The President of Congo, Denis Sassou N’Guesso has called on the African Union (AU) to make the resolution of the Libyan crisis a top priority at its next summit scheduled for Addis Ababa in February.
By Léon Charles Moukouri
The head of state also pleaded for the implementation of strategies to “counter the rise of terrorist attacks” in the Sahel region.
“In 2020 it is necessary that the African Union raises the resolution of the Libyan crisis to the rank of top priority to silence the gun on the continent,” said the chairman of the AU High Level Committee on the Libyan crisis, during Monday’s presentation of New Year wishes by the diplomatic corps accredited in Congo.
“Libya is an African country and the victims of this Libyan tragedy are mainly Africans,” Denis Sassou N’Guesso lamented, stressing that “the tendency to marginalize Africa in the resolution of this crisis could prove ineffective and counterproductive.
The Congolese leader also expressed his concern following the terrorist attacks perpetrated during 2019 in the Sahel region, which he said were due to the dismantling of the Libyan state.
To this end, he called on African countries to wage a “permanent and relentless fight against terrorism, fundamentalism and extremism in all their forms.”
The Cogolese leader also reiterated his appeal to the international community to “support the efforts of the countries of the Congo Basin to protect and preserve the ecosystems of the second green lungs of the planet after the Amazon.”
A proponent of a united Africa, he advocated the integration of the continent through regional grouping to build infrastructure such as the road-rail bridge project linking the capitals of the two Congos.
LCM/ard/cd/lb/as/APA