IMC to move base to Bujumbura

The Implementation Monitoring Committee (IMC) for the Burundi peace agreement will move its base to Bujumbura two weeks before the transition government is installed there on 1 November, the independent Hirondelle news agency quoted the committee’s chairman, Ambassador Berhanu Dinka as telling journalists on Tuesday at the close of the fourth IMC meeting in Arusha, Tanzania. He said that the preparations were under way for moving the IMC to Bujumbura. “However, certain conditions required by the IMC on the ground in Burundi have to be met before repatriation,” he said. Ambassador Dinka stated that a key condition was security for exiled Burundians returning home, and the establishment of a protection force to ensure their safety. He said that the protection force was expected to be in place three weeks before 1 November. He said that work was yet to be completed on the five substantive items that were on the IMC agenda. These include three government reports which the IMC rejected and asked the Burundi government to redraft. Dinka said that he had written to the Burundi government and national assembly in this regard, at the behest of the IMC members, Hirondelle said. The government is expected to amend and re-submit these documents by 8 October when the IMC holds its next session, Dinka said. The IMC agreed on a draft law on the status of its members when they return home. The delegates agreed that the IMC members would be regarded as among the “highest officials in the country, but below the president”, he explained. He noted that the government had agreed to issue them with diplomatic passports. “I am very optimistic that things are moving in the right direction,” he said.