24 August 2017
African Union Chairperson
H.E. Moussa Faki Mahamat
African Union Headquarters
P.O. Box 3243
Roosvelt Street (Old Airport Area) |
W21K19 | Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Your Excellency,
Africa-Israel summit ‘justifies colonialism, apartheid’
You are aware that in less than two months, an October summit between the illegal state of Israel and countries in Africa will be held in Togo. We believe this is an insensitive and a miscalculated move by Togo’s President. He has equally been rejecting calls by various quarters to scrap the event.
First and foremost, this summit should not have been conceived, with Israel considering the number of blatant violations of Human Rights it has done and is doing. Hence we called the African Union under your stewardship to press for the boycott of the summit on the basis that establishing relations with an “apartheid state” and condoning its actions against the occupied Palestinian people comes in violation of various UN conventions.
You might also be aware that, a number of African countries including South Africa have decided to pull out from the event. The South African newspaper The Citizen last week quoted Sean Benfeldt, the country’s ambassador to Lebanon and Syria as telling a delegation of the Popular Conference of Palestinians Abroad that Pretoria will not take part in the event which he described as a step to normalize relations between Africa and an “occupation state.”
According to the report, “the South African ambassador highlighted what he believed was Israel’s inhumane blockade of the Gaza Strip, stressing the need for practical solutions to the humanitarian suffering of the population in the besieged territory. Benfeldt also adopted the delegation’s proposal to invite ambassadors of African countries in Lebanon to a special meeting soon to talk about the summit with Israel and the need to boycott it.
In addition to South Africa, Al Jazeera also reported several other African countries – including Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Mauritania – have decided to boycott the summit.
In a nutshell, we believe African countries, which fought colonialism for decades and became free after a long-suffering should never associate their countries with the only, longest and most brutal colonial project in the world today. Therefore, in the name of justice and freedom and in the name of the African legacy of long struggle for freedom, we urge AU to lobby its members to disassociate from Israel’s Apartheid regime and the conference in Togo, this coming October 2017.
We do hope the argument that has been put forth does resonate with your conscience.
We trust your good office will get back to us on this matter, the soonest.
Your Faithfully
Signed
…………………..
S.M Mohammed Idris
Chairman
Citizens International
