Africa prepares G8 message on aid, debt, trade

SIRTE, Libya - African leaders, admonished by Libya for "begging" from the West, met behind closed doors on Tuesday to agree a message to rich nations that is expected to call for more aid, freer trade and debt relief.

Heads of state of many of the African Union's (AU) 53 member governments were holding a private meeting in the Libyan town of Sirte on the second and final day of the pan-continental organisation's half-yearly gathering of leaders.

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, a wealthy force among poor African states, told the leaders on Monday that the solution to Africa's woes was the creation of one pan-continental country, not Western aid that came with strings attached.

But Britain, which is hosting the Group of Eight (G8) summit due to start in Scotland on Wednesday, said any move to increase aid was simply the right thing to do, and in any case trade was the key to unlocking Africa's development.

"It's not about charity, it's about justice," said Britain's international development secretary, Hilary Benn, at the AU summit.

"But in the end it's going to be economic development, opening up the world trading system, enabling Africa to earn and trade its way out of poverty that's really going to make the difference, and for that to happen you also need peace and stability, good governance, and we have heard all that very clearly from the African Union summit."

AU chairman Olusegun Obasanjo, also president of Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, praised a British-backed report recommending more help for Africa to be presented to the G8 summit.

But he said rich nations should repay money looted in the past by corrupt African leaders and deposited in the West -- funds believed to be worth tens of billions of dollars.

A STEP FORWARD

Benn said without elaborating that he expected a "real step forward" by the G8.

"People are being ambitious. We are putting pressure on ourselves and on each other. Of course you run the risk (of disappointment), but the greatest crime of all would be not to try in the first place."

More than 40 per cent of Africans live on less than $1 a day, 200 million Africans are threatened by serious food shortages and AIDS kills more than 2 million Africans a year.

As it does at all its summits, the AU targeted wars as a big barrier to growth on a continent that has seen 186 coups d'etat and 26 major conflicts in the past half century.

In the African gathering's other major piece of business, the leaders endorsed a plan to demand two permanent seats on a reformed UN Security Council, although they dodged the question of how their representatives would be selected.

Diplomats said the gathering was running out of time to tackle the subject, and leaders did not want to spark acrimony among top contenders Nigeria, South Africa and Egypt.

"We have agreed the principle but have not gone into the selection process," South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told reporters. "It will be negotiated."

- REUTERS