Yet there is an ominous silence from the 55-member continental organisation.

The AU echoes the United Nations in making clear its fears about the Libyan conflict becoming proxy war.

It’s failure to condemn Egypt taking the North African state down that road undermines AU credibility and certainly makes a nonsense of the grouping’s major goal of silencing the guns.

African leaders are behaving like their predecessors who took too far their reluctance to interfere in the internal affairs of their peers.

Two decades ago, having sat on their hands during the Rwandan genocide, African leaders resolved never to allow a repeat of such a shameful occurrence.

Since the fall of dictator Muammar Gadaffi in 2011, Libya has been the biggest mess the AU has had to contend with.

The country has become armoury for conflict in the region and beyond.

Its potential oil wealth has been ruined by the conflict and instability.

Nevertheless that oil attracts the unwanted attention of Russia, Turkey and Egypt all of whom hold the  lethally misguided belief that Libya represents their strategic interest.

The most dramatic illustration of this is Egypt’s parliament voting to allow President Abdel Fattah El Sisi to take the country to war over Libya.

The temerity of El Sisi warning the United Nations-backed Libyan Government of National Accord not to attempt to regain control of Sirte is staggering.

A credible government must perforce control the port city at the centre of Libya which is the country’s oil export terminal and gateway it oil fields. The GNA has mounted the ironically named Operation Peace Storm to ensure this.

Egypt backs the rebel force of Khalifa Haftar who are making a last ditch stand at Sirte having been driven out of the capital Tripoli to the west.

Haftar also enjoys the backing of the United Arab Emirates and Russia, which this week shipped mercenaries and air defense systems to the rebels. 

France, which takes more than a passing interest in developments across the Mediterranean, has despatched the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaul to lie off Sirte.

Turkey, determined to be player in this game, has provided both troops and arms to the GNA led by Fayez Al Sarraj.

Small wonder the United Nations Secretary General António Guterres has repeatedly expressed concern about the developing proxy war in Libya.

Western powers have also been involved in attempts to get the belligerents around the negotiating table, causing the AU to complain about being iced out of peace efforts in one of its member states.

Surely African leaders must accept that their silence about Egyptian interference in Libya rather disqualifies them from achieving an African solution to this particular African problem.

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A director of the UN human rights office known as OHCHA refers to South Africa’s heavy handed, highly militarized enforcement of the stay-at home directive.OHB

Briefing journalists, OHCHA’s director of field operations Georgette Gagnon says from South Africa to the Philippines, from Hungary to Jordan abuses in enforcing the lockdown appear to transgress basic key freedoms.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet warns that emergency powers should not be used as a weapon to quash dissent, control the population or perpetuate time in power. 

Last week UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres urged governments to realize the coronavirus is the enemy, not the people.

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They say they’re echoing the call by United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

The ceasefire call comes from French Foreign Minister Yves le Drian and his counterparts from Germany  Heiko Maas and Italy Luigi Di Mayo.

EU foreign policy chief Joseph Borrell has endorsed the call which was spurred by the refusal of Tripoli’s  Government of National Accord led by Fayez Al Sarraj to accept an EU blockade of Libya to enforce the United Nations arms embargo.

The government, which is backed by the UN, says the naval action has failed to stop weapons getting through to rebels led by Khalifa Haftar who are bent on occupying the capital. 

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The statement from Pretoria calls on Morocco and the Saharawi liberation movement POLISARIO to observe the ceasefire called by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres during the pandemic.

The hard-hitting South African statement calls Western Sahara Africa’s last case of colonialism.

It points out that the International Court of Justice has ruled that Morocco is an illegal occupying force in the territory abandoned by Spain.

The South African position, says the statement, is driven by its opposition to the occupation, its determination to see decolonisation and its concern for human rights 

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Traditional differences between China, Russia and the three Western powers has paralyzed the world organizations top body on dealing with one of the greatest challenges in its history.

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French Ambassador Aurelien Lechevallier told journalists in Pretoria that France agrees with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres that COVID19 poses a threat to world peace and should get attention from the Security Council.

France believes the crisis calls for unity rather than playing the blame game about where COVID19 originated

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The jury remains out on whether the African Union’s determination to silence the guns this year will be actualised.

Anglophone rebels of the Southern Cameroons Defence Force have agreed for humanitarian reasons to lay down their arms while the battle rages against COVID 19.

The larger Ambazonia Defence Force has yet to say it is calling off its three-year insurgency.

In Mozambique the Islamist separatists in the gas-rich northern province of Cabo Delgado have got even tougher.

In the past week they have raided two towns, sending residence fleeing in boats to the provincial capital Pemba.

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He describes the pandemic as the common enemy and a threat to all mankind.

Antonio Guterres has instructed the UN Secretary General’s special envoys in every conflict zone to work for a global ceasefire.

This is ahead of a $2-billion appeal he’s making to stop the pandemic spreading into refugee camps caused by fighting around the world.

Libya is leading by example.

The UN-backed Government of National Accord and the Russian-backed rebels led by Khalifa Haftar have agreed to a ceasefire to allow the medics to fight CORONA 19

Guterres says he hopes the ceasefire will become immediate and permanent.

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The gathering in Madrid is being seen seen by environmental analysts as activists as a wasted opportunity.

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres says he’s disappointed with the outcome of COP25 that went into two extra days and nights.

Exhausted delegates could only agree that  new pledges on the key question of curbing carbon emissions will have to be on the table by the next climate summit in Glasgow next year.

They could ntw agree on carbon markets and on closing the gap between what scientists say is necessary to avoid a global crisis and the status quo which will see the world pass the threshold in the next decade.

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He tells the climate summit in New York that mankind has the tools and technology  to win the contest.

The UN chief urged world leaders to leave their beautiful speeches at home and come to the climate summit in New York with concrete plans.

Antonio Guterres says his generation has failed in its obligation to protect the planet.

However he does not  despair.

Young people,  above all young people, are here providing solutions and insisting on accountability and demanding urgent action. They are right,” he says

Guterres says the climate crisis is caused by us and the solution must come from us.

Irrefutable science teaches us that it is not too late to limit warming but it will require fundamental transformation in all aspects of society.

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As more details follow the international condemnation of the air strike on migrants being held in Libya, it has emerged that guards fired on refugees trying to escape the carnage.

At least 170 people have been hurt in what UN envoy to Libya Ghassan Salame says is probably a war crime.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has deplored the attack and called for an independent investigation with a view to bringing the culprits to book.

Militia fighting for warlord Khalifa Hafar have been blamed for the incident.

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