APS : Sunday, 11 March 2018
ALGIERS- Algeria will host on 9 and 10 April an African high level meeting on terrorism’s funding channels, announced Saturday in Algiers Foreign Minister Abdelkader Messahel.
Holding this meeting in Algiers has been “decided by the Summit of the Heads of State and Government of the AU Peace and Security Council in September 2014, and approved by a summit” of the African Union, Messahel told a news briefing following his meeting with Chairperson of the AU Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, on a three-day official visit to Algeria.
“This conference is extremely important in the current situation to have the African positions, exchange views about the legislations in our countries, and identify the role of our institutions in charge of combating money laundering and trafficking in all its forms,” added the minister.
During his talks with the AU Commission Head, Messahel said he had broached the scourge of illegal migration, a source of “concern for our States.” “We have expressed our views to the AU Commission head about the fight against trafficking networks, which sometimes participate in the financing of terrorist acts,” he added.
The minister recalled that President of the Republic Abdelaziz Bouteflika has been chosen by his African peers to be “leader in promoting the African vision on counter-terrorism.
We make our contribution and we submit every year reports to the AU commission and to the conference of the Heads of state.”
Concerning the African Union’s institutional reform, Messahel affirmed a “need to adapt the organization to change and mutations,” adding that “since the creation of the AU, many things happened. And the question of the reform has been an extremely important and interesting initiative. As States, we provide our contribution to the reflection for the application of the Heads of State’s decisions in this regard.”
“I believe that the AU Extraordinary Summit, planned in Kigali (Rwanda) on the African Continental Free Trade Area will be an outcome of the so-awaited-for African integration.”
