Addis Ababa - A raft of security crises around the continent dominated the AU summit here on Saturday, the main one being how to stop the atrocities by Islamist terrorist group Boko Haram in West Africa.
The African leaders meeting under the AU’s chairman for this year, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, adopted a proposal for a regional force to fight Boko Haram and to ask the UN Security Council to support it – and pay for it.
The civil war in Africa’s newest state, South Sudan, also dominated proceedings as regional leaders tried to coax South Sudan President Salva Kiir and his estranged former deputy, Riek Machar, to sign a peace agreement which the summit could endorse.
But despite several days of negotiations, South Sudan seemed no closer to overcoming differences over how to divide power in a proposed transitional government.
The long-standing crisis in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) also featured at the summit as controversy raged over this week’s announcement by the DRC government and the UN about the launch of their long-awaited military operations against the FDLR rebel group.
It emerged that the UN peacekeeping force Monusco - which includes a battalion of South African combat soldiers – would not take part in the initial attack. This was apparently because the DRC force’s commander is on a Monusco “red list” due to alleged human rights abuses.
The summit also discussed the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea and appealed to international creditors to forgive the three countries’ $3 billion (about R35bn) debt to enable them to finance their recovery from dealing the virus.
The World Health Organisation told the African leaders that the outbreak seemed to be waning in Sierra Leone and Liberia, but not in Guinea.
The summit bashed the International Criminal Court (ICC), as it has for at several summits, for indicting sitting Presidents Omar al-Bashir of Sudan and Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya. It welcomed the ICC prosecutor’s decision on December 5 to withdraw charges against Kenyatta, but regretted that the case against his deputy, William Ruto, was proceeding.
The AU leaders also berated the ICC for rejecting the AU suggestion that sitting presidents be immune from prosecution while in office.
AU Peace and Security Commissioner Smail Chergui said the summit had discussed how to scale up the operations of Amisom, the force fighting the Islamist extremist group al-Shabaab in Somalia.
He said that the AU had decided it needed to increase pressure on Mali’s government and the country’s Tuareg separatists to finalise the peace process they had been negotiating.
He said the security situation was deteriorating to the point that UN forces were being attacked.
The fighting in Libya was also discussed.
Chergui said that the AU had realised that its deadline this month for elections in the Central African Republic was unrealistic, and had pushed it back six months.
The summit had made progress in establishing standby AU forces to deal with crises.
The Central African region had held military exercises for its component of the proposed African Standby Force, while East Africa had declared its component was ready after its field exercises.
The Amani 3 exercise of all components of the force would be held in South Africa around September, Chergui said.
The AU had also conducted a command exercise for the African Capacity for Immediate Response to Crisis, a voluntary rapid response force proposed by South Africa to fill the gap while the more formal African Standby Force was being established.
This force would have another command exercise this year and might have a full military exercise in South Africa before Amani 3.
Women’s empowerment and development were the official theme of the summit, but were overshadowed by the crises.
Officials said they hoped it would be addressed properly at the next summit, which is to be held in South Africa in June or July.
Foreign Bureau