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Belgian minister urges rebels to join peace process

    NAIROBI

    Belgian Secretary of State for International Cooperation Eddy Boutmans has urged rebel groups in Burundi’s eight-year civil war to stop fighting and join the peace process.

    "There is a lot of poverty and killing in Burundi. The rebels must join the peace process to end the conflict," AP quoted him as saying on Monday.

    The rebel groups Boutmans referred to are the Conseil national pour la defense de la democratie-Forces pour la defense de la democratie and the Forces nationale de liberation. Both have refused to participate in the Arusha peace accord, signed by 19 Burundian parties in August 2000.

    Boutmans said Belgium fully supported the peace efforts and the reconstruction of Burundi, which is a former Belgian colony, a Tanzanian agency, Internews, reported. Belgium has offered US $5 million for the 701 South African troops in Burundi, deployed there to guard returned political exiles serving in government bodies and the cabinet.

    "We support all arrangements agreed by the Burundian parties to end the war," AP quoted Boutmans as saying.

    He is leading a seven-man delegation on a five-day official visit to Tanzania, which borders Burundi and is home to almost 350,000 Burundians. The Burundians, in western Tanzania, are receiving aid from the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Another group of about 470,000 Burundians live in Tanzanian settlements and villages but are not receiving help.

    In a related development, presidents Pierre Buyoya of Burundi and Benjamin Mkapa of Tanzania are due to hold talks on Thursday, in Tanzania, to discuss ending the hostilities between government and the Burundi Hutu rebel forces, Internews reported.

    A transitional government was inaugurated in Burundi in November 2001 with Buyoya, a Tutsi, as president and Domitien Ndayizeye, a Hutu, as vice-president. Both will govern for the first half of the three-year transition period, followed by a Hutu president and a Tutsi vice-president for the rest of the period.

    Some 250,000 people have been killed in Burundi’s conflict since 1993, when paratroopers killed the country’s first democratically elected Hutu president, Melchior Ndadaye.

    This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions

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