The African Union (AU) said it was ready to send 5,000 peacekeepers to Burundi to protect civilians caught up it a growing crisis, the first time the bloc has invoked powers to deploy troops to a member country against its will. Burundi said on Friday no troops would get in without its permission. But its neighbours have growing increasingly alarmed about the violence in the central African state which the United Nations says is on the brink of civil war. Tensions have been running particularly high since gunmen attacked military sites in the capital Bujumbura last week, unnerving a region where memories of the 1994 genocide in neighbouring Rwanda are still raw.
The African Union's Peace and Security Council approved the force late on Thursday, a diplomat said - a decision which would still need to be backed by the U.N. Security Council to come into effect.
"We have authorised the deployment of a 5,000-man force for Burundi whose mandate includes the protection of civilians ... This resolution marks the first time the African Union decided to invoke its charter's Article 4," the diplomat added.
Under that article, the bloc has the right to intervene in a member state "in respect of grave circumstances, namely: war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity".
The United Nations says at least 400 people have been killed since April when President Pierre Nkurunziza's decision to seek a third term in office triggered protests and a failed coup. Hundreds of thousands have also fled the worst violence to hit the country since it emerged from an ethnically charged civil war in 2005.
Source: Reuters
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