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FACTBOX-Kenya dominates African Union summit
31 Jan 2008 15:22:03 GMT
 Source: Reuters
Jan 31 (Reuters) - Here are some facts about the African Union, meeting in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa for a three-day summit likely to be dominated by the crisis in neighbouring Kenya:

AIMS OF THE AFRICAN UNION:

* The AU aims to promote democracy, human rights and development across Africa, especially by increasing foreign investment through the New Partnership for Africa's Development Programme. It groups 53 member states and its official languages are English, French and Arabic.

ORIGINS:

* It emerged from the Organisation of African Unity, which was founded in 1963 with a charter signed by 32 countries in Addis Ababa.

* In September 1999, a special summit in Libya established the African Union loosely based on the European Union model. It was officially launched in Durban in July 2002 with South Africa's Thabo Mbeki as chairman. The present summit, which began on Thursday, will decide who will succeed Ghana's President John Kufuor as the next chairman.

INTERVENTIONS:

* The AU's first military intervention in a member state was the May 2003 deployment in Burundi of a peacekeeping force of soldiers from South Africa, Ethiopia and Mozambique.

* A ceasefire was agreed in Sudan's western Darfur region in April 2004 and the AU sent 7,000 peacekeepers with a mandate to monitor the peace and protect those displaced in the camps. However the shortcomings of the AU force have angered Darfuris, who have begged for international protection for almost five years. Experts have estimated 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million been driven from their homes since mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms in Darfur in 2003.

-- The AU is due to hand over to a 26,000-strong joint U.N.-AU mission which will take most of 2008 to deploy.

* In Somalia, the AU has criticised member states for not honouring pledges to send peacekeeping troops to reinforce 1,600 Ugandans and about 400 Burundians, who have been attacked by Islamist insurgents battling the interim government. The AU originally wanted 8,000 troops in Somalia.

* An early mediation mission by AU chairman Kufuor to try to end Kenya's crisis failed on January 10. Kufuor left Kenya without Kibaki or Odinga meeting or agreeing how to end the crisis. Kufuor did however say that both sides had agreed to work together with a panel headed by former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

2007 SUMMIT:

* At last year's summit in January 2007 Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir was snubbed for a second time in his attempts to be made AU chairman by regional leaders because of international outrage over bloodshed in Darfur. The AU's rotating leadership instead went to Ghana.


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