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African Union summit opens in Ethiopia
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African Union summit opens in Ethiopia
An African Union (AU) summit opened in Ethiopia amid warnings by aid agencies that their operations in Darfur are on the brink of collapse.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon, who is at the summit, says he will press Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to allow UN peacekeepers into the war-torn region.
Bashir is also due to assume the AU chairmanship – but human rights groups say that would be an outrage.
The instability in Somalia is also likely to be a prominent issue. Ethiopia itself played a major role in ousting the Islamist forces that had taken control of much of southern Somalia and supports the official interim government.
Ethiopia says it will begin cutting its force levels in Somalia, making a proposed AU peacekeeping force for Somalia an even more pressing issue, according to reporters in Addis Ababa, where the summit is being held.
On Sunday, at least two people were killed in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, during an hour-long gunbattle between the police force and a local militia.
On the eve of the AU summit, the six biggest aid agencies working in Darfur warned that the humanitarian operation there is on the verge of total breakdown.
“Enormous humanitarian response in Darfur will soon be paralysed unless African and global leaders at the AU Summit take urgent action to end rising violence against civilians and aid workers,” they said in a joint statement.
Concrete commitments</B>
The agencies – Action Against Hunger, Care International, Oxfam International, Norwegian Refugee Council, World Vision and Save the Children – said the conflict was now worse than ever, with aid workers being increasingly targeted as they sought to help threatened Darfuris.
Ban says he wants concrete commitments that Sudan will open the door to peacekeeping forces in Darfur.
Bashir has agreed in principle to a joint UN-AU force, to replace the current overstretched AU troops.
But no formal deal has been reached. Ban says he will seek “a firm commitment to action”. The UN wants to insert 22,000 soldiers.
<B>Deadlock </B>
Nearly four years of fighting in Darfur, between rebels and government-backed militias, has killed some 200,000 people, and forced more than two million people to flee their homes.
Amnesty International said Sudan’s assumption of the AU chairmanship, while the AU was trying to mediate in Darfur, would be “a glaring conflict of interest”, and would damage the organisation's credibility.
Sudan was lined up to take the chair at last year's summit, but was passed over because of international pressure over its role in Darfur.
It was promised it would be given the chair in 2007, but correspondents say a diplomatic deadlock is again in the offing.
Chad, which borders Darfur, says it will leave the AU if Sudan takes over, while one of the Darfuri rebel group said it would consider AU peacekeepers as enemies.
Officially, the AU agenda yesterday day was be headed by climate change and scientific development, but correspondents say it is the other matters which are concentrating minds.
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