Photo: AP
Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, right, enters the UN Conference Hall during the closing ceremony, for the 14th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union, in Ethiopia, 02 Feb 2010
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Liberia's president says the transitional government in neighboring Guinea needs international support to hold elections in June that are meant to end more than a year of military rule.
Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf says the Economic Community of West African States will help Guinea return to constitutional rule through a transitional government led jointly by the country's acting military leader and its new civilian prime minister.
"Let me say I am very pleased in the progress that we have made in Guinea. I am the current chair of the Manu River Union countries, which comprises Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Cote d'Ivoire. And so I have been able to have active participation in the consultations and mediations that have led to where we are today," she said.
President Sirleaf spoke in Ethiopia at an African Union summit that discussed Guinea.
A joint mission by the African Union, the United Nations, and the Economic Community of West Africa States is in Conakry to see how it can support security reform and new elections.
The mission is led by Senegalese General Lamine Cisse who met with Guinea's new civilian prime minister Jean-Marie Dore to discuss the transition process. State-run television says the men discussed how outside civilian observers can best help reform the Guinean military and when such work will begin.
Prime Minister Dore told the general the interim authority is determined to "see the dream come true" of a return to constitutional rule following the military coup that brought to power Captain Moussa Dadis Camara.
Captain Camara is in Burkina Faso recovering from being shot by the former head of the presidential guard, who says Captain Camara was trying to blame him for the killing of opposition protesters in September.
A U.N. inquiry into that violence says there are sufficient grounds for presuming direct criminal responsibility by Captain Camara and other members of the ruling military council.
The International Contact Group on Guinea is backing the transitional government. But the group says moving forward toward a political solution should not mean impunity for those who organized September's killing and rape of unarmed demonstrators.
Source:Scott Stearns/VOA
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