ADDIS ABABA, Nov 9 (Reuters) - Mediators in Burundi's peace process on Thursday requested the African Union (AU) to send two battalions to protect Burundi's rebels as they move to designated assembly areas. Burundi's last Hutu rebel group, the Forces for National Liberation (FNL), signed a ceasefire with the government in September and agreed to gather at assembly points where they must decide to join the national army or be demobilised. "The focus now is in the implementation of the agreement," Kinsley Mamabolo, the special envoy of South Africa to the Great Lakes region told Reuters in Addis Ababa. "I proposed that the AU dispatch without delay two battalions to serve as a protection force for FLN combatants during their movement as well as the protection of their leaders," he added. South Africa is leading Burundi's peace talks. The United Nations has previously sent troops to Bujumbura to oversee the country's peace process. Mamabolo said a dissident FNL faction that failed to sign the ceasefire agreement in Tanzania was still a major concern. He praised the Burundi parliament which he said had granted provisional immunity to FNL members. The deal provides immunity for political crimes committed between July 1962 and Sept. 7, 2006 when the ceasefire was signed. The AU's peace and security council is expected to decide on the request soon. The FNL is the last holdout from a 12-year civil war that killed more than 300,000 people in the central African country.
