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16 Nov 2003 17:30:00 GMT

Regional leaders sign Burundi peace deal

By Daniel Wallis

DAR ES SALAAM, (Reuters) - Regional leaders signed an agreement to cement a Burundi power-sharing accord in Tanzania on Sunday and gave a rebel faction that has refused to join the peace process three months to do so or be branded an outcast.

The leaders hope their signing of the deal, which incorporates all previous ceasefire agreements signed since 2000, will help to end the decade-old war that has torn the tiny central African country apart and killed some 300,000 people.

But analysts have cautioned that the war is far from over, and that while a second Hutu rebel group refuses to join peace moves the bloodshed is likely to go on.

Burundi's war has pitted rebels from the ethnic Hutu majority against a politically powerful Tutsi minority.

The Forces for National Liberation (FNL), which analysts say can shell Burundi's lakeside capital of Bujumbura virtually at will, has refused to talk to government politicians and said it will negotiate only with Tutsi commanders in Burundi's army.

On the deadline, FNL spokesman Pasteur Habimana said: "We don't care about the deadline...our position is still the same. We will never negotiate with a government led by a Hutu."

The FNL sees itself as defending a community persecuted by extremist Tutsi soldiers, who they say have massacred Hutu civilians. The army denies it deliberately kills civilians.

Jacob Zuma, South African deputy president and the facilitator of the process, said it was imperative the FNL be brought into the peace process.

Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni, Democratic Republic of Congo's Joseph Kabila, Mozambique's Joaquim Chissano and Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi were also the ceremony.

BIG DAY

In a joint statement, the leaders gave the FNL three months to end violence and join the process.

"After this deadline...the Burundi people, the regional initiative on Burundi and the African Union will consider it to be an organisation that is against peace and stability in Burundi and will treat it as such," the statement said.

"Today is a big day for the peace process in Burundi," Burundi's President Domitien Ndayizeye said after the signing ceremony in the coastal city of Dar es Salaam.

Ndayizeye and the main rebel group, the Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD) led by Pierre Nkurunziza, agreed last month to share power to try to end the war.

Under the deal signed between the FDD and the government, FDD officials will start taking up army and government posts in the next three weeks.

"The number of fighters that need to be integrated is 37,000," Nkurunziza said.

But Burundi specialist Jan van Eck said peace would remain elusive if the FNL decided to continue fighting.

"The FNL has a lot of traditional support and has shown it can survive against the odds. If they are not brought to the table they will continue with the war," he said.

Four ex-FNL fighters were decapitated on Saturday night in the district of Gatumba, 13 km (7.8 miles) west of the capital, in what local officials said was a settling of scores after they abandoned the rebel outfit.

(Additional reporting by Patrick Nduwimana in Bujumbura)

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