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Burundi govt to include rebels
07/11/2003 15:46 - (SA)
Bujumbura - President Domitien Ndayizeye of Burundi has pledged to incorporate Hutu rebel leaders into an enlarged government no later than November 23, in line with a peace deal signed in Pretoria earlier this month.
"The deadline" reached with the leader of the Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD), Pierre Nkurunziza, "will be respected," Ndayizeye told a news conference late on Thursday in Bujumbura.
The FDD is the largest Hutu rebel group engaged in a civil war that has killed more than 300 000 people, mostly civilians, since 1993.
Another, smaller Hutu rebel group, the National Liberation Forces, has not begun negotiations with the government and remains active.
"We are going to form an enlarged government with this movement (FDD) no later than November 23," he said.
In South Africa on November 2, the existing transitional government led by Ndayizeye, a Hutu, and the FDD ironed out points still outstanding after the October 8 signing of a power-sharing deal.
The November 2 accord, which Ndayizeye described as "a real breakthrough towards peace," opens the way for the entry of the FDD into the Tutsi dominated army and the government.
"I see no reason not to respect this undertaking," the president told the news conference, adding that the latest deal will allow delayed elections to be held before the November 2004 end of a transitional period of government.
Local elections had been scheduled for May this year, while legislative and senatorial polls are meant to be held before the end of the transitional period.
"I think that at the end of the remaining 12 months of my mandate I will have finished my work and I will leave," said the president, who took over the job from Pierre Buyoya, a Tutsi, on April 30.
The next president is meant to be appointed by the next, elected, parliament.
- AFP
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