EU to reduce slash Burundi peacekeeper funding
The European Union plans to reduce funding for Burundi’s peacekeeping force.
European diplomats are quoted as saying that the EU is considering reducing funding for the East African nation’s lucrative peacekeeping force deployed in Somalia as a way of putting pressure on the country’s president Pierre Nkurunziza.
Reuters reports the diplomats to say that the money would no longer be channelled through the government.
The international community is pushing for Nkurunziza to enter talks with his country’s opposition to avert a full-scale conflict.
The 20% kept by the state, worth about $13m (£9m) a year, would be cut.
More than 5,000 Burundian soldiers serve in the 22,000-strong African Union force in Somalia.