Congo backs Chad peace efforts for Darfur
BRAZZAVILLE, May 6 (AFP) — The Republic of Congo pledged Thursday to back Chadian efforts to restore peace in Sudan’s Darfur region, to prevent the 15-month war destabilising the central African subregion, a statement issued during a visit by Chadian President Idriss Deby said.
“Given the serious consequences of this crisis on the stability of the central African subregion, the two heads of state have recommended that the Economic Community of Central African States (CEEAC) be represented on a follow-up committee” set up last month at talks mediated by Chad in Ndjamena.
At those talks, Chadian mediators also got the Khartoum government and its Arab militia allies, and two rebel groups in Darfur to agree to a ceasefire, but it has reportedly been violated on several occasions.
Congo President Denis Sassou Nguesso is the current head of CEEAC. Three central African states — Chad, the Central African Republic and Democratic Republic of Congo — border on Sudan, Africa’s largest country.
Deby and Sassou Nguesso also “reaffirm their commitment to the ideals of peace and reiterate their support for the peace processes under way in Burundi, the Central African Republic and Democratic Republic of Congo,” the statement said.
The two leaders stressed “the importance of conflict prevention to reinforce peace and stability in Africa” and repeated the need for a pan-African non-aggression pact, which Sassou Nguesso has proposed to the African Union (AU).
African Union military and security experts are due to meet in Brazzaville next week to study the proposal before it is put to heads of state and government for ratification at an upcoming AU summit at the pan-African grouping’s headquarters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.
Deby left Brazzaville for Gabon at around midday Thursday, where he was due to hold talks with President Omar Bongo, the current CEMAC chair.
The Chadian leader was expected to return later Thursday to Ndjamena, where unnamed diplomats have told AFP that Chad has called in the Sudanese ambassador to lodge a formal complaint over alleged cross-border attacks by Khartoum’s Janjawid militia allies in Darfur.
The war in Darfur is estimated by the United Nations to have claimed at least 10,000 lives, uprooted a million people from their homes, and driven more than 100,000 to seek shelter across the Chadian border.
Under the terms of the deal signed on April 8 in the Chadian capital, the parties to the conflict agreed to cease hostilities, guarantee safe passage for humanitarian aid to the stricken region, free prisoners of war and disarm the Janjawid.
The UN has accused Khartoum’s militia allies of ethnic cleansing in Darfur, and a UN report obtained by AFP Thursday accused Khartoum of deliberately starving civilians in at least one town in the western region of Sudan.