Tanzania urges Burundi rebels back to truce team
Source: Reuters
ADDIS ABABA, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Burundi's rebels must urgently return to a joint ceasefire monitoring team with the government or risk jeopardising a peace process aiming to end more than a decade of war, a senior diplomat said on Friday. "Nobody can afford to wreck the implementation of the comprehensive ceasefire agreement at this time," Msuya Mangachi, Tanzanian ambassador to the African Union, told journalists. Tanzania was the mediator in Burundi's peace talks. Senior members of the Hutu Forces for National Liberation (FNL) have gone missing from Burundi's capital Bujumbura, sparking fears they have returned to the bush to restart their insurgency. "Consultation is under way to bear pressure on the rebels to return them to talks," Mangachi said. The FNL quit a ceasefire monitoring team for the second time last month, accusing the government of refusing to withdraw troops from areas under their control. Ethnic strife in Burundi has killed 300,000 people in the past 10 years and the FNL insurgency had been seen as the final barrier to peace talks until a deal struck in September. But wrangling has delayed implementation of the ceasefire.
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