IRIN Focus on ceasefire talks in Pretoria

Last week's attempts to have delegations respectively from the Burundi government and the rebels of the wing of the Forces pour la defense de la democratie (FDD) wing led by Pierre Nkurunziza hold talks in Pretoria, South Africa, flopped, but something "quite significant" happened, an analyst on Burundi affairs, Jan van Eck told IRIN on Thursday. According to him, after talks with South Africa's Deputy President Jacob Zuma, there are now prospects that the rebel group, Forces nationales de liberation (FNL) will "start joining" the ceasefire negotiation process by end of May. "The FNL delegation expressed its commitment to possible ceasefire talks, but asked that it be given some time to have its own internal consultations before it could start face to face talks with the government side at the end of May," van Eck explained. "This gives the possibility of all-inclusive talks," he said. "The fact that everybody has realised the need to have FNL in the ceasefire talks gives that glimmer of hope that a durable ceasefire could be achieved in future," he said, adding that with this decision, probably the facilitation will put "a little" on hold talks with the FDD wings until the end of May. The FNL group together with FDD, which is split into two wings, one led by Nkurunziza and the other by Jean-Bosco Ndayikengurukiye, did not sign the Arusha peace agreement in August 2000. There have been preliminary contacts established and initial face-to-face discussions held between the government and the FDD, but efforts to have similar contacts with FNL have most of the time failed. The spokesman for FDD, the Nkurunziza group, Jean-Marie Ngendahayo, told IRIN on Thursday that the day-and-a-half talks it held with the government delegation did not achieve much. The talks, which were to take centre stage in the diplomatic manoeuvres taking place in Pretoria last week, were scheduled to be held from 22 to 30 April. They only took place on 27 and part of 28 April, because part of the FDD delegation was stranded in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, after failing to get travel documents from the Tanzanian authorities. They finally got them from the South African government. "During the short discussions we had with the government, we stressed that before even talking of cessation of hostilities, we would like those who overthrew democracy and staged a coup and, in October 1993, assassinated the democratically elected president, Melchior Ndadaye, to come clean and say what motivated them to do this, because they are the cause of the war that has been going on in Burundi," Ngendahayo said. "If they cannot come themselves to these meetings, then the army should be given the mandate to answer this question. After this, we can start taking about cessation of hostilities, then the implementation of a ceasefire," he added. "This is the best way to avoid future coups and assassinations. We are not part of the transitional government, and we would like to finalise matters with the real perpetrators of the Burundi crisis before we think of joining hands with the government," Ngendahayo said. He said the delegation had told the facilitation team and the United Nations Security Council team, which they met on Monday this week, the same thing. "We also told them our grievance against the co-facilitation team of Zuma. We feel quite frustrated with its way of doing things," he said. "As we speak, our delegation, which was to leave for Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, today [Thursday] has had their flights cancelled, because they did not even have visas for Tanzania, and besides, there were financial matters to be sorted out," he said. "They will travel tomorrow [Friday]." In 1987, Maj Pierre Buyoya took power in a coup. He immediately introduced a process of reform aimed at ensuring equal opportunities in education and employment, and an ethnically balanced army. Peaceful elections took place in June 1993 and, for the first, time a Hutu, Ndadaye, was elected president. Ndadaye ruled for just four months before being murdered during another army take-over. Ndadaye's assassination triggered violent killings in the country - violence which was perpetrated by the new Front pour la Democratie au Burundi (Frodebu) administration against civilian Tutsi, particularly in the centre and north of the country. Whilst about 100,000 people were subsequently massacred, the army retaliation killed a further 100,000 civilians, most of them Hutu, while 380,000 others fled to neighbouring Tanzania, a Save the Children-UK report in August 2001 noted. After years of negotiations, a transitional government was installed last November, following a peace agreement signed by political parties, but not by armed rebels, the main ones being FDD and FNL, in Arusha in August 2000. Despite the installation of the government, fighting has been going on in different parts of the country and has caused displacement of thousands and deaths. Fighting intensified between rebels and government troops on 11 March this year, in western Burundi's Bujumbura Rural Province. In a recent report by Burundi analyst van Eck, a combination of continuing insecurity and increasing poverty in Burundi form "a deadly combination", which threatens not only the survival of the transitional government but also that of the peace process as a whole. Unless the key factors of poverty and an end to the war were addressed immediately, it was very unlikely that the transitional government would be able to continue implementing the Arusha accord, van Eck said. It was even more unlikely that the second 18 months of the transition, when a Hutu leader was to assume the presidency, would actually take place under these circumstances, he warned.