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Tanzania to send 750 soldiers to Comoros
2008-03-15 09:34:17
By Juma Thomas
Tanzania has said it will dispatch a total of 750 soldiers to Anjouan for the African Union-sanctioned military operation meant to help the President of Comoro to re-establish his authority on the island.
They will be joining as many others from Senegal and Sudan, according to Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation minister Bernard Membe.
The minister told editors in Dar es Salaam yesterday the AU remained with military action as the only means of getting Anjouan leader Col Mohammed Bacar out of power.
``Bacar had squandered the opportunity given to him to stand down to pave the way for democratic elections to be held, and the only option left is military action. We have reached a point of no return and no more negotiations will be entertained,`` he said.
Sudan and Senegal have together offered a 750-strong contingent, with Libya saying it would oversee logistics for the military action.
The Anjouan crisis started in April last year after Bacar refused to relinquish power when his term ended.
He then sealed off Anjouan airport, expelled union soldiers and declared the island out of bounds for Comoro President Mohammed Abdallah Sambi.
Bacar went on to hold an unofficial election using his own printed ballot papers, declaring himself the winner in June the same year.
The Comoro Constitutional Court declared the election illegal but Bacar refused to go. The federal government believes he is bent on seceding.
Membe said Bacar’s actions constituted a rebellion and the AU had to intervene to ensure normalcy returned to the islands.
``We had three options - bringing the two sides to a negotiating table, economic sanctions and military action. But even after we had held numerous discussions, Bacar refused to hold democratic election,`` he explained.
``Upon realising that we could not reach anywhere with negotiations, we opted for sanctions,`` he noted, adding: ``The sanctions did not work either because we later learnt that the major harbour serving the entire Comoro is in Anjouan and imposing sanctions on the island would adversely affect the whole country.``
Membe elaborated: ``We therefore had the military action option as the last resort, and last month the AU summit (in Addis Ababa) decided that Sambi should use military action to regain control of the island.``
He said late last month African foreign affairs and defence ministers met in the Ethiopian capital to discuss how military action could be carried out with minimum harm to people or destruction to property.
``We have agreed that the operation will be carried out with minimum collateral damage and minimal if not zero casualties,`` he said.
He said the coalition forces would seek to capture Bacar and bringing him to justice, disarm his gendarmerie (militia), and hand over the militia`s mission to the Comoro police.
He said the operation had ``all the blessings of the international community`` and the US and France were supporting it.
Membe said time for negotiations with Bacar was over after he failed to put to good use the earlier options.
``This man is a liar. He will not honour the promise. Military action is the best option. Let him face the army,`` he said.
Defence and National Service minister Hussein Mwinyi meanwhile said Tanzania knows the geography of Comoro well and was given the honour to head the coalition forces.
The operation is set to last three months and involve 750 soldiers from Tanzania, 150 from Senegal, 600 from Sudan and 300 from Comoro.
More than 500 Tanzanian soldiers hare already in Comoro ready for the operation, with the remaining 250 expected there any of these days.
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