AU Hails Somalia Milestone; Donor Conference Planned
By Peter Heinlein
Addis Ababa
23 March 2009
Africa Union peacekeepers man the entrance to the presidential palace in the embattled Somalia capital Mogadishu, 23 Feb 2009
Africa Union peacekeepers man entrance to the presidential palace in the embattled Somalia capital Mogadishu, 23 Feb 2009
The African Union's peacekeeping force in Somalia has reached 50 percent of authorized strength for the first time, with more reinforcements expected soon.
Senior AU officials are hailing the arrival of the 4,000th peacekeeper in Somalia. The African Union Mission in Somalia, or AMISOM has an authorized strength of 8,000, but has been operating with only 3,500 Ugandan and Burundian soldiers.
A bomb attack that killed 11 Burundian soldiers last month had prompted speculation the troops might be withdrawn. But AU Peace and Security Commissioner Ramtane Lamamra says the opposite is true. He says negotiations are underway with Rwanda and other troop contributing countries to bring the force up to nearly full strength soon.
"As we speak we are deploying a battalion from Uganda that brings the total strength of AMISOM to 50 percent, for the first time we are above 4,000 so this is quite an achievement ... This is already symbolically very important despite the terrorist acts directed against AMISOM," he said. "The agenda of the day is to strengthen AMISOM not the other way around."
Lamamra expressed annoyance at news reports that Somali President Sheik Sharif Ahmed is under pressure to order the AMISOM troops home. Speaking on the sidelines of an AU consultative meeting on Somalia, the commissioner said such information is motivated by either ignorance or bad faith.
"Those statements are basically prompted either by genuine ignorance of what the AMISOM role is or by some pre-judged hostile position toward every friendly force that is likely to be there to make sure that Somalia is actually coming out of its crisis and moving forward to reconstitute its government institutions," he said. "So I would not be worried by the statements either way."
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http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-03-23-voa47.cfm
