African Peace Facility to support war-torn Somalia

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia, Jan 21, 2005 (PANA) — War-devastated Somalia may benefit
from the Africa Peace Facility in restructuring its state
apparatus, according to sources at the African Union (AU)
Commission here.

Hope for support to Somalia was raised at the first meeting of
the Joint Coordination Committee (JCC) of the 250 million euro
Peace Facility.

The European Union set up the Peace Facility following a request
of the AU heads of state and government at their July 2003 summit
in Maputo, Mozambique.

Following a request by President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed of the
Transitional Federal Government of Somalia, the AU is planning a
peace support operation for enhancing the security situation in
the Horn of Africa country, the sources said.

Other AU operations likely to get support of the Peace Facility
include the AU participation in the Rwanda/DR Congo Joint
Verification Mechanism, and the disarmament and neutralisation of
the Rwandan Interahamwe militias and the country’s former armed
forces (ex-Forces armées rwandaises).

The African Peace Facility became operational in May 2004. So
far, it has contributed to the financing of the African Mission
in Sudan (AMIS), the CEMAC peace support operation in Central
African Republic and to an initial capacity building programme
for the AU Peace and Security Department.

Co-chaired by the AU Commission and the European Commission, the
JCC met here Tuesday to review implementation of the Facility.

Representatives of Nigeria, Mozambique, the Netherlands and UK,
as members of the AU and EU Troikas, the EU Council Secretariat,
and some African regional organisations, namely ECOWAS, ECCAS,
IGAD and COMESA, also took part in the meeting.

“The JCC expressed its satisfaction with the progress made in the
operations of the Peace Facility and discussed ways to further
improve the cooperation between the EU and the AU in the
implementation of the Peace Facility,” the AU Commission said in
a statement Thursday.

Also, the meeting emphasised the issue of capacity building, in
particular the support that the Peace Facility can provide for a
coherent programme to strengthen the capacity of the AU and
regional organisations.