Posted on 11/20/2004 9:32:00 AM PST by Rebelbase
DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - U.N Secretary General Kofi Annan urged leaders of Africa's resource-rich but blood-soaked Great Lakes region on Friday to implement a peace plan that could herald a "new era" for millions of Africans.
Annan was speaking at the start of a two-day U.N.-backed summit that has been 10 years in the making and aims to approve a peace framework for the volatile area that includes Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
"What is at stake is nothing less than a new era for many millions of African men, women and children, who have been through a lot, who have buried too many relatives, who look to us not to waver in this effort," Annan told at least 13 heads of state gathered in Tanzania's commercial capital.
"We cannot afford to have them write this process off as a theoretical exercise."
Under a pact approved by regional foreign ministers on Thursday and due to be adopted at the Dar es Salaam summit, Great Lakes leaders are expected to pledge greater cross-border cooperation and confidence-building.
The agreement also calls for moves to disarm rebel groups and build regional security structures, a first step toward ending a violent decade across the region that saw 3 million people die in war and genocide and from hunger and illness linked to political chaos.
Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa, whose country has been among those hit by an influx of refugees, said leaders must now accept their neighbors had a right to intervene in situations such as Rwanda, where 800,000 people died in the 1994 genocide.
"Possibility for intervention must be placed on the table," Mkapa said in his welcoming speech.
The European Union envoy to the meeting, Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot, vowed rich country support for the peace plan, which he called a "turning point" for the Great Lakes.
"Starting is often the most difficult step. But a start has been made," he said.
MICHIGAN/OSU game? Pistons/Pacers? !!!
"Annan hopes to stay out of prison"
Maybe there's a naval war with Canada that's being supressed by the media?
Finally the UN will stop ethnic cleansing in Cleveland.
Did we attack their canoe again?
Was there a clear-cut victor in the war? If not, there will be no peace.
As a former patron of the amenities that Lake Ontario brought, I hope the UN intercedes quickly and prevents those rotten Canadians for damaging this important resource.
They've even taken to strapping explosives around the waists of their moose, and suicide-moosing people.
The Battle of Beaver island, part of the hillarious history of the kingdom of beaver island.
After producing mysterious brass plates from the ground and receiving directives from God, Strang formed a colony on Beaver Island in 1848. It grew year by year, and soon had the numbers to elect Strang to the state legislature. Trouble with the "gentiles" led to the "War of Whiskey Point", which the Mormons won by unexpectedly firing a canon at the unruly gang gathered at the trading post. By the early 1850s, most of the non-Mormons had left the Island. The ensuing degree of absolute power went to Strang's head, and rumors spread about Mormon attrocities.
http://www.beaverisland.net/History/A_Rich_History/index.htm
Somebody should make a movie.
Rwanda is a tiny country with the densest population in Africa. A bit bigger than New Jersey with roughly the same number of people...after the massacres. It used to be run by Belgium. I was thinking--after being bemused like everybody else by the Great Lakes reference--why not give Rwanda to bill clinton? He could fix things up...
Welland Canal bump !
Detroit militias' strikes in Huron county were devestated by smaller, but much better-armed forces coming from Western and Northern Michigan, which in turn burned Ann Arbor to the ground. A small band of Waukeegan infantry managed to hold off an attempt by Chicago and Milwaukee warlords to merge their forces. Meanwhile, Ohio National Guard forces easily quelled sporadic violence in Cuyahoga County and areas around Toledo.
NO RIGHT OF RETURN FOR BLUE-STATE REBELS, oNLY THOSE WHO PLEDGED LOYALTY TO JESUSLAND!!!
Seriously, with the talk of secession by Blue-State radicals, what kind of an idiot reporter refers to Lake Victoria as the Great Lakes?
Reuters.
Any surprise, this is the same "news" network that declared "one mans terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" when rationalizing why they wouldn't call Al Qaeda terrorists; terrorists.
Yeah us Michiganders are a rowdy bunch. We started a war over Toledo. (I don't know why) We invaded Canada from Port Huron and Detroit. Then theres the kingdom of Beaver Island experiment.
A lot of unruly drunken mobs in our history.
...no, deer rifle season opened this past week. Hunters were taken by surprise at the highly organized resistance of the herds but hundreds of thousands of reinforcements were streaming northwards following the end of the workday Friday.
It is suspected that by Monday, the orange clad hunters will have rallyed sufficiently to get the deer on the run........
Yeah you're fierce as hell. I was watching the Pacers/Pistons last night.
LOL!
My heart stopped there for a minute - my old State; all we need there is Kofi along with that Canadian Governor, Granholm in Michigan to really muck things up.
Obviously this is not referring to the Great Lakes region of the U.S., but to the Lakes Region of East-Central Africa. However, Chicago and Detroit could use some harmony, no doubt.
Obviously this is not referring to the Great Lakes region of the U.S., but to the Lakes Region of East-Central Africa. However, Chicago and Detroit could use some harmony, no doubt.
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