President Girma confers with Thabo Mbeki

Addis Ababa, February 2(ENA)-- Ethiopian President Girma Woldegiorgis on Sunday received and held talks with the South African President, Thabo Mbeki who is here to attend the AU Summit to convene as of Monday.

Briefing journalists after the meeting, Mbeki said the AU has been formed to further enhance African unity, to make sure that African countries would be able to act together.

African countries are going to establish a new mechanism to deal with questions of conflict in the continent, a peace and security council to be able to intervene better in situations of conflict, Mbeki said.

The AU will address the need to make sure that all African people work towards ending poverty and underdevelopment in order to catch up with the rest of the world in terms of development, stability and democracy.

"The AU is an African institution, not a governmental institution," Mbeki said.

"When you talk about war and peace, you can't approach those questions by saying that governments will act and people just watch," he said.

"I think when there is a war and when people say we want peace, people must go in the streets of Addis Ababa, Johannesburg and everywhere and say 'we are demonstrating in support of peace in Cote d'Ivoire'."

"The relations between Ethiopia and South Africa are very good. We sit together with the Ethiopian Prime Minister in the implementation of NEPAD (the new partnership for Africa's development)," he said.

"We are going to be working together with regard to the peace process in Burundi," he indicated.

President Girma on his part said that the goals of the AU could be attained only when all the countries of the continent do what is expected of them to their level best.

"Our cooperation should be designed in a way that could enable us grow together," Girma said.

The AU should serve as a vehicle for the achievement of the common goals and the realizations of the African people, African affairs as well as world issues affecting Africa, he said.

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