The Lord Bishop of Durham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office
The below Parliamentary question was asked by The Lord Bishop of Durham on 2016-02-03.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to engage the African Union and the East African Community in efforts to stabilise the situation in Burundi.
Baroness Anelay of St Johns
In the margins of the African Union (AU) Summit, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), met with the Chair of the AU Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the AU’s Peace and Security Commissioner Smail Chergui and a number of African Foreign Ministers. We are exploring what more we can do to support the AU’s leadership, and have intensified our efforts at the UN and with our EU partners to halt the violence.
The UK strongly supports the East African Community-led dialogue and sees it as crucial in finding a solution to stabilising the situation. The parties met for the first time on 28 December and the second round of talks is scheduled for 16 February. Alongside our international partners we continue to press them to engage.
