Regional ministerial meeting opens

Foreign ministers from Africa's Great Lakes region began a meeting on Monday in Bangui, capital of the Central African Republic (CAR) to finalise preparations for a heads of state summit due to be held in Nairobi, Kenya, later in the year. CAR President Francois Bozize opened the three-day meeting, also attended by the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General to the Great Lakes, Ibrahima Fall; Mamadou Bah of the African Union (AU); as well as Aldo Ajello, the representative of the European Union to the region. In a joint statement, the UN-AU secretariat organising the international conference said the ministers would finalise all documents in preparation for the Nairobi summit. They are due to review and adopt a draft pact on security, stability and development, as well as programmes of action for all the four main themes of the conference, which are: peace and security; democracy and good governance; economic development and regional integration; and humanitarian and social issues. The secretariat said in addition to these, the ministers would also review and adopt draft protocols and the institutional follow-up mechanism of the conference. These documents were prepared by the Regional Preparatory Committee in a series of meetings and workshops that have been held in various venues since the last heads of state summit in 2004, in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The Bangui meeting is be the minister' third since Dar es Salaam summit. Apart from reviewing the documents, the secretariat said, the ministers would be briefed on the preparations leading to the Nairobi summit where the heads of state would be expected to sign the "Pact of Security, Stability and Development which will crown the second phase of the Conference process". Representatives of Angola, Burundi, Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia are attending the meeting. These are the states that are considered the "core" countries of the conference process. The Bangui meeting is also being attended by six co-opted countries, the Group of Friends of the Great Lakes Region co-chaired by Canada and the Netherlands, the EU, UN agencies and regional economic communities.