Security Council calls for action on elections

The United Nations Security Council said yesterday (Wednesday) Guinea Bissau needed to set the timetable for general elections “at an early date” and could count on the world body for help. Elections due at the end of March under a peace accord signed in November last have been pushed back, partly because of delays in the deployment of ECOMOG peacekeepers and in the departure of the Guinean and Senegalese troops that backed President Joao Bernardo Vieira. Prime Minister Francisco Fadul also said at his inauguration in February that the eight-month civil war made it impossible to organise elections sooner than September. In a statement, the Security Council urged UN member states to provide help to rebuild the country and to support ECOMOG. It said a donors’ conference would be held early May in Geneva.