethiopia- Eriteria conflicts.
If African leaders think of the general future of Africa but not their own houses/homees, then they should have to leave authorative and military rule. Crisis like what is happening in Zimbabwe at the moment should be term as humantarian crisis because people are living without adequate food to eat and no employment as well. But non of the neigbouring countries interfere with the president Robert for his unprecendented act againtst his people. If African leaders used to listen to the world news or watch TV programs, I think they would have learn more and that may change some circumstances in the region.
Being a president without experience is a disaster, many African leaders rule the countries without knowing what the leadership itself is and what he as a leader should value if he enter into the leadership. If they have access to media, then they would have changed these rules. Policies which are helpful to the countries have be restricted. Things like foreingn direct investment in the country can help by create employment and free market between countries..
Such things can help the continent to ease conflicts. All these conflicts are about the lack of something to eat, they are about neglect of parts of the country to the government and have shares of the country’s wealth which might be control by the military wing e.g Sudan since 1956. As African, I always asked myself, what will change Africa into a good shape.
My recommendations as African are, African leaders should have adopt the western countries way of government the societies. Military should be apart from civilian rules. Foreign policies should be adopt that can help the countries like South Sudan wiht the employment. If foreign firms are allow into the country, that can help a lot. Second, African leaders should have to adopt unity and coporation among the African countries. They should have to set up trade partnership that might also help. Depending on the world organisation like UN, is not a solution to African affairs, they need to have their majors in place to tackle their problems.
Depending on UN always is not a guarantee, African leaders should have to learn from the past, genocide of Rwanda in 1994 is a good example. The killing of civilians took place in the present of UN contingents, in that sense they failed to provide any force to prevent killing. UN have charters which prevent it to use excessive force, and in that sense, you don’t need to depend on UN for any prevent of killing or in other. The only thing I expect from UN should be fund.
For anybody who is going to read this article, this is not an offend but the fact about the leadership of our leaders.
YihHon Alewei
is student from Bond University, Australia, School of Humanities and Social Sciences.
He can be reach by [email protected]