AFRICA - Africa adopts crisis warning system

Addis Ababa (Fides Service) - The African Union has adopted a 24 hour continental crisis monitoring system which will supply advice and suggestions to the AU presidency with regard to potential crisis and threats to peace and security.
A “situation room” has been set up at the African Union headquarters, in Addis Ababa to follow the situation in real time based on information from the different peace missions operating in various parts of Africa. At the moment the only connected mission is with the African mission in Darfur, the only African led peace keeping contingent. Eventually the African Union intends to assume responsibility for the security of the continent, also to avoid useless and costly overlapping with other international bodies, although it will continue to demand logistic and financial assistance from the United Nations and other international organisations.
For this reason the African Union wishes to increase its partnerships with the continent’s regional organisations to improve crisis control devices, centralising the system of information collection and analysis.
So far only CEDEAO (Economic Community of West African Countries (15 countries) and IGAD Inter-government Authority for Development (7 east African countries) have a rapid crisis warning system. The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is setting up its own warning system which will have a fundamental role thanks also to reserved information from its own intelligence service. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 18/12/2006 righe 25 parole 282)