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South Africa: Kofi Annan to Head AU's Kenya Panel
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BuaNews (Tshwane)
14 January 2008
Posted to the web 14 January 2008
Nairobi
Former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has accepted an invitation to head an African Union (AU) panel to help broker peace in Kenya.
Mr Annan received the invitation from Ghana's President John Kufuor of Ghana, in his capacity as the current Chairman of the AU.
The other two members are of the panel Gracia Machel, the wife of former South African President Nelson Mandela, and Benjamin Mkapa, the former President of Tanzania. Both the government and the opposition in Kenya have welcomed the mediation of the panel.
Mr Annan's decision to take on the task came as the death toll from the post-election violence in Kenya, East Africa's biggest economy, and once one of the continent most stable states, has soared to close to 700, according to new figures released by the police and Red Cross officials.
At a meeting with President Kufuor in Accra, Ghana, Mr Annan appealed to the feuding sides not to take any more steps that would compromise the search for peace.
He urged Kenyan politicians not to create problems that would make it difficult for the Panel of Eminent African Personalities to find a viable and lasting solution to the crisis.
Police sources from Kenya's Western and Rift Valley Provinces say 89 more bodies have been recovered from the bushes in the last five days in the two provinces, which have been among the most violence-plagued.
The newly recovered bodies have prompted the Kenya Red Cross Society to increase its official death toll from 486 to 575 people.
This was a result of violence which broke out after the opposition disputed the results of the 27 December presidential polls which gave a narrow victory to incumbent President Mwai Kibaki.
Mr Annan, who called on both sides to bear in mind the interest of Kenyans and show goodwill, leadership and maturity, said a secretariat would be established to enable the panel to work as expeditiously as possible to resolve many of the issues and restore the East African country to normalcy.
President Kufuor, who arrived back in Ghana after meeting both sides of the political divide in Nairobi, said his visit to Kenya was at the invitation of the two feuding parties.
He said he went to Kenya with a programme to get them to agree to immediate cessation of violence, accept to use dialogue to settle their differences, and agree to talk under the aegis of the Panel of Eminent African personalities.
President Kufuor, who was dismissing reports that his mission to Kenya failed, said during the two days, he won the support of both the government and the opposition to abide by his programme.
He said political negotiations took time and that it was simply impossible to have solved the crisis within the short period of his visit.
More than 250,000 other people have been displaced. Among the worst affected areas are Rift Valley, Western, Nyanza, Coast and Nairobi provinces and security in these areas and other parts of the country remained high to ensure no further loss of lives.
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Police have reiterated that they would not condone the calls for three days of mass action protests by the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) of defeated presidential candidate Raila Odinga set to take place this week.
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