AU starts 12th Summit with theme on infrastructure development

2009-02-01 15:38:07  

    ADDIS ABABA, Feb. 1 (Xinhua) --

 The African Union (AU) started its 12th Summit Sunday morning here in the Ethiopian capital, with the continent's infrastructure development high on its agenda.

    The first day of the summit is dedicated to a special session on Africa's Union Government, which is designed to seek the integration of the African continent.

    A.E. Abu Zeid, Ambassador of The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) in Eastern Africa with the AU said that he hoped the attending heads of state and government would reach consensus and walk a step further on Africa's integration at this meeting.

    Talking about the two approaches of forming a union government within Africa: the immediate announcement of the union government, or a gradual integration, Zeid said that he is in favor of the gradualists, as "we have so many difficulties and differences in Africa, an immediate integration is not feasible", he said.

    According to him, the most difficult part of the integration process is Africa's security issues. Foreign and domestic conflicts have severely hampered peace and security on the continent, also dragged slow the integration procedure.

    He hoped Sunday's meeting would discuss the report submitted bythe AU Commission on the African unity, to form some kind of mechanism and hopefully endorse the report.

    Tchiffi Ze Jean Gervais, chief of the Forum of African kings, said to Xinhua: "Europe is united, America is federated, Africa also needs to be united in order to have a stronger force... to form a unique defense and army in order to intervene radically and rapidly once problems occur."

    Following the closed door session on the Union Government, the summit's opening ceremony will be staged on Monday morning with speeches by AU Commission Chairman Jean Ping, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Secretary General of the League of Arab States Amr Moussa and several African heads of state or government.

    Delegates to the summit will mainly discuss Africa's infrastructure building in the last two days of the three-day summit, with emphasis on the transport, energy and investment sectors.

    Besides the main theme of infrastructure development, the African leaders will also exchange ideas on the global financial meltdown's impact on African countries and how to take coordinated measures to steer their economies through the crisis.

    A number of hot regional issues, such as security situation in Somalia, Zimbabwe, Sudan's Darfur region and the Democratic Republic of Congo, are also expected to be discussed by the African heads of state and government.

Backgrounder: AU integration

2009-02-01 15:09:30  

     ADDIS ABABA, Feb.1 (Xinhua) --

The African Union is holding its three-day summit in Addis Ababa, capital of Ethiopia from Feb. 1 to Feb. 3, with the infrastructure development high on its agenda.

    The first day of the summit will begin with a special session on the idea of the United States of Africa.

    Establishing a unified Africa to give African people stronger bargaining power at international forums has been a dream of several generations of pan-Africanists since the notion was pioneered by African liberation leaders, represented by the Republic of Ghana's founding president Kwame Nkrumah, in the 1950s.

    Following are some of the key dates in recent years in the process of Africa's efforts to achieve integration:

    January 2005

    -- The 4th AU summit in Abuja, Nigeria, after reviewing the proposal of creating certain ministerial portfolios for the union, decided to set up a committee of seven heads of state under President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda to examine the proposal in all its ramifications.

    July 2005

    -- The 5th AU summit held in Sirte, Libya affirmed that the ultimate goal of the union is full political and economic integration leading to the United States of Africa after reviewing the report submitted by the committee, in which it recommended that there was need to work towards the formation of a union government for the continent.

    July 2006

    -- A committee of seven African heads of state submitted a report to the AU summit. The report, named the "Study on an African Union Government towards the United States of Africa", outlines a roadmap of forming the United States of Africa by 2015 in three phases.

    November 2006

    -- The AU Executive Council concluded that "All member states accept the United States of Africa as a common and desirable goal, but differences exist over the modalities and time frame for achieving this goal and the appropriate pace of integration."

    July 2007

    -- AU summit meets in Accra, Ghana to debate the plan for an African union government.

Editor: Fang Yang

Backgrounder: Previous AU summits

2009-01-31 19:45:43

    ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 31 (Xinhua) --

The 12th African Union (AU) Summit will be held here from Sunday to Tuesday. The following is a brief introduction to previous AU summits:

    The first summit was held from July 9 to 10, 2002, in South Africa's Durban just after the African Union was formed to replace the Organization of African Unity.

    From July 10 to 12, 2003, the second summit took place in the Mozambican capital Maputo. Its focus was the establishment of a new partnership among African countries, conflict reduction and AIDS prevention.

    The third summit was held in Addis Ababa from July 6 to 8, 2004,with leaders of African countries vowing to reduce poverty by seeking integration and security.

    The fourth summit, which took place in the Nigerian city Abuja from Jan. 30 to 31, 2005, focused on the Darfur crisis in Sudan, the situation in Cote d'Ivoire, Somalia's reconstruction and UN reforms.

    Libya's Sirte hosted the fifth summit from July 4 to 5, 2005, which highlighted poverty reduction, the continent's integration, and the seeking of a common position on UN reforms.

    The sixth summit took place from Jan. 23 to 24, 2006, in the Sudanese capital Khartoum. At the summit, leaders of AU member states discussed cooperation in economy, culture and education, and how the AU could better cooperate with the UN.

    The seventh summit, which was held in the Gambian capital Banjul from July 1 to 2, 2006, decided to suspend recognition of new regional economic communities on the continent, and to speed up construction in transportation, energy and other infrastructure.

    The eighth summit was held in Addis Ababa from Jan. 29 to 30, 2007, taking science and technology promotion and climate change as its themes.

    The ninth summit took place in the Ghanaian capital Accra from July 1 to 3, 2007, with the theme of "Grand Debate on the Union Government."

    The 10th summit was held in Addis Ababa from Jan. 31 to Feb. 2, 2008 under the theme "Industrial Development of Africa". Gabonese Jean Ping was elected as the new chairperson of AU Commission during the summit.

    The 11th summit was held in Egypt's Sharm El-Sheikh from June 30 to July 1, 2008, with African leaders discussing the impact of soaring food prices, the situation in Zimbabwe, and how to achieve the Millennium Development Goals in Africa.

Editor: Han Jingjing